Cardillo

architecture

Postmodern Cafe

London,

Project for the commissioned by Wallpaper* editor-at-large Suzanne Trocmé London Design Festival entrance to the Victoria & Albert Museum exhibition ‘Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970–90’

Postmodern Cafe

Interpretation

Less is more. — Ludwig Mies van der Rohe

Less is bore. — Robert Venturi

Mies + Venturi. Modern in plan and ‘Post’ in elevation, Postmodern Cafe is a divertissement, a quest between Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Robert Venturi.

Urban baroque strategy. Two façades capture glances across the V&A’s 1970s Exhibition Road hall.

Symmetry and negation. Although symmetrical, they are perceived from diagonal points of view. The front view seems to be denied by the pathway.

Inflection. On the façades, figures converge toward the centre. Though symmetrical overall, each side is unequal.

Archetypes. Like huge frescoes, the façades recall the pre-modern bond between painting and architecture. Vinyl graffiti refigure themes of Tympanum and Arch: two contrapositive triangles in a Suprematistic broken tympanum and a stretched arc framing a shard of the Aston Webb screen behind.

Stripes. Crossing the space, there are stripes everywhere, evoking ephemeral structure on a shoreline and retroactive presages close to Gio Ponti and Postmodernism: Art is fluid. Although categorised, it escapes boundaries.

Victoria and Albert Museum Exhibition Road Screen

London Design Festival 2011 exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum. Aston Webb, Exhibition Road Screen, Victoria & Albert Museum, London, 1909, demolished in 2014. Photography: Antonino Cardillo, 2011

References

  • , ‘On restraint in design’, The New York Herald Tribune, New York, 28 June 1959.
  • , Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1966.

Data

  • Time: July–Sept. 2011 (design)
  • Venue: Victoria & Albert Museum, Exhibition Rd, South Kensington, London, UK
  • Area: 250 m²
  • Typology: reception/bar
Postmodern Cafe
Postmodern Cafe
Postmodern Cafe
Postmodern Cafe
Postmodern Cafe

Credits

  • Architecture: Antonino Cardillo
  • Client: London Design Festival (via Suzanne Trocmé; director: Ben Evans; deputy director: William Knight; project manager: Ruth Dillon; festival assistant: Siobhan Henderson and Enis Karavil; consultant curator: Suzanne Trocmé; head at the V&A: Victoria Broackes; officier at the V&A: Sophie Reynolds)
  • Graphic, text: Antonino Cardillo
  • Translation: Charles Searson

Anthology

2011

Style and subversion

To complement the V&A’s keynote exhibition ‘Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970–90’, the LDF invites you to the specially commissioned Postmodern Cafe, designed by architect Antonino Cardillo.

The London Design Festival 2011, London, Sept. 2011, p. 183. (en)

Exhibition

2011

The London Design Festival 2011

Suzanne Trocmé (cur.)

Curator Suzanne Trocmé published the Postmodern Cafe project for the keynote exhibition of the V&A ‘Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970–90’ on the guide The London Design Festival 2011.

Victoria & Albert Museum, London, –.

Publications

2011