Constructive craft and contested regionalities

Journal article

The methodologies of Critical Regionalism have problematized antiquarian and chauvinist narratives around vernacular building cultures. However, assessment of the agency of anonymous local makers’ craft skills within the construction of the built environment remains neglected within these frameworks centred upon celebrated architects. This special issue explores how the skills and labor of constructive crafts people transform metal, stone and wood into built structures which embody both local particularities and global entanglements within Critical Regionalism. The geopolitical contexts in play across the articles in this special issue are diverse, but interrelated in their attention to marginalised regions and makers: from enslaved and indentured labor in public works and archives in the Southern United States and colonial Lusophone Africa (Cabo Verde) to rural craft builders in nineteenth-century Zakopane (now modern-day Poland) and the Highlands of contemporary Scotland. Analysis of the representations in words and images of these building cultures and traces of their overlooked makers through the lens of Critical Regionalism opens up fresh questions about locating craft. Our reassessments of the multivalent agency of constructive practices recalibrates architect-centred lenses of Critical Regionalism to engage with contested regionalities recuperated through craft histories.

Authors: O'Mahony, CIR

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Journal: Journal of Modern Craft
• Volume: 18
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 1-16
• Publication date: 2025-11-17
• Acceptance date: 2025-09-11
• DOI: 10.1080/17496772.2025.2560722
• EISSN: 1749-6780
• ISSN: 1749-6772
• Language: English
• Keywords: hedger; critical regionalism; construction; craft; geopolitics; glocal; dry stone wall; representation