Updated on: 24 October 2026
The main architectural styles, in chronological order, are Classical, Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Rococo, Neoclassical, Victorian, Art Nouveau, Art Deco, Modern, Brutalist, Postmodern and Contemporary. Each reflects the values, materials and building techniques of its era, from the symmetry of Greek temples to the steel and glass of modern towers. Types of architecture are grouped in two ways: by style (how a building looks and when it was built) and by function (what it is for).
Below you will find a timeline table and then each of the 14 styles with its dates, key features and a famous building, followed by other styles and movements, the types of architecture by function, regional and American styles, a guide to identifying a style and a way to try one on your own design.
What Is an Architectural Style?
An architectural style is a unique approach to building design that reflects the culture, technology, and creativity of its time. It shapes how we experience spaces through form, proportion, and materials.
Architectural styles evolve with geography, climate, and innovation. Gothic cathedrals reached for the heavens with stained glass and stone arches, while Japanese Minimalism embraced balance, light, and nature.
Style, movement and type are easy to mix up. A style is the look that a group of buildings shares, such as pointed arches or raw concrete; a movement is the circle of architects and ideas behind it, such as the Bauhaus; a building type is what a building is for, such as a house, an office or a museum. Many 20th-century movements end in “-ism”, which is why people speak of the “isms” of architecture: Modernism, Brutalism, Postmodernism and Deconstructivism.
Architectural Styles in Order: A Timeline
The table lists the 14 main architectural styles in chronological order. Dates are approximate: styles overlapped, and each reached different countries at different times.
Style | When | Look for | Famous example |
|---|---|---|---|
Classical | From about 700 BCE in Greece, then Rome | Columns, pediments and symmetry; Roman arches, vaults and domes | Parthenon, Athens (447–432 BCE) |
Romanesque | About the 10th to the early 13th century | Round arches, thick walls, small windows | Santiago de Compostela Cathedral (begun 1075, consecrated 1211) |
Gothic | From the 1140s, starting near Paris | Pointed arches, rib vaults, buttresses, stained glass | Basilica of Saint-Denis, east end (1140–1144) |
Renaissance | About 1420 to 1600, starting in Florence | Classical orders, symmetry, proportion, domes | Florence Cathedral dome (from 1420) |
Baroque | About 1600 to the mid-18th century, starting in Rome | Curves, movement, dramatic light, gilding | St. Peter's Square colonnade, Rome (1656–1667) |
Rococo | 1720s to about the 1760s, starting in Paris | Asymmetric shell ornament, pastels with gold, mirrors | Amalienburg, Munich (1734–1739) |
Neoclassical | Mid-18th century, dominant by the 1760s | Temple fronts, columns, pediments, restraint | Panthéon, Paris (1764–1790) |
Victorian | 1837–1901, Britain | Revival styles, iron and glass, terracotta | Natural History Museum, London (1873–1880) |
Art Nouveau | 1890s to the First World War | Flowing lines and plant forms | Guimard's Paris Métro entrances |
Art Deco | 1920s and 1930s | Stepped facades, zigzags, geometric ornament | Empire State Building, New York (1930–1931) |
Modern | From the early 20th century | No ornament, flat roofs, white walls, large windows | Villa Savoye, Poissy (1928–1931) |
Brutalist | 1950s to 1970s | Raw concrete, heavy block-like forms | Unité d'habitation, Marseille (1945–1952) |
Postmodern | Late 20th century | Classical motifs used with color and irony | Portland Building, Oregon (1982) |
Contemporary | Late 20th century to today | No single style: exposed structure, warped planes, parametric curves | Centre Pompidou, Paris (opened 1977) |
The 14 Major Architectural Styles
Each of the 14 styles below gets its dates, what to look for and a famous example, with a link to our full guide to the style; our list of famous architects covers many of the people behind them. Together they trace the main line of Western architecture; the regional section further down covers other traditions.
1. Classical Architecture
Classical architecture began in ancient Greece around 700 BCE and spread across the Roman world. The Greeks sought harmony and proportion in marble temples built on columns and pediments, as in the Parthenon in Athens (447–432 BCE); the Romans advanced engineering with arches, vaults, domes and concrete, as in the Pantheon in Rome, rebuilt under Hadrian in about 118–125 CE. Our guide to Classical architecture covers the orders and the differences between Greek and Roman building.
2. Romanesque Architecture
Romanesque architecture spread across Western and Central Europe from roughly the 10th to the early 13th century, at its peak in the 11th and 12th. Its churches emphasize solidity: thick stone walls, massive piers, round arches, barrel or groin vaults and small windows. The pilgrimage Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, begun in 1075 and consecrated in 1211, is a famous example; our guide to Romanesque architecture covers many more.
3. Gothic Architecture
Gothic architecture began in the 1140s at the abbey church of Saint-Denis near Paris, where Abbot Suger had a new east end built from 1140 to 1144; the Basilica of Saint-Denis calls itself the cradle of Gothic art. Gothic cathedrals soared with ribbed vaults and stained glass, symbolizing divine light: rib vaults, buttresses and finer stone-cutting let the walls rise higher and open into large windows. From the 13th century this new way of building was known as the French art; the name Gothic came later, in 16th-century Italy, as a term of contempt. Our guide to Gothic architecture explains the style in depth.
4. Renaissance Architecture
Renaissance architecture began in Florence around 1420 and lasted in Italy until about 1600. The Renaissance revived classical ideals, emphasizing symmetry, perspective and mathematical precision, with columns, round arches and domes: Filippo Brunelleschi's Ospedale degli Innocenti (begun in 1419) and his dome for Florence Cathedral (from 1420) mark its start. The style then spread across Europe, as our guide to Renaissance architecture shows.
5. Baroque Architecture
Baroque architecture began in Rome in the late 16th century and flourished from about 1600 to the middle of the 18th, driven by the Counter-Reformation Church and absolute monarchs. Baroque design added movement, light and emotional intensity, seen in richly ornamented churches and palaces: Gian Lorenzo Bernini's colonnade around St. Peter's Square in Rome (1656–1667) and Jules Hardouin-Mansart's Hall of Mirrors at Versailles (1678–1684) are famous examples. More in our guide to Baroque architecture.
6. Rococo Architecture
Rococo grew out of the late Baroque in Paris in the 1720s and 1730s, after the death of Louis XIV in 1715, and lasted to about the 1760s. It is above all a style of interiors: asymmetric shell-like ornament called rocaille, S- and C-shaped curves, pastels with gold, mirrors and carved paneling, as in François de Cuvilliés' Amalienburg pavilion in Munich (1734–1739). Read more in our guide to Rococo architecture.
7. Neoclassical Architecture
Neoclassical architecture turned back to the order and proportion of ancient Greece and Rome, partly in reaction against Rococo ornament, and was dominant by the 1760s. Look for temple fronts, columns, pediments, symmetry and plain wall surfaces, as in Ange-Jacques Gabriel's Petit Trianon at Versailles (1758–1768), which the palace calls a blueprint for the neoclassical movement, and the Panthéon in Paris (1764–1790). Classical revivals went on into the 20th century, as the American table below shows; our guide to Neoclassicism covers the style in depth.
8. Victorian Architecture
Victorian architecture is named after the reign of Queen Victoria (1837–1901). As Historic England notes, no single style gained supremacy: Gothic Revival, Italianate and Neoclassical buildings went up side by side, while railways, iron, plate glass and terracotta changed what could be built. Alfred Waterhouse's terracotta-clad Natural History Museum in London (1873–1880) and the iron-and-glass Palm House at Kew (1844–1848) show both sides; our guide to Victorian architecture explains the style in depth.
9. Art Nouveau Architecture
Art Nouveau is an international style that emerged in the 1890s, characterized by sinuous lines and flowing organic shapes based on plant forms, as Tate describes it. The Paris Exposition Universelle of 1900 brought it to a wider audience; Guimard's Paris Métro entrances and Charles Rennie Mackintosh's Glasgow School of Art are key examples, and the First World War brought it to an end. In Spain it is called modernismo, and Antoni Gaudí, who took over Barcelona's Sagrada Família in 1883, is its leading exponent. More in our guide to Art Nouveau architecture.
10. Art Deco Architecture
Art Deco is a design style of the 1920s and 1930s with a geometric character, named after the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts held in Paris in 1925. In architecture, look for stepped facades, zigzags, a strong vertical emphasis and stylized ornament, often on cinemas, hotels and skyscrapers. The Empire State Building in New York, an Art Deco skyscraper begun on March 17, 1930 and opened on May 1, 1931, is a famous example; see our guide to Art Deco architecture.
11. Modern Architecture: Bauhaus and the International Style
Modern architecture, from the early 20th century, rejected ornament in favor of function, clear structure and new materials such as steel, glass and reinforced concrete. The Bauhaus, the school Walter Gropius founded in Weimar in 1919, moved to Dessau in 1925–26 and was closed in 1933 (see our guide to Bauhaus architecture); in 1932 an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York named the International Style, whose buildings were, as Tate puts it, mostly rectilinear, undecorated, asymmetrical and white. Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye in Poissy, near Paris (1928–1931), is a textbook example; our guide to modern architecture goes further.
12. Brutalist Architecture
Brutalism is an architectural style of the 1950s to the 1970s characterized by simple, block-like forms and raw concrete. The name comes from béton brut, French for raw concrete, which Le Corbusier left exposed at his Unité d'habitation in Marseille (1945–1952); the British critic Reyner Banham coined the term, and London's Hayward Gallery and National Theatre are typical examples. For a present-day take, see this Brutalist office on a city plaza in our exterior style library, or read our guide to Brutalist architecture.
13. Postmodern Architecture
Postmodernism answered modernism with color, irony and historical reference, turning architecture into a playful dialogue between old and new. It grew in the late 20th century as a reaction against modernism; Tate notes that the term came into use around 1970. Michael Graves's Portland Building in Oregon, constructed in 1982, is in the City of Portland's words an award-winning example of postmodern architecture; our guide to postmodern architecture presents more buildings and architects.
14. Contemporary Architecture
Contemporary architecture is the architecture of the present, from the late 20th century to today, and no single style dominates it. Minimalism emphasizes openness and light; high-tech design puts structure and services on show, as in Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers's Centre Pompidou in Paris (opened in 1977); Deconstructivism, named by a 1988 exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, works with diagonals, arcs and warped planes; and parametric design uses algorithms to create fluid forms, like this parametric wave roof from our style library. Sustainability now runs through all of them; our guide to contemporary architecture goes further.
Try a historic style on your own facade Upload a photo of a house or a building, describe the style, materials and colors for the facade, and ArchiVinci shows the exterior redesigned. A new account starts with 3 free credits. |
More Architectural Styles and Movements
The 14 styles above are the main line, but many others fill the gaps between them. These are the ones you are most likely to meet:
Style or movement | When and where | What to look for |
|---|---|---|
Islamic | Many regions and eras; the Alhambra in Granada was begun in the 13th century and reached its height in the 14th | Geometric patterns, calligraphy, domes, courtyards with water |
Gothic Revival | 19th century; Manchester Town Hall (1868–1877) | Pointed arches and towers on new public buildings and churches |
Beaux-Arts | United States, 1890–1930 | Grand classical compositions, paired colossal columns, statuary, monumental stairs |
Organic architecture and the Prairie style | Frank Lloyd Wright's work in the US; Fallingwater (1936–1937) | Long, low lines and open floor plans; buildings shaped by their site |
Early 20th century, in Europe | Sculptural, symbolic forms instead of boxes | |
Mid-Century Modern | United States, 1950–1979 | Sub-styles from the International Style (no ornament, expansive windows, flat roofs) to Brutalism (exposed concrete) |
20th century to today | Few materials, clean lines, open space, natural light | |
From the 1970s; Lloyd's of London (1978–1986) | Exposed structure and services, steel and glass | |
Deconstructivism | Named by MoMA's 1988 exhibition in New York | Diagonals, arcs, warped planes, fractured forms |
Today, with digital design tools | Fluid forms generated by algorithms | |
Every era and region | Local materials and traditions, often without an architect |
Types of Architecture by Function
Types of architecture can also be grouped by what buildings are for. The five groups used most often are residential, commercial, institutional and civic, industrial, and landscape and urban design. A type says nothing about style: a courthouse can be Greek Revival, Beaux-Arts or contemporary.
Residential Architecture
Residential architecture focuses on creating comfortable, functional, and aesthetic living spaces. From suburban homes to minimalist urban apartments, designers experiment with light, space, and sustainable materials. Modern trends like eco-housing and modular design reflect a shift toward efficiency and environmental awareness.
A home's style starts with its plan. To work out yours, draw the rooms in Floor Plan Maker, our free floor plan creator for desktop browsers: each room shows its area as you draw, the plan opens in 3D, and the 3D view can be rendered with a sentence that names the style you want (renders use normal ArchiVinci credits).
Commercial Architecture
Commercial buildings define how we experience modern cities. Skyscrapers, offices, hotels, and retail centers combine functionality with visual identity. Glass façades, open-plan layouts, and smart technologies create flexible spaces that foster productivity and collaboration. In this category, architectural styles evolve rapidly, following brand aesthetics and new business needs.
Institutional and Civic Architecture
Museums, schools, libraries, courthouses and government buildings show a society's values and progress. Institutional design blends practicality with symbolism, balancing public accessibility and architectural presence. A famous example is Frank Lloyd Wright's Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, commissioned in 1943 and opened on October 21, 1959, with a spiral ramp rising to a domed skylight; minimalist university campuses express the same cultural and educational identity more quietly.
Industrial Architecture
Industrial architecture covers factories, warehouses, workshops and power stations: buildings planned first around a process, with long spans, generous daylight and room for machines and loading. Many have since been converted to offices, homes or cultural venues, which keeps their structure while giving it a new use.
Landscape Architecture and Urban Design
Landscape architecture shapes the open space around and between buildings, from gardens and parks to squares, while urban design arranges streets, blocks and public spaces at the scale of a neighborhood or a city. To test ideas on your own site, our AI landscape design page shows how to redesign a yard or garden from a photo of it, and the AI urban design page does the same for site plans, massing models and aerial views.
Regional and Cultural Styles Around the World
Architecture is a reflection of place. Each region has developed its own architectural identity, shaped by climate, resources, religion, and culture. These styles form the foundation of what we call world architecture, blending tradition with innovation.
European Architecture
Europe’s architectural journey spans from ancient Greek and Roman temples to Gothic cathedrals and Renaissance palaces. Northern regions favored steep roofs and wood structures, while Mediterranean architecture embraced stone, arches and courtyards to balance light and heat, as in this Mediterranean courtyard house from our exterior style library. In modern Europe, movements like Scandinavian Minimalism and Brutalism highlight simplicity, structure and honesty in materials.
Asian Architecture
Asian architecture is deeply rooted in philosophy and harmony. Japanese design values simplicity, natural materials and a close bond with the garden, as in this Japanese garden house with a koi pond from our style library, while Chinese imperial architecture emphasizes symmetry and hierarchy. In India, the Dravidian temples of the south rise in stepped towers, while Mughal buildings are known for their domes. Across Asia, architects continue to merge tradition with contemporary design, creating spaces that honor balance and serenity.
Middle Eastern and African Architecture
The Middle East and North Africa are home to some of the world’s most intricate Islamic architecture, with geometric patterns, calligraphy, domes and courtyards designed for both beauty and climate control; in Spain, the Alhambra in Granada, begun under the founder of the Nasrid dynasty in the 13th century, reached its full splendor in the second half of the 14th. In Africa, Nubian and Moroccan architecture shows earthen materials, bold colors and organic forms, and architects such as Diébédo Francis Kéré, born in Burkina Faso in 1965 and the 2022 Pritzker Prize laureate, combine local materials with modern engineering, starting with his Gando Primary School (2001).
American and Latin American Architecture
The Americas bring a rich mix of indigenous, colonial and modern influences. In the United States, revival styles echoed European traditions, from Colonial Revival (1900–1940) and Mission Revival to Spanish Colonial Revival (1915–1940), with its stucco walls and red tile roofs, while Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie-style buildings, known for their long, low structures and open floor plans, became what the Guggenheim calls the first uniquely American mode of architecture. In Latin America, architecture thrives on color, rhythm and community: the work of Mexico's Luis Barragán (1902–1988), the 1980 Pritzker Prize laureate, has been called minimalist but is, in the prize's words, sumptuous in color and texture.
American Architectural Styles by Period
Many American buildings and houses follow these styles. The US General Services Administration (GSA) dates them as follows for its historic federal buildings; Colonial Revival, for one, was used mostly for homes.
Style | Years | What to look for |
|---|---|---|
Federal | 1780–1830 | Symmetry, elliptical fanlights over paneled front doors, Palladian windows |
Greek Revival | 1820–1860 | Temple fronts, classical columns, wide entablatures |
Italianate | 1840–1880 | Low-pitched roofs with projecting eaves on brackets, tall first-floor windows |
Romanesque Revival | 1840–1900 | Single-color masonry, round-arched openings, square towers |
Renaissance Revival | 1840–1925 | Symmetry, a different window treatment on each floor, roofline balustrades |
Second Empire | 1860–1890 | Double-pitched mansard roofs, brackets, paired windows |
Beaux Arts Classicism | 1890–1930 | Grand compositions, paired colossal columns, statuary, monumental stairs |
Neoclassicism | 1900–1940 | Pedimented porticos with colossal columns, symmetry, little ornament |
Colonial Revival | 1900–1940 | Brick, symmetrical facades, centered doors with fanlights or pediments |
Spanish Colonial Revival | 1915–1940 | Stucco, red tile roofs, arches and arcades, iron railings |
Art Deco and Moderne | 1925–1945 | Stepped facades and zigzags; Moderne: rounded corners and bands of windows |
Mid-Century Modernism | 1950–1979 | International Style: no ornament, expansive windows, flat roofs; Brutalism: exposed concrete |
How to Identify an Architectural Style
Recognizing an architectural style requires more than familiarity. It involves observing proportions, materials, geometry, and the emotional tone a space creates. Every detail, from rooflines to window frames, reveals clues about its origin, philosophy, and function.
Start with the features that change least: the roof, the arches and openings, the main material and the ornament. This table pairs common clues with the style they usually point to:
If you see | It is probably |
|---|---|
Pointed arches, rib vaults and large stained-glass windows | Gothic, or Gothic Revival on a 19th-century building |
Round arches, thick walls and small windows | Romanesque, or Romanesque Revival |
A temple front with columns and a pediment | Classical, Neoclassical or Greek Revival |
Curves, gilding, painted ceilings and dramatic light | Baroque |
A double-pitched mansard roof | Second Empire |
Wide eaves on brackets and a low-pitched roof | Italianate |
Flowing lines based on plants | Art Nouveau |
Stepped facades, zigzags and stylized geometric ornament | Art Deco |
A flat roof, white walls, large windows and no ornament | Modern or International Style |
Raw concrete in heavy, block-like forms | Brutalist |
Classical motifs in bold colors, used with irony | Postmodern |
Structure and services on the outside | High-Tech |
Diagonals, arcs and warped planes | Deconstructivist |
Long, low lines and an open floor plan | Prairie style |
Stucco walls, red tile roofs and arches | Spanish Colonial Revival |
Architects analyze form, structure, and material composition to understand a building’s character. The simplicity of Modernism contrasts with the ornamentation of Baroque or the balance of Neoclassical architecture. In contemporary work, designers often merge historical references with minimalism, resulting in new creative expressions.
With the rise of AI in architecture, you can also test a style before you commit to it. ArchiVinci does not name a style for you, but it lets you try one: upload a photo, a sketch or a model view, describe the style and its materials in a sentence, and it generates a new image that follows your upload, in seconds.
Understanding styles in modern design means reading architecture as a visual language that connects history, innovation, and imagination.
Try different architectural styles on one design Upload a sketch or a massing view, name the style and the materials in a sentence, and ArchiVinci renders a photorealistic version that follows your image. A new account starts with 3 free credits. |
How to Try an Architectural Style on Your Own Design
ArchiVinci has no style menu: you name the style in a sentence. Upload a photo of a house or a facade to the Exterior module, presented on our AI exterior design page, or a photo of a room to the Interior module (AI interior design); for a sketch or a model view of a new design, start from our AI render generator. Each run generates a new photorealistic image that follows your upload, in seconds, often ready for a presentation. Two more ways to start:
To restyle a render or a photo: AI style transfer
For architecture concepts: AI rendering for architecture
Name the style together with the materials and details that define it. For example:
You have | Module | What to write |
|---|---|---|
A photo of a house | Exterior | "Victorian house with red brick walls, a bay window, white trim and a slate roof" |
A photo of a room | Interior | "Art Deco living room with black lacquer, brass details and a geometric rug" |
A sketch or model view of a building | Exterior | "Neoclassical villa with a temple front, white stucco walls and tall sash windows" |
A render you want in another style | Edit | "Restyle this facade as brutalist architecture: exposed board-formed concrete and deep window reveals" |
Left: the uploaded picture of a two-story house without materials. Right: the result in the Exterior module on the default engine, with the Daylight button and the prompt "Modern house with white plaster walls, timber cladding on the upper floor, large glass openings, a lawn and a few trees."
You need an account; a new account starts with 3 free credits. Uploads: JPG, PNG or WebP, up to 5 MB. The default engine is asked to keep your perspective and geometry, an instruction to an AI model rather than a lock, so check details such as windows and moldings; with a plan, you can run a view again as often as you need. Commercial use of the images needs an active plan; plans are on the pricing page.
For ideas, browse our exterior style library and interior style library: each example image comes with a written description you can adapt.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the different architectural styles in order?
In chronological order, the main styles are Classical (from about 700 BCE), Romanesque (about the 10th to the early 13th century), Gothic (from the 1140s), Renaissance (about 1420–1600), Baroque (about 1600 to the mid-18th century), Rococo (1720s to 1760s), Neoclassical (dominant by the 1760s), Victorian (1837–1901), Art Nouveau (1890s to the First World War), Art Deco (1920s and 1930s), Modern (from the early 20th century), Brutalist (1950s to 1970s), Postmodern (late 20th century) and Contemporary (today). The dates overlap, and each style reached different countries at different times.
How many types of architecture are there?
There is no fixed number. By function, architecture is usually divided into five types: residential, commercial, institutional and civic, industrial, and landscape and urban design. By style there are dozens, depending on how finely you divide them; this guide covers 14 main styles and 11 more styles and movements.
What are the three elements of architecture?
The classic answer comes from the Roman architect Vitruvius, who wrote in the first book of his treatise on architecture that all buildings should possess strength, utility and beauty (English translation on LacusCurtius). As he explains, strength comes from sound foundations and well-chosen materials, utility from a sensible arrangement of the parts, and beauty from a pleasing whole whose parts are duly proportioned.
What is the difference between Renaissance and Neoclassical architecture?
Both revived the architecture of ancient Greece and Rome, but more than three centuries apart. The Renaissance began in Florence around 1420 and adapted classical orders, round arches and domes to churches and palaces, as in Brunelleschi's dome for Florence Cathedral; Neoclassicism, dominant by the 1760s, turned to ancient buildings as models of order and proportion, partly in reaction against Rococo ornament, as in the Panthéon in Paris (1764–1790).
What is the difference between Gothic and Baroque architecture?
More than four centuries separate them. Gothic began in France in the 1140s and reaches upward, with pointed arches, rib vaults, buttresses and large stained-glass windows that fill the interior with colored light. Baroque began in Rome around 1600 and uses curves, movement, dramatic light and rich decoration to stir emotion in churches and palaces.
What architectural style are we in now?
Today's architecture is called contemporary architecture, and no single style dominates it: minimalist, high-tech, deconstructivist and parametric buildings stand side by side with buildings rooted in local traditions. Sustainability runs through all of them as an approach rather than a style of its own.
How do climate and geography influence architectural styles?
Climate affects materials, roof shapes, and window orientation. Warm regions use open courtyards and natural ventilation, while colder climates favor insulation and compact layouts.
How has technology changed modern architectural styles?
Digital modeling, AI visualization, and parametric design have transformed how architects visualize and build. Modern styles now merge creativity with efficiency, sustainability, and precision.
What makes contemporary architecture different from modern architecture?
Modern architecture values simplicity and function, while contemporary architecture adapts to current materials, technologies, and sustainability trends, emphasizing flexibility and innovation.
How do architects mix multiple styles in one design?
Through adaptive reuse and hybrid design approaches, architects combine historical references with modern techniques, balancing contrast, context, and coherence.
Is sustainable architecture a new architectural style?
Not in the usual sense. Sustainable architecture prioritizes eco-friendly materials, energy efficiency and harmony with the environment, but it can shape a building in any style, from a vernacular house to a parametric tower. It is better described as a design philosophy and a defining feature of 21st-century architecture than as a style of its own.