Chapter IV, Escape to Islip Summary and Analysis

The twentieth century has been the American century. But the irony is that the buildings that represent American are distinctly un-American. American architecture does not express the manifestation of its exuberance, power or even high spirits. The Babylon of capitalism is constructed from worker housing. Sometimes worker housing was build for workers, known as public housing projects, but workers managed to stay out of them, calling them "the projects." Many went to the suburbs, going to places like Islip, Long Island. The houses in these areas are as un-Bauhausian as they could be. The worker-housing interiors are glum and uncomfortable; the suburban house is quite the opposite.

Today the furniture of the Bauhaus architects is available only through decorators. Again, ironically, the workers' furniture is solely the province of the rich, the property...