Venturi, Robert, Denise Scott Brown, and Steven Izenour. Learning from Las Vegas: The Forgotten Symbolism of Architectural Form. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1977
. This work, as a call to reinvigorate architectural design with symbolic content, advocates the study of the commercial strip and in particular, the role that signs play in conveying meaning and providing order to the landscape. The study begins with a discussion of an architectural studio project conducted at Yale in 1968. The mission of the studio was to document and analyze the physical form of Las Vegas in order to learn from contemporary urban sprawl. During the process, the studio attempted to develop a set of graphic methods for analyzing and representing the commercial strip. To augment the results of this study, the authors utilize examples of Gothic, Renaissance and Modern architecture (including the authors' own design work) to illustrate the terms "duck"and "decorated shed" which, it is suggested, represent two conflicting ways which forms can convey meaning. As advocates of the "decorated shed," the authors propose that by studying and adopting the tactics of commercial strip buildings and signs, architects could enrich the symbolic content of post-modern architecture. When initially published, this book was considered groundbreaking and was extremely influential to the postmodern movement, although to a contemporary student of cultural landscapes, this work may seem limited in scope due to its reliance on formal analysis. [P. Schwab]