Gender and architecture

This essay discusses how gender still affects modern architecture design. In the very early state, architecture reflected feminine and masculine mostly on its form. In modern times, architecture avoids any exterior form of gender. Modern architecture is degendered. However, gender influences architecture in inevitable ways. Simone de Beauvoir said in her The Second Sex, One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman.  Femininity is an artifact of civilization. Women is gradually shaped by the man-dominated society and was told to be secondary and passive. Modern architecture pursues functionalism and thinks making even spaces could avoid any discussion of gender. Degendered space is not a neutral or unbiased space. In a lingual context, words like architect, steel, concrete and screw are masculine, and tearoom, kitchen and nursery are feminine. Are these words born to be masculine or feminine? Are they biased as well? Female architects will also be discussed, mostly about their gender as one of the valuable elements in their design. Such as Kazuyo Sejima compares to her teacher Toyo Ito, and Charlotte Perriand to her mentor Le Corbusier. In Sejimas design, it is seemingly floating and fragile at the first glance but it is strong and functional in reality. Perriand furnished modernity by her keen observation and vision of the world and its cultural and artistic expression. Degendered architecture is never enough. This essay will conclude with a discussion of what to take to make gender-neutral and truly humane, artistic space.