A new architectural movement is sweeping across the globe as brutalism, the polarizing concrete-heavy style that dominated the mid-20th century, experiences an unexpected revival. This contemporary iteration, dubbed "neobrutalism," is being championed by a new generation of architects who are adapting the raw, uncompromising aesthetic to address modern challenges while reflecting society's growing desire for authentic, tangible experiences in an increasingly digital world.
The resurgence isn't without controversy. When Berlin's infamous Mäusebunker building was saved from demolition in 2023 following a petition signed by ten thousand people, the local right-wing tabloid B.Z. ran a provocative headline calling it "Berlin's Ugliest Building Now Heritage Protected." Yet despite such criticism, remarkable developments are occurring in contemporary architecture worldwide, with new projects embracing the brutalist approaches that flourished from the 1950s through 1970s.
Buildings like the Universidad de Ingeniería y Tecnología (UTEC) in Lima, completed in 2015, immediately evoke the bold designs of half a century ago with their raw materials, exposed structures, legible arrangements, and sculptural forms. Similarly impressive examples include the Nubuke Foundation building in Accra, Ghana, and various projects across Southeast Asia and Latin America that demonstrate how brutalist principles are being reinterpreted for contemporary needs.
When architects discuss their work, they often express admiration for historical brutalist masters like Le Corbusier, particularly his radically brutalist La Tourette monastery in France. However, most don't view their own architecture as mere references to earlier models, but rather as responses to today's challenges. Their underlying design philosophy, whether conscious or unconscious, resembles historical precedents because similar approaches naturally lead to similar aesthetics.
The core philosophy of neobrutalism centers on creating "honest architecture" that makes structure and function openly visible, intentionally avoiding cladding and plaster to display fundamental building materials. While critics might argue that plastered walls or wooden panels aren't necessarily "dishonest" and can serve important functions like insulation, there's something particularly appealing about displaying the structural bones of a building.
Beyond aesthetic considerations, avoiding industrial building products represents a pragmatic response to growing global resource scarcity. A brick or concrete wall eliminates the need for plaster and paint and ideally doesn't require regular recoating. However, concrete use faces significant criticism, as the cement industry alone accounts for 7 percent of human CO2 emissions, while sand and gravel suitable for concrete are becoming increasingly scarce in many regions.
Industry innovations like climate-neutral cement and recycled or bio-concrete remain largely niche products in advertising brochures, far from transforming the global construction industry. Nevertheless, building planners still find compelling reasons to use conventional reinforced concrete. The construction industry readily employs it even in remote regions, transportation routes are typically shorter compared to other materials, and costs remain lower. Most importantly, no other material offers such free moldability at a comparable price, allowing for bold cantilevers, thin shell constructions, and almost unlimited sculptural possibilities.
When questioned about sustainability, some architects acknowledge the issues but argue that concrete allows for large spaces to be enclosed with minimal material, potentially reducing overall resource consumption. Thicker insulating concrete can eliminate highly specialized wall layers, contributing to hazardous waste reduction. While neobrutalist projects represent only an extremely small fraction of global concrete consumption, their photogenic and popular nature gives them prominent influence on collective visual memory, inevitably serving as models of taste.
The timing of brutalism's revival reflects broader societal trends. Architectural styles always mirror their times, and their aesthetics result from specific ethical stances toward design and construction. In our increasingly virtual, dematerialized, and hypercomplex living environments, there's a growing longing for distinctly physical, tactile, seemingly tangible phenomena – a longing that neobrutalism can satisfy. Just as consumers interested in their breakfast eggs' origins might also want to understand how buildings are planned, what materials they contain, and how they're constructed.
Roughly cast concrete walls bearing construction marks not only show how they were created but reveal and sometimes exaggerate the physical nature of buildings. Where load-bearing structures support heavy beams and cables and pipes are openly laid, the system appears comprehensible. Massive, rough surfaces offer physical experiences that brick or concrete walls provide, seeming less abstract than glass and white-painted surfaces. This neobrutalist approach strikes the same chord as collective fascination with craftsmanship, echoing the Arts and Crafts movement of 150 years ago that promoted nature and craftsmanship as antidotes to threatening rapid industrialization.
A significant difference between historical brutalism and contemporary neobrutalism lies in who commissions the work. Original brutalism was largely a public sector phenomenon, with universities, cultural centers, town halls, infrastructure, and government projects receiving substantial funding while postwar administrations showed surprising openness to experimentation. In contrast, neobrutalism is predominantly a private sector project, with education buildings like UTEC being constructed for private universities and single-family houses becoming central preoccupations of neobrutalist planners, despite their questionable sustainability.
This shift reflects changed priorities under neoliberalism. When Berlin's Hygiene Institute brutalist building received heritage listing, its parent organization, the state-owned hospital Charité, questioned whether contemporary buildings are being designed to merit heritage protection sixty years later. The same question applies to often utilitarian, faceless, price-above-everything projects of recent years, since sustainable construction requires long lifespans.
A fundamental brutalist principle is memorability as an image. When building projects exceed bare minimums, they're more likely to be appreciated, develop identity, and remain well-maintained for thirty, seventy, or one hundred years, continuing to justify the resources used in construction. While neobrutalism is predominantly upscale, privatized architecture, notable exceptions exist, particularly in China, where a new generation of architecture firms benefits from construction booms in cultural centers and rural development projects.
With large budgets, Chinese architects create designs combining sculptural forms with local building craftsmanship and materials. Wang Shu won the prestigious Pritzker Prize in 2012 using these approaches, followed by Liu Jiakun in 2025. Wang Shu's monumental Ningbo Museum features concrete bearing bamboo formwork traces, with other façade parts made from reused bricks from demolished houses. While not directly criticizing massive demolition waves during China's rapid growth, it cleverly probes the issue while anchoring the museum in its surroundings.
Meanwhile, Southeast Asia and Latin America are seeing increasing approaches to social-minded brick architecture. Tropical Space in Vietnam and Mínimo Común in Paraguay create ingenious brickwork structures promoting passive ventilation and cost-effective residential solutions. Mínimo Común's openly visible materials and constructions are specifically designed to encourage copying and self-construction, hoping to reach more people with their approach. Here, architecture theory's concept of "legibility" becomes a practical tool for social advancement.
Despite raw beauty, core criticisms regarding climate efficiency and high resource consumption persist, with growing voices suggesting the approach may soon reach its limits. Switzerland, with its long history of high-end concrete architecture, has seen the majority of recent public competitions won by wood-based designs, some featuring greenwashed cladding, others genuine timber constructions.
One potential path forward involves switching to other materials. Even Reyner Banham, who coined the term "brutalism" in 1955, clarified that it was less about concrete itself. While the term derived from French "béton brut" (raw concrete), it's more about basic concepts, regardless of whether materials are exposed concrete, brick, or rammed earth. Neobrutalist approaches increasingly appear in projects emphasizing ecological sustainability.
The Colegio Reggio in Madrid exemplifies this evolution as a quirky patchwork of glass components, masonry screens, exposed concrete arches, clay walls, and portholes – all radically raw and exposed. These exposed elements provide children with playful approaches to understanding architecture while using 48 percent less material by eliminating cladding and wall layers. Cork insulation has halved energy consumption, suggesting possibilities for "ecobrutalism" that renews the style from within.
These forms of raw architecture will continue accompanying us in built environments for the foreseeable future. However, we haven't yet seen true revival of experimental brutalism in the spirit of postwar public building commissions. Today's neobrutalism remains rooted primarily in the private sector through well-financed residential buildings, private universities, and cultural projects by individual patrons. What's missing is political will to again understand public architecture as a field for creative and social experimentation, neobrutalist or otherwise. The public sector needs courage to develop distinct, memorable buildings with identity that can be used long-term, requiring not only greater design scope in public construction projects but cultural shifts away from short-term efficiency thinking toward architecture understood as collective heritage – raw, open, and accessible.
