Brutalism was an experiment in architecture that touched many lives in the nineteen fifties and sixties and continues to do so today to a lesser extent. This article looks at the movement's major players - their opponents - and ponders the inheritance of brutalism. So, what did Le Corbusier ever do for us, then? Huh?

With many Brutalist buildings, the feeling exists that the needs of expressing an architectural ideal comes before the needs of the human beings who have to use them. By the time the backlash against Modernism was in full swing in the 1970s, Brutalist buildings often bore the brunt of the criticism.