~3500 BCE
Pre-Historic
Megalithic structures — Stonehenge, Göbekli Tepe — raised before writing
~3000 BCE
Mesopotamian
Ziggurats of Ur and Babylon; mud-brick stepped temples approaching the divine
~2700 BCE
Egyptian
Pyramid complexes, hypostyle halls, obelisks — eternity expressed in limestone
~800 BCE
Greek Classical
The three Orders; mathematical proportion; the Parthenon as canonical ideal
~300 BCE
Hellenistic
Greek forms spread across Alexander's empire; more ornate, emotionally dynamic
~200 BCE
Roman
Concrete revolution; the arch, vault, and dome; infrastructure at imperial scale
~330 CE
Byzantine
Pendentive dome; gold mosaics; Eastern Christianity's sacred architecture
~650 CE
Romanesque
Thick walls, round arches, massive piers — the heavy backbone of medieval Europe
~700 CE
Islamic
Geometric abstraction, muqarnas, arabesque, the mosque as divine geometry
~1100 CE
Gothic
Flying buttresses free walls to become glass; pointed arches reach for heaven
~1420 CE
Renaissance
Classical revival; mathematical perspective; Brunelleschi's dome; Palladian villa
~1600 CE
Baroque
Theatrical drama; curved forms; light as material; Bernini and Versailles
~1750 CE
Neoclassical
Enlightenment rationalism; Greek Revival; government buildings as temples
~1890 CE
Art Nouveau
Nature as ornament; sinuous lines; Gaudí's organic masonry; total artwork
~1920 CE
Modernism
Ornament as crime; honest structure; form follows function; Le Corbusier, Mies
~1950 CE
Brutalism
Raw béton brut; exposed concrete; social housing as monument; honest material
~1970 CE
Postmodern
Historical allusion returns; irony; ornament allowed; Venturi's complexity
~1990 CE
Deconstructivism
Fragmented forms; Gehry's titanium curves; Hadid's fluid planes; computer-aided
~2000 CE
Parametric
Algorithm-driven form; computational optimization; biomorphic structures
~2015 CE
Sustainable
Net-zero energy; living walls; circular materials; architecture for climate