Of all building materials in the world, brick is one of the most enduring and ubiquitous. Traces of brickmaking date back to 7500 BC and fired brick first made its appearance in about 3500 BC. Since then, the trusty brick has shown amazing resilience and remains one of the mainstays of contemporary architecture. Rooted in tradition in countries as different as China and the Netherlands, it is inexpensive, flexible in use, and can also be ecologically fabricated.

This comprehensive two-volume set tours the world to cover the most exciting and innovative brick buildings of the past 15 years, from Argentina to New Zealand. True to all TASCHEN architecture tomes, it includes new talents like Argentina’s Diego Arraigada and Vietnam’s Nguyen Hai Long as well as established architects such as Tadao Ando and Peter Zumthor.

Featured buildings showcase the variety of brick applications across cultural, domestic, infrastructure, and leisure spaces, including Tate Modern Switch House by Herzog & De Meuron, Tidy Architects’ Amorio Restaurant in Santiago, and Mass Design Group’s Maternity Waiting Village in Kasungu, Malawi.