Christopher Alexander is widely acknowledged as one of the leading and original contemporary architectural and urban theorists. A theorist and a practicioner, who has implemented his ideas and concepts in architectural and urban design, has made a lasting impact on architectural and urban thinking. However, being an author of important treatises on architecture and city-making, Alexander is still largely ignored in mainstream architectural and urban discourse. While revisiting the seminal writings of Christopher Alexander and recon- sidering reception of his ideas in architectural academy, the article offers the view on why architectural thinker and theorist of an exceptional caliber remains to a certain extent marginalized. The article suggests that holistic concepts of live and durable architecture as well as humane urban design have for decades been against shallow and narrow modernist and post-modernist mainstream thinking which so far has failed to revisit and revise its own sources and developments. It still remains the main obstacle to a more adequate un- derstanding of the (antimodern) holistic way of the designing and thinking proposed by Alexander.
Key Words: Christopher Alexander; pattern language; architectural theory
