Two visionary architects from different continents shared a revolutionary approach to design that challenged the rigid conventions of 20th-century modernism. Lina Bo Bardi from Brazil and Aldo van Eyck from the Netherlands developed architectural philosophies centered on playfulness, community interaction, and spaces that invited human appropriation rather than imposing predetermined behaviors.
Both architects belonged to the same generation, with van Eyck passing away in 1999 at age 80 and Bo Bardi earlier that decade at 77. Their paths crossed in 1969 when the Dutch architect visited São Paulo and was received for lunch at Bo Bardi's famous Glass House. Though they never collaborated professionally, fate would arrange a profound posthumous encounter that revealed the deep affinities in their work.
Years after Bo Bardi's death, van Eyck discovered an exhibition dedicated to her work. The experience moved him so deeply that he traveled across Brazil to experience her architecture firsthand. This posthumous meeting sparked recognition of the remarkable parallels between their approaches—connections that had remained dormant during their lifetimes. These silent dialogues and coincidences became the foundation for several studies, most notably the 2024 publication "Lina por Aldo: Affinities in the Thought of Architects Lina Bo Bardi and Aldo van Eyck."
The similarities between the two architects lay not in the visual forms of their buildings but in something far more fundamental: their belief in architecture that opens itself to people and achieves completion only through human interaction. Within this framework, playfulness emerged as their shared language, capable of transforming spaces into places of encounter, movement, and discovery.
Van Eyck's most extensive exploration of this philosophy materialized in Amsterdam's playgrounds. Between 1947 and 1978, while working for the Amsterdam municipality, he designed nearly 750 playgrounds throughout the city. These were far more than simple recreational spaces for children—they became territories of imagination and anchors of identity for communities rebuilding after World War II. His network of playgrounds functioned as a quiet but powerful urban strategy, reversing the rigid, functionalist character of Modernism and restoring to cities an essential dimension: the space for human encounter.
The Dutch architect advocated for an architecture that served everyday life and fostered social interaction. In Amsterdam's playgrounds, he developed a simple yet flexible vocabulary consisting of concrete-edged sandpits, rounded blocks, curved bars, trees, and benches that could be recombined in different configurations to suit each specific site. His approach was tactical rather than formulaic, filling vacant lots with temporary structures that invited community appropriation.
By choosing abstract elements over traditional playground equipment like slides or seesaws, van Eyck encouraged entirely new ways of playing. For him, the geometric forms were secondary; the real architecture emerged through the movement of children—a living form that was ephemeral and constantly reinvented with each game. This philosophy reflected his broader belief that architecture should be completed by its users rather than dictating their behavior.
Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, Bo Bardi was developing her own interpretation of playful, community-centered architecture. Her most famous project, the São Paulo Museum of Art (MASP), raised the building on pilotis, returning the open span beneath to the city—a gesture that van Eyck himself would later highlight during his visit to the museum. Originally conceived as a space for gathering and social life, the project initially included playful elements designed specifically for children, as recalled by her biographer Francesco Perrotta-Bosch, though these features were never constructed.
Bo Bardi's sense of playfulness was never limited to childhood spaces. It manifested in her passionate defense of free appropriation—spaces without predetermined uses that remained perpetually open to the unexpected. This philosophy is evident throughout her body of work, not only in MASP's dramatic open span but also at Sesc Pompeia, where the reflecting pool and fireplace evoke the primal elements of water and fire, creating comfort while inviting multiple forms of use.
The same spirit shaped her design for Teatro Oficina, conceived as a space to be experienced with the entire body—climbed, traversed, and discovered rather than passively observed. As architect Marcelo Ferraz observed, Bo Bardi designed like a child playing at building cities and inventing worlds. Her spaces are characterized by half-open forms and voids impregnated with possibilities, where large-scale gestures embrace everyday happenings while countless small-scale details spark human affection.
Bo Bardi's understanding of architecture's true purpose was captured in a revealing moment from the 1980s. While speaking with students at Sesc Pompeia, she was asked about her view of architecture's fundamental role. Her response came not in technical or academic terms, but in an image both ordinary and profoundly human: "Architecture, for me, is seeing an old man or a child with a full plate of food gracefully crossing the restaurant space in search of a place to sit at a communal table." In this simple yet tender scene, Bo Bardi condensed her entire architectural philosophy.
Francesco Perrotta-Bosch, in his essay "A Fable of Two Scales" from "Lina por Aldo," returns to this moment, emphasizing the power of a definition rooted in human action rather than abstract theory. As Bo Bardi herself explained, "A temple, a monument, the Parthenon or a baroque church exists in itself by its weight, its stability, its proportions, volumes, and spaces. But until a person enters the building, climbs the steps, and inhabits the space in a human adventure, architecture does not exist—it is a cold, unhumanized scheme."
This perspective reveals how both architects distanced themselves from the traditional role of the architect as demiurge—the all-controlling creator who seeks absolute dominion over forms and behaviors. Instead, they embraced an open, deliberately incomplete architecture that only achieves full realization in the presence of others: in play, in the crossing of a restaurant with a plate of food, in the body that climbs, runs, and discovers new possibilities within their spaces.
Against the established architectural canons of 20th-century modernism, both van Eyck and Bo Bardi were fundamentally subversive, unruly, and defiant figures. Their human-centered standards stood in stark contrast to Le Corbusier's Modulor—that supposedly universal figure based on the proportions of an average adult male. As Perrotta-Bosch noted, "In so many of their projects, Aldo and Lina took as their measure the gaze closest to the ground, the hearing nearest to footsteps, the touch within reach of the soil. Their human scales were those of mischievous boys and girls ready for playful revolutions to unsettle any and every spatial order."
In this space of freedom and unpredictability, their works converge around a shared vision: an architecture less about imposition and more about invitation, where every person—regardless of age—can become an active author of space. Their legacy challenges contemporary architects to create buildings that remain incomplete until animated by human presence, play, and the endless possibilities of community life.
