What does brutalist architecture look like? 9 of the most iconic buildings

Brutalist architecture, known for its raw concrete, geometric forms and imposing presence, has gained a renewed interest in the modern age of social media and more recently through the film The Brutalist, which won three Oscars this month and three Golden Globe Awards in January.

The film, which was released in December 2024, stars Adrien Brody as a fictional Hungarian architect and Holocaust survivor who emigrates to the United States.

Mark Cavagnero, the founding principal architect of San Francisco-based firm Mark Cavagnero Associates, explained to Newsweek the origins of brutalism, which grew out of the need to quickly rebuild much of Europe after the widespread destruction of World War II.

“With steel factories widely destroyed, straightforward béton brut [raw concrete] was both fast and expressive. The war’s destruction never crossed the Atlantic, but the power of concrete as 20th-century masonry did,” he said.

Hannah Simonson, a senior cultural resources planner at Page & Turnbull, an architecture and historic preservation firm, told Newsweek that brutalist architecture has been gaining a new audience in the past 10 years or so.

She said: “Social media and image-sharing platforms are helping people see the brutalism style in a different way. There are more coffee table books on the architecture, too, as opposed to academic literature, which are drawing people in for the style’s aesthetic value, bringing new attention and new eyes to the architecture.”

Here, experts highlight some of the most iconic brutalist structures in the U.S. and abroad.

St. John’s Abbey in Minnesota

Designed by Hungarian-German architect Marcel Breuer, St. John’s Abbey was built between the late 1950s and early 1960s. The building’s striking concrete facade and massive bell banner set it apart from traditional ecclesiastical designs.

Simonson told Newsweek: “St. John’s Abbey in Minnesota by Marcel Breuer stands apart for its significant step forward in religious architecture in the brutalist style.” She added that some suggest that certain details of the fictional architect featured in The Brutalist film “are drawn from Breuer’s life, although not closely.”

Boston City Hall

Built in 1968 by Kallmann McKinnell & Knowles, Boston City Hall is one of the most controversial examples of brutalist architecture. Its raw concrete exterior, modular design and cavernous interior spaces contrast starkly with the historic brick buildings surrounding it.

Simonson noted: “The brutalist style of Boston City Hall by Kallmann McKinnell & Knowles presents a completely different architecture of the Colonial-era buildings that neighbor it. It was and still is a controversial building—people seem to love it or hate it.”

Geisel Library in California

Located at the University of California in San Diego, the Geisel Library was designed by William Pereira and completed in 1970. Its distinctive shape, featuring dramatic overhanging concrete floors supported by thick pillars, gives it a futuristic appearance.

Simonson said: “The Geisel Library at U.C. San Diego by William Pereira is noted for its importance as one of the first buildings whose architecture went from the brutalist style to an approach in futurism.”

She added that what makes the aforementioned three buildings interesting architecturally is “how they explore the plastic and sculptural possibilities of concrete and often express interior function or changes in space on the exterior.”

East Campus of the University of Illinois Chicago

Designed by architect Walter Netsch of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, the University of Illinois Chicago’s (UIC) East Campus was constructed between 1961 and 1968. The campus includes striking concrete structures modeled on intricate geometric patterns.

Stewart Hicks, an architectural design professor at UIC, told Newsweek: “Nestled in the southwest corner of Chicago’s Jane Byrne Interchange, the University of Illinois Chicago’s East Campus comprises a 100-acre collection of brutalist buildings.”

With these buildings, which include a 28-story tower with cantilevered floors and windows made to look like the capital letter ‘I’ for Illinois and buildings modeled on the double-helix structure of DNA, “Netsch sought to materialize a new expression of public education through urban and architectural design,” Hicks noted.

The Oakland Museum of California

Designed by Kevin Roche and opened in 1969, the Oakland Museum of California is a brutalist masterpiece that integrates nature with its concrete structure through rooftop gardens and open-air terraces.

Cavagnero, whose firm completed a major renovation and expansion of the museum in 2021, explained that Roche conceived the building as a walled garden with large entrances and placed rooftop terraces on top of galleries, “resulting in a stage set where downtown urban life occurs in every imaginable way.”

He added: “The museum combined the rugged qualities of concrete with entirely new possibilities made possible only by this brutalist approach of exposed concrete construction.”

Unité d’Habitation in France

Brutalism in Europe is often associated with housing projects, such as Le Corbusier’s Unité d’Habitation in Marseille, completed in 1952. This monumental concrete structure, with its mix of residential, commercial, and communal spaces, served as a model for high-density urban living.

Simonson told Newsweek: “Unité d’Habitation by Le Corbusier may be one of the most famous examples of architecture by Le Corbusier, one of the most famous architects in the world.”

“This brutalist-style building explores housing with the idea to incorporate retail, a bookstore, restaurants, and more within housing to serve the community. It’s more of a mixed-use community, in a sense,” she said.

The Barbican in England

Designed by Chamberlin, Powell and Bon and completed in 1982, the Barbican in London epitomizes brutalist urban planning. The massive residential and cultural complex includes housing, theaters, concert halls and public spaces.

Simonson said: “It’s a massive, mega-brutalist structure designed as a cultural center with housing and performing arts spaces, galleries and retailers—everything you might need, right there in the space. There are sunken pools and landscape features. It’s an interesting space.”

Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral in England

Designed by Frederick Gibberd in the 1960s, the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral is a striking departure from traditional Gothic cathedrals.

Jake Shepherd, a postgraduate researcher on modernist architecture, told Newsweek: “The project, which was Gibberd’s first commission of a religious building, refreshed his reputation for radical architecture.”

With Gibberd having won the international design competition and commission to construct this landmark building, “the cathedral has since become a totemic part of Liverpool’s rich architectural heritage and identity,” he said.

Habitat 67 in Canada

Architect Moshe Safdie’s Habitat 67 in Montreal, completed in 1967, is one of the world’s most distinctive brutalist housing projects. Comprising prefabricated concrete units stacked in a modular formation, the design was originally conceived as a model for affordable housing.

“Habitat 67 in Montreal is distinctive because of how it presents as a set of different cubes stacked together in different geometries. The structure shows what is possible from building with concrete and how brutalism and concrete construction can be sculptural,” Simonson said.

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