Architecture, which can be understood in its most basic sense as a form of enclosure created with an aesthetic intent, first made its appearance in the Prehistoric Age. From its earliest developments, architecture changed over time and in different cultures in response to changing cultural needs, aesthetic interests, materials, and techniques.

The A to Z of Architecture provides information on architects like Frank Lloyd Wright, Tadao Ando, Leon Battista Alberti, Filippo Brunelleschi, Michelangelo, and Konstantin Stepanovich Melnikov, as well as on famous structures like the Acropolis, the Colosseum, the Forbidden City, Machu Pichu, Notre Dame, the Pyramids of Giza, Stonehenge, and the World Trade Center. The dictionary examines the development of architecture over the centuries through a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries on the major architects, well-known buildings, time periods, styles, building types, and materials in world architecture.