Postmodernism is an eclectic, colourful style of architecture and the decorative arts that appeared from the late 1970s and continues in some form today.
It emerged as a reaction to Modernism and the Modern Movement and the dogmas associated with it. By the 1970s Modernism had begun to seem elitist and exclusive, despite its democratic intentions. The failure of building methods and materials (shown in the collapse of Ronan Point, a tower block in east London in 1968) and alienating housing estates was a focus for architects and critics in the early 1970s.