Phallic architecture consciously or unconsciously creates a symbolic representation of the human penis. Buildings intentionally or unintentionally resembling the human penis are a source of amusement to locals and tourists in various places around the world. Deliberate phallic imagery is found in ancient cultures and in the links to ancient cultures found in traditional artifacts.

The ancient Greeks and Romans celebrated phallic festivals and built a shrine with an erect phallus to honor Hermes, messenger of the gods. Those figures may be related to the ancient Egyptian deity Min who was depicted holding his erect phallus. Figures of women with a phallus for a head have been found across Greece and Yugoslavia. Phallic symbolism was prevalent in the architectural tradition of ancient Babylon. The Romans, who were deeply superstitious, also often used phallic imagery in their architecture and domestic items. The ancient cultures of many parts of the Far East, including Indonesia, India, Korea and Japan, used the phallus as a symbol of fertility in motifs on their temples and in other areas of everyday life.

Scholars of anthropology, sociology, and feminism have alleged a symbolic nature of phallic architecture, especially large skyscrapers which dominate the landscape, supposedly as symbols of male domination, power and political authority. Towers and other vertical structures may unintentionally or perhaps subconsciously have those connotations. There are many examples of modern architecture that can be interpreted as phallic, but very few for which the architect has specifically cited or admitted that meaning as an intentional aspect of the design.

Phallic architecture became prominent in ancient Egypt and Greece, where genitalia and human sexuality received a high degree of attention. The ancient Greeks honored the phallus and celebrated phallic festivals. The Greco-Roman deity Priapus was worshiped as a god of fertility, depicted with a giant phallus in numerous public architectural pieces.

The Greeks regularly built a shrine which they called "Herm" at the entrance of major public buildings, homes and along roads to honor Hermes, messenger of the gods. The shrines typically "took the form of a vertical pillar topped by the bearded head of a man and from the surface of the pillar below the head, an erect phallus protruded". It is believed that they sought their inspiration from the ancient Egyptians and their phallic image of Min, the valley god, who was similarly "depicted as a standing bearded king with simplified body, one arm raised, the other hand holding his erect phallus."

Herodotus, the ancient Greek historian, documented women carrying large phallic-shaped monuments and ornaments the size of a human body in villages in ancient Dionysia. On the island of Delos a pillar supports a colossal phallus, the symbol of Dionysus. Phallus reliefs on buildings on such sites are also believed to have been apotropaic devices to ward off evil. The elaborate use of phallic architecture and sculpture in ancient Greek society can also be seen in sites such as Nea Nikomedeia in northern Greece. Archaeologists excavating the ancient town discovered clay sculptures of plump women with phallic heads and folded arms.

Similar figurines of women with phallus heads from the Neolithic period have been found across Greece, Macedonia and parts of old Yugoslavia. The vast majority of the figurines of the Hamangia culture have cylindrical phallus-shaped heads without facial features, although some, particularly of the Aegean culture, had phallic sculptural pieces with phallic heads with a pinched nose and slitty eyes. In these parts of the ancient world, obelisk like structures resembling the human penis were built, often with phallic symbols, representing human fertility and asserting male sexuality and orgasm. Phallic symbolism was prevalent in the architecture of ancient Babylonia, and in Khametian iconography, the obelisk was considered to be symbolic of the phallus of the masculine earth.

Although phallic architecture as individual pieces was not prevalent in ancient Rome as it was in ancient Greece or Egypt, the Romans were deeply superstitious and often introduced phallus-related components as architectural pieces and domestic items. Archaeologists unearthing a site in Pompei discovered many vases, ornaments and sculptures unearthed revealing the preoccupation with the phallus, also unearthing an 18-inch terracotta phallus protruding from what was believed to have been a bakery with the inscription, "Hic habitat felicitas" (here dwells happiness), and many Romans wore phallus amulets to ward off the evil-eye.