The Law of Polarity holds good in relation to human society and cultures as well - everything has an opposite. Countercultures have erupted as condemnations of “the ways of the world”. A countercultural movement expresses the ethos and aspirations of a population during a specific time. As new lifestyles are explored, supporting architecture evolves to satiate the utopian ideals of new societies. Architecture is a product of the culture it is designed for.
Besides reflecting the aspirations of a society, public spaces also configure the scenarios in which new ideas of coexistence and the collective can emerge from their qualities. Thinking about the streets, squares, parks, and even nature is a way of dealing with common ideals and ensuring the social dynamics in the relationship between bodies and the environment.
Over the last few years, bike share systems experienced a renaissance as the pandemic forced a hard decline in other forms of public transportation like trains and commercial flights where people wanted to avoid close contact with strangers. While ridership is now on a slow decline, since much of the “normal life” aspects have returned, many people continue to see bike shares as a viable means of transportation, lured by the ease and affordability of getting from place to place.
The hosts and producers of the Uncertain Things podcast, Adaam James Levin-Areddy, and Vanessa M. Quirk, conduct interviews with experts with a variety of experiences to answer the question, “Now what? How did we get here and what is next?”. In this episode with Michael Kimmelman, they touch upon many interesting subjects, namely, The New York Times institution and its evolution, Kimmelman’s new book the Intimate City, and our overall understanding of communities in cities.
The International Placemaking Week, presented by Project for Public Spaces (PPS) is an inspiring and engaging event designed as a global gathering of placemakers from different sectors to discuss thoughts and share strategies in order to push forward the concept of placemaking in the host city and on an international level. Previous editions took place in Vancouver in 2016, Amsterdam in 2017, and Chattanooga, Tennessee in 2019.
PPS, the nonprofit organization behind Placemaking Week, helps people create and sustain public spaces that build strong communities. In 1999, they elaborated “How to turn a place around”, a book that defined the placemaking movement, creating a guideline of 11 principles to follow in order to create vibrant community spaces.
Snøhetta, in collaboration with MQDC, has released the design for Cloud 11, a large-scale mixed-use complex in the South Sukhumvit district in Bangkok, Thailand. The new development addresses the pressing need for urban green spaces in the densely built neighborhood. The project, measuring a total of 250.000 square meters, also aims to help transform the Sukhumvit into a hub for innovation and tech companies in the city while providing the area with a large, green public space and spaces for artists, makers, and tech entrepreneurs. Construction has already started, and the project is expected to be completed by the end of 2024.
This article was originally published on Common Edge.
This week, the Museum of Modern Art officially launches a new series of exhibitions entitled Architecture Now. According to MoMA, “The first iteration of the series, New York, New Publics, will explore the ways in which New York City–based practices have been actively expanding the relationship of metropolitan architecture to different publics through 12 recently completed projects.”
The exhibition will showcase public-facing work, such as parks, community gardens, and pools, by Adjaye Associates, Agency—Agency and Chris Woebken, CO Adaptive, James Corner Field Operations, Kinfolk Foundation, nArchitects, New Affiliates and Samuel Stewart-Halevy, Olalekan Jeyifous, Only If, PetersonRich Office, SO – IL, and SWA/Balsley and Weiss/Manfredi.
This article was originally published on Common Edge.
There are countless good bones in American downtowns across the country, but they’re seldom connected to enough good tissue to be filled with life. This post is on the 10 things needed to make downtowns thrive. And none are the usual suspects. I’ve omitted stuff everyone else talks about because many of you already know those things.
New Orleans experiences the worst urban heat island effect in the country, with temperatures nearly 9 F° higher than nearby natural areas. The city also lost more than 200,000 trees from Hurricane Katrina, dropping its overall tree canopy to just 18.5 percent.
The non-profit organization Sustaining Our Urban Landscape (SOUL) partnered with landscape architects at Spackman Mossop Michaels (SMM) to create a highly accessible, equity-focused reforestation plan for the city that provides a roadmap for achieving a tree canopy of 24 percent by 2040. But more importantly, the plan also seeks to equalize the canopy, so at least 10 percent of all 72 neighborhoods are covered in trees. Currently, more than half of neighborhoods are under the 10 percent goal.
This article was originally published on Common Edge.
Covid has been particularly hard on cities: downtown business districts are still struggling due to the shift to remote work; some cities have seen population declines; and crime has spiked virtually everywhere. In addition, the pandemic pushed more people into cars, setting back the safe streets movement. After years of progress, cities like New York City saw big increases in pedestrian deaths. This is a nationwide problem—with one notable exception: Jersey City recently announced that no one died on its city streets in 2022, meeting its Vision Zero plan for the city. The milestone was the result of years of work by the city and its collaborator, Street Plans, a planning firm founded by Mike Lydon and Anthony Garcia. Lydon, a DPZ alum and co-author of the 2015 book Tactical Urbanism (currently being updated), began working with Jersey City on a whole raft of initiatives six years ago. I spoke with Lydon last week and asked him, specifically, how the city and he did it.
Biennales, exhibitions, and architecture focused festivals provide a platform for opening debates, conducting research, and driving innovation, but they can also contribute to the incremental changes that shape the image and the character of a city. Through temporary installations and experiments, this type of events have the opportunity to open lines on inquiry into the quality of urban spaces, inviting visitors and residents to slow down, break away from their daily routine and interrogate their local environments. The effects might not be immediate, but by cumulating these impressions and moments of contemplation, architecture and design festivals can have a long-lasting impact on the cities that welcome them.
Playgrounds are spaces with equipment dedicated to children's leisure, where they can develop motor and social skills. However, these spaces are new to our cultures and cities and emerge from the recognition of childhood as a fundamental stage of human development.
Urban public spaces can transform the life of neighborhoods and cities and, therefore, need to be open to the social, cultural and technological changes that occur in society. From urban vegetable gardens to pet spaces, from rain gardens to art pavilions, life in today's cities has created new demands and ways of using and appropriating public spaces.
Norwegian architecture offices A-lab and LPO revealed the plan to develop the last remaining plot in Bispevika, part of the Fjord City, a large-scale waterfront urban renewal project in the center of Oslo, Norway. The intervention strengthens the connection between the historic medieval city of Oslo to the new Fjord City while also introducing cultural, creative, and commercial activities to the area. The project comprises five buildings forming a quarter. The proposed massing and height take a contextual approach as they are reduced toward important local monuments such as the baroque residence “Ladegården” with its baroque garden “Barokkhagen." The project is developed by Oslo S Utvikling (OSU), the same client behind the Barcode project, and in collaboration with landscape architects SLA.
International architecture office KPF has unveiled the design for Parkside Seoul, a new mixed-use neighborhood planned for the South Korean capital designed to complement the surrounding natural elements and pay homage to Yongsan Park. The 482,600 square meter development is composed of a layered exterior envelope that encompasses various programs and public amenities with the purpose of enhancing the residents’ experience of space. Besides the residential units, the complex includes office and retail spaces, and hospitality facilities along with public and green spaces.
In the 19th century, many Americans living in up-and-coming cities and towns oftentimes found themselves strolling through the winding paths of curated gardens, stopping to rest under the shade of a tree and share a picnic with family and friends. Dotted across the grassy areas were headstones, marking the burial locations of those who were laid to rest. While the concept of relaxing in a graveyard seems a bit taboo in the present day, it was sometimes the only option for people to find space for recreation and leisure and was one of the earliest examples of a public park. Many of the parks we have today were actually caused by the evolution and planning of historic cemeteries.
If street culture is the glue that holds together an urban environment, what happens when its denizens no longer need to go outside? This is one of the fundamental questions faced by architects today, decades after the New Urbanist movement first popularized, or rather brought back, the concept of mixed-use streetscapes—and more than sixty years since Jane Jacobs famously championed walkable streets as essential to building vibrant urban communities.
Long gone, of course, are the days when city streets were our only outlet or option for access to retail and other services. Now, the internet gives us all that and more: remote shopping, banking, education, and even healthcare. Meanwhile, social media has transformed the way we communicate with friends and neighbors. All of which is to say: we no longer need to go out for social interaction or to procure services, we choose to.
