Archinect - Features

The People’s Place in the City of Bits and Atoms

2024-03-06T07:34:00-05:00

The city of the 21st century represents a confluence of bits and atoms; an organism in its own right that relentlessly spawns information and data about itself, its people, and the invisible flows that support them. What is the relationship between humans and the city in this new condition? What is its future? To explore these questions, we speak with architect, TED founder, and father of information architecture Richard Saul Wurman, 2025 Venice Biennale curator Carlo Ratti, and MIT Media Lab researchers Naroa Coretti and Ainhoa Genua.

This article is part of the Archinect In-Depth: Artificial Intelligence series.

Understanding a City’s Image: Exploring New York Through the Spatial Experiences and Perceptions of Its Users

2023-03-31T12:45:00-04:00

For our latest installment of the Thesis Review series, we connected with New York Institute of Technology (NYIT) M.Arch graduate Jay Patel to discuss his project, Urbanary — Enjoy the City While Moving.

Patel explained that his work reflects the perception of urban spaces. He uses the city of New York as a reference to investigate "how a human-oriented city image is formed with people’s perceptions to design and define future cities and spaces." Patel's thesis project aims to explore a concept that "emphasizes how each urban location has a distinctive character that has been shaped by human interaction."

In our interview, he discussed his motivations for exploring the topic of architectural perception, urban usability, how Kevin Lynch's work influenced his research approach, and he shared his own path toward licensure in both India and the U.S.

'Leadership Is Not Linear': A Conversation with Mary Anne Alabanza Akers, the New Dean of Cal Poly Pomona's College of Environmental Design

2023-03-27T10:00:00-04:00

The fabric of architectural academia is changing. As leadership turnover is more apparent than ever before, I wondered if the demands of an academic leader have outgrown the stereotypical "profile" of what qualifies a dean or department chair. Is there room for deans to lead and make changes beyond their bureaucratic administrative duties? How much experience is enough experience to be "qualified to lead?"

I discussed these questions when I got the opportunity to connect with Cal Poly Pomona's new dean for their College of Environmental Design, Mary Anne Alabanza Akers. She joins the institution after heading Morgan State University's School of Architecture + Planning as its dean for 14 years. Not only has Akers served at a prominent HBCU — she was also its founding dean.

During our conversation, for our latest Dean's List series, we unpacked her childhood in the Philippines, her journey to attending school and working in the United States, her commitment to academia, and what it ...

‘Clearly, The World Cup Format is Not Sustainable’; A Conversation with WilkinsonEyre Sports Director, Sam Wright

2022-12-20T12:03:00-05:00

The 2022 FIFA World Cup was mired in controversy. Human rights groups saw Qatar’s hosting of the event as an affront to the LGBTQ+ community, free speech, and ethical labor practices. Ethics and standards groups investigated whether Qatar had ‘bought’ the event following rumours of bribery. Fans and sporting bodies alike even questioned the timing of the event, and its interference with domestic league calendars.

While these concerns targeted at Qatar at the 2022 World Cup specifically, the event was also a catalyst for environmental groups to ask broader questions about the carbon cost of major temporary sports and cultural events, and whether they can be justified by long-term economic or social benefits. These questions are not new or bespoke to Qatar; they also formed the basis for our feature articles on both Expo 2020 Dubai and the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.

For WilkinsonEyre’s Sports and Leisure Leader Sam Wright, whose team has delivered an abundance of major sports project...

Architecture and Urban Planning YouTubers worth a 'Like and Subscribe'

2021-12-01T14:31:00-05:00

A new crop of content creators is at the forefront of envisioning and producing some of today's most commonly consumed forms of media. Individuals on various internet platforms, namely YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram, tell their stories covering a limitless range of topics.

While not nearly generating the same astronomical viewership as some of the medium's top stars, there is a large community of creators whose work centers on the built environment, covering architecture, design, urban planning, and construction subjects. Through a diverse array of perspectives and ways of communicating information, their content serves as a resource for students, professionals, and enthusiasts alike while making these subjects more accessible to wider audiences.

For this particular showcase, we focus on YouTube and its most exciting creators within this niche. While there are plenty of noteworthy genre-specific channels on this platform, here is our pick of fun, informative, and engaging channels...

RISD Interior Architecture Graduate Students Utilize Adaptive Reuse Principles and a 3D Immersive Experience to Reimagine a More Accessible Pell Bridge

2021-09-30T08:08:00-04:00

The case for increased accessibility for pedestrians and cyclists is an ongoing topic. While public access and mobility within urban landscapes also involve factors relating to public policy and urban planning, eight students from RISD's Interior Architecture (RISD Int|AR) were presented with a challenge to address ways an iconic bridge in Rhode Island could be improved.

For their project "Crossing the Pell," a group of graduate students has developed a design proposal that brings attention to pedestrian and cyclist pathways to Pell Bridge, an iconic suspension bridge connecting Newport and Jamestown, RI.

"Crossing the Pell" is merely one of the many projects produced by students from RISD's Int|AR program that aims to elevate the use and application of adaptive reuse techniques and community engagement. To learn more about this work, Archinect explores the project and the immersive in-person exhibition that took place in August.

Shenzhen: A City at a Crossroads in its Past and Future

2021-09-10T13:55:00-04:00

The past, present, and future narrative of Shenzhen offers rich ground for architectural thought. The megacity, which emerged from the remote Chinese countryside over 40 years, has captured the imagination of urbanists seeking to understand its rise, architects seeking to contribute to its lively urban fabric, and national governments seeking to replicate the "miracle of Shenzhen" and its associated economic riches in their own country. However, despite the prevailing narrative of a highly-planned "instant" metropolis springing from nothingness, Shenzhen's history is more complex, more expansive, and more grounded in localism, than is commonly noted. Meanwhile, as the city continues its meteoric urban expansion, local and international architects, curators, and researchers are tasked with weaving the next chapter of Shenzhen's story; guided by forces of innovation, culture, climate, and geopolitics.

A House of Cards: The Miami Condo Collapse Exposes a Dehumanized Mindset in the Built Environment

2021-08-17T08:00:00-04:00

On June 24th, 2021, the Champlain Towers South condo building in Surfside, Miami collapsed, killing 98 people. While the causes of the collapse are still under investigation, the building's history of structural deficiencies is likely to have played a part. The Champlain Towers collapse is only the latest in a series of fatal building catastrophes which could have been prevented with proper oversight. In their wake, the continuing deterioration of our buildings and infrastructure causes us to ask if the commodification of buildings as real estate, and exercises in wealth creation, has caused us to lose sight of architecture's primary role as shelter and habitat.

Private Interests and the Public Good: Could an Office of Public Space Management Fix New York’s Chaotic and Unfriendly Public Realm?

2021-08-12T09:00:00-04:00

Cities express the tension between private interests and the common good, between buildings and public space. New York, the most populous city in the US, enjoys an abundance of impressive, exclusive structures (and quite a few impressive public ones, most of them built in the mid-20th century) while lacking high-quality, accessible open space.

This is despite a stock of undervalued public space: streets.

For Host Cities, the Olympics Are No Game

2021-08-03T13:27:00-04:00

With the 2020 Olympics underway in Tokyo, we reflect on the urban and environmental impacts of the Olympic Games on its host cities. Whether Rio 2016, Tokyo 2020, Paris 2024, or Los Angeles 2028, the Olympics suffer from a legacy of fragmenting existing urban environments, accelerating gentrification, and alienating local citizens. Meanwhile, the environmental cost of hosting the Olympics, driven by the construction of new venues and infrastructure, serves as a visible embodiment of our failure to adequately address climate change. Among the challenges, however, there are meaningful steps for improvement.

Beyond the Street: ODA Proposes a Zoning Regulation To Expand the Public Space in New York

2021-07-24T09:00:00-04:00

ODA has released a new video advertising Beyond the Street, which promises to hack New York’s infamously rigid gridiron to unlock hidden courtyards New Yorkers never knew they were missing. The proposal, which has no official client, aims to create new privately owned public space by opening the interior of city blocks to pedestrians and street-level retail.

The speculative project by the New York-based firm is being promoted through a glossy animation depicting the potential change to Manhattan’s Flower District, where the architects keep an office space.

FireCity | FireLAnd: New Models of Resilience and Community with UCLA's Hitoshi Abe and Jeffrey Inaba's Research Studios

2021-07-22T13:48:00-04:00

What does building resiliency look like for urban landscapes? With the effects of climate change increasing, architects, urban planners, and landscape architects must work towards land use design strategies while having humans and nature coexist effectively.

The University of California, Los Angeles Department of Architecture and Urban Design's faculty and students continue to unpack challenges between land development and urban conditions. An institution that focuses on collaborative research between its students and faculty, it strives to create learning environments fueled by experimentation and discovery. To highlight these initiatives, Archinect connected with Associate Adjunct Professor Jeffrey Inaba and Professor Hitoshi Abe to discuss their collaborative research studios FireCity and FireLAnd. In addition, they explain common misconceptions students have when learning about urban regeneration, land use, and ways to approach design strategies for fire resilient urban infrastr...

USC M.Arch Graduate Fabian Dietrich Creates an "Urban Architectural Metaphor" for Southern California

2020-07-27T14:00:00-04:00

Imagine dissecting a region and collaging areas together in order to study the relationships between two different urban landscapes. Fabian Dietrich uses his thesis, Long Air, or L.A, to do just this by creating "a composite of disparate communities, united by the shared idea of a city." Influenced by British architecture duo Smout Allen and their two drawing series LA To Be Done and LA Recalculated, Dietrich creates a conceptual cut-out using two Southern California cities, Bel Air and Long Beach, to test his hypothesis.

Since completing his M.Arch from the University of Southern California (USC), Dietrich's job search has been a bit different from other COVID-19 era graduates, as he has been able to successfully enter the workforce. Dietrich shares his own perspectives as an international student to observe how the industry has been affected by the pandemic and what students should take away from these challenging times.

Archinect's Spotlight on 2020 Thesis Projects: 2020 has been...

Oussama Khalfi of Temple University Explores Radical Vertical Urban Growth

2020-07-15T13:31:00-04:00

Temple University's Tyler School of Art and Architecture M.Arch graduate Oussama Khalfi explores the idea of urban development through vertical expansion in his thesis "Perpendicular City." Khalfi proposes that his project aims to "challenge the way today's society thinks about urban development and propose visionary alternatives. Cities' cores, mainly historical, have become static, which is against the nature of evolution. It is time to give back to the city its right to evolve, become diverse, and adapt by unleashing the urban evolution machine to define the city of tomorrow."

Archinect connects with Khalfi to discuss how his thesis project was shaped, his experiences as an international student, and graduating during challenging economic conditions. We also discuss employment prospects and how recent grads are being affected by the pandemic.

Archinect's Spotlight on 2020 Thesis Projects: 2020 has been an extraordinarily challenging year for architecture graduates. Students were ...

Kate Katz and Ryan Shaaban, Tulane University MArch graduates, Consider the Urban Grid's Relationship to Sea Level Rise

2020-06-26T12:00:00-04:00

Kate Katz and Ryan Shaaban are recent graduate students from Tulane University's 5-year M.Arch program. Together the two explore the impact of rising sea levels and alternative approaches to coastal city infrastructure. According to both students, their thesis "strives to change the perception of how we as humans relate to nature by accommodating the dynamic qualities of water into the urban grid network."

Archinect connected with Katz and Shaaban to learn more about their final thesis project, their experience transitioning to remote learning, and their thoughts on graduating during a global pandemic. Their project was selected to be featured in Tulane's 2020 Thesis Show and chosen as one of the top four presentations in their graduating class.

Archinect's Spotlight on 2020 Thesis Projects: 2020 has been an extraordinarily challenging year for architecture graduates. Students were displaced as schools shut down, academic communities had to adapt to a new virtual format, end-of-yea...

Miami's Urban Robot Associates on Creating Fun, Multidimensional Architecture

2020-03-10T13:28:00-04:00

Miami-based Urban Robot Associates strives to create memorable projects within the realms of landscape, hospitality, residential, and interior design. Led by Giancarlo Pietri, Sebastian Velez, Justine Velez, and JJ Wood, the firm's work showcases a mix of formal playfulness and meticulous, detail-oriented design.

Founded in 2009, Urban Robot Associates has since become one of Miami's powerhouse firms as the team pursues its stated goal of creating "something memorable that's also multidisciplinary in nature, while also referencing the context within which we design."

For this week's Studio Snapshot, Archinect chats with JJ Wood and the rest of the team as they collectively share their experiences of running and growing an integrated, design-oriented architectural practice .

Developing a Better City With UCLA's IDEAS Urban Strategy Studio

2020-02-27T14:30:00-05:00

How do we go about shaping a better city? How can land use and urbanism be explored to create solutions for pressing urban problems? Can multidisciplinary approaches to urban planning help create new ways of defining and shaping urban growth?

In Los Angeles, ubiquitous and challenging land development conditions have positioned the University of California, Los Angeles Department of Architecture and Urban Design to unpack these topics and explore them like perhaps no other school of design can. An institution that focuses on collaborative research between its students and faculty, UCLA AUD strives to create learning environments fueled by experimentation and discovery. As a means to highlight the initiatives being focused on at the school, Archinect spoke with Associate Adjunct Professor, Jeffrey Inaba, and lecturers David Jimenez Iniesta and Gillian Shaffer of UCLA AUD's IDEAS Urban Strategy Studio. The studio is one of four research topics: Entertainment (studio previously covered...

Deans List: University of Detroit Mercy's Dan Pitera and the Three Questions That Drive His Career

2019-08-30T09:00:00-04:00

The Deans List is an interview series with the leaders of architecture schools, worldwide. The series profiles the school’s programming, as defined by the dean—giving an invaluable perspective into the institution’s unique curriculum, faculty, and academic environment.

For this installment, Archinect spoke with Dan Pitera, newly appointed dean at the University of Detroit Mercy School of Architecture. An influential leader in architectural academia, social justice practices, and community engagement in the city of Detroit, Pitera brings a passion for education and dedication to creating "practice-ready graduates." According to Pitera, "design is really an issue of social justice, which our School defines as the distribution of both advantages and disadvantages across the full cross-section of society."

EXTENTS on the Importance of Being Earnest, Contemporary Urbanism, and the Digital World

2019-08-21T12:00:00-04:00

How do you re-image a city? How would you re-tell this narrative? The Ann Arbor-based duo Cyrus Peñarroyo and McLain Clutter use their passions in digital media, urbanism, and visualization to help answer this very question. Heavily invested in reshaping and reworking architectural practice and academia, both are faculty at Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning at the University of Michigan, and also, co-founders of EXTENTS, their architectural practice. Keen on finding new ways to "see the city," the duo creates digital and spatial practices for experiencing and understanding contemporary urbanism.

According to Peñarroyo and Clutter, "if we're able to see the city differently, maybe we can get other people to see it differently, too."

For this week's Studio Snapshot, Archinect had a chance to connect with Peñarroyo and Clutter. Together, they share their goals for running a practice as well as the role academia plays in their work. They also share their values when co...

The City That Could: Understanding Detroit Through Inclusive Design and Public Policy

2019-08-14T07:00:00-04:00

In 2015, Detroit was announced as a UNESCO City of Design honoree, the first American city to receive the recognition. Since then, Detroit has made efforts to revitalize and revamp its once declining fortunes. A city with a complicated history of trying to reposition its vibrant industrial past into a thriving future, the current push to modernize Detroit has taken time, if nothing else. However, collaborative efforts between local government, planners, designers, and the community at large has helped turn the once "forgotten city" into "the city that could."

To learn more about Detroit's progress, Archinect chats with Executive Director Olga Stella of Design Core Detroit. A formidable force for change within the city, Stella helped initiate the Detroit City of Design Competition that calls for architects and designers to create solutions to help transform Detroit neighborhoods for the better. Together with Stella, we discuss the role public policy plays in architecture, the import...

It’s Getting Hot in Here: Will Heat Waves Become the New Normal?

2019-07-21T12:28:00-04:00

Let’s face it...it’s hot. Even though it is the summer season, sweltering temperatures ranging in the 100’s with added humidity isn’t due to the season alone. With Archinect’s recent coverage of sustainable cities and alternative building practices to help regulate building temperatures, how can this information be applied to the everyday American? Cities and infrastructures can’t be rebuilt in a day so what can residents, especially those in the Central and Eastern portion of the U.S. do to survive the heat? What can we learn from heat waves like this, and how can the built environment respond to these changes?

One step to staying cool and safe during these extreme weathers is staying informed. In this piece, we break down terms relating to heat waves and learn how the built environment impacts these temperatures.

Glavovic Studio on Using Architecture as a Catalyst for Environmental Stewardship and Social Impact

2019-07-15T12:45:00-04:00

Born in Zimbabwe and raised in South Africa, architect Margi Nothard uses her global heritage and upbringing as a keystone to leading her Florida-based practice Glavovic Studio. A practice whose values stem from community-based engagement, socially conscious designs and environmental stewardship, Nothard has helped transform South Florida. Through her work in urban planning projects, affordable housing, public art projects, and commercial projects, the studio has made a lasting impact in Florida. Leading her firm for twenty years, Nothard's enthusiasm for social change through good design has allowed her and her team to works like the Young Circle Arts Park and the Kennedy Homes.

For this week's Studio Snapshot, Nothard shares her experiences of running a firm and what has changed over time. According to Nothard, "I was told after graduating to go somewhere where I could make a difference." After starting her practice 1999, Glavovic Studio has established itself as one of Fort Laude...

DATA-AND-MORTAR; Will the Technological Revolution Render Architects Obsolete?

2018-11-10T11:43:00-05:00

Globally, multinational tech companies are moving beyond the digital realm to enter the physical domains of where, when, and how we will produce our cities in the future. Grounded in the interdependency between us (citizens) as “users” and tech corporations as “providers,” we have no other choice than to open the doors to the core of our cities if we wish to remain “connected.” However, rather than simply accepting the imposition often dictated by tech companies and political policy-making, how can architecture’s response move beyond the current trends of uncritically adapting technology and, instead, begin to reclaim agency over architectural and urban development? What role can architects play in this seemingly-inevitable technical evolution, with their knowledge and sensitivity to the relationship between the body and space? It is undeniable that architecture will have to run much faster to catch up (with Silicon Valley) or the design of our cities will remain in the territory of...

The Architecture Collective KnitKnot Shows Us the Possibilities of Practice in a Hypermobile World

2018-10-16T10:15:00-04:00

KnitKnot Architecture is an international collective born out of a competition entry. The team of architects, urban planners, artists and thinkers operate on a role-based structure, constantly adapting to meet the specificities of a given project.

Though spread across the globe, the group recently moved their offices into the GSAPP Incubator at NEW INC, Columbia University's launchpad for entrepreneurship and expanded modes of practice. Beyond serving as the physical office for its members in New York, the group hopes the new digs will bring about new ways of rethinking their practice. Here, the team talks about how they met, the recent move, and their unique working methodology.

How One Architecture Remains Small While Working on Massive Urban Resiliency Projects

2018-01-22T09:00:00-05:00

Matthijs Bouw is a Dutch architect and urbanist and founder of One Architecture, an award-winning design and planning firm that was established in Amsterdam in 1995 and again in New York in 2015 after the firm won the Rebuild by Design competition in partnership with BIG. Bouw is also the Rockefeller Urban Resilience Fellow for PennDesign at the University of Pennsylvania, where his work centers on urban resilience and water management projects.

For this week's Small Studio Snapshots, we talk with Bouw about opening up his New York office, the difference between working in the Netherlands versus the United States, and the benefits of keeping a small team despite working on large-scale projects.

America and the AV: Digital Mobility for Architects

2017-11-15T09:00:00-05:00

American cities and their suburbs were built on innovations in transport technology. The spatial imprint of car ownership is so apparent it led urban activist Jane Jacobs to question whether American cities had in fact been built for people or for cars. In the past five years, a digital-hybrid layer of urban mobility has emerged—a fleet of autonomous, self-driving, car-pooling, electric vehicles have been set in motion. Google’s Waymo project is now driving 25,000 autonomous miles each week, and the net worth of the automated vehicle (AV) industry is projected at $7 trillion. This month I discuss how architects can participate in this emerging technology with architect and Yale professor Keller Easterling and Carlo Ratti of MIT’s Senseable City Lab. Will the uptake of AV’s deter people from public transit, pressurizing motorway expansion, or will we instead create an architectural switch, for a smarter, more equitable transport network?

The Open Workshop explores how housing density may have decided the U.S. 2016 Election

2017-07-21T13:11:00-04:00

Think about the American political landscape, and a highly partisan, Russian-government-colluding version may come to mind. But what about the literal American political landscape, as defined by housing density and building typology per acre? The project “Environment as Politics: From Identity to Density Politics” by The Open Workshop, originally presented on Places Journal, studied voting patterns in the 2016 election for the U.S. President and discovered that how closely people live together may be the soundest predictor of which candidate gets their vote.

"I think of architecture as an act of writing in the city": Vishaan Chakrabarti discusses PAU's upcoming projects

2017-06-22T13:27:00-04:00

As the founder of PAU, Vishaan Chakrabarti is an architect and urban planner who considers every aspect of the city with foresight, but isn't as concerned with the culture of celebrity that has often dominated the profession. "Calling oneself a humanist over the last couple of decades was a real no-no," he explains via phone. "You're supposed to be a bad-boy, cape-wearing starchitect." He purposefully did not name the firm after himself in order to place emphasis on intelligent discussion, not hierarchy. Although he's excited about taking on more projects, he never wants PAU to grow beyond roughly 30 employees so that he will always know everyone in his office.

With 'Ways of Life,' 19 Architects Reimagine What It Means to Live and Work in Nature

2017-06-21T12:30:00-04:00

According to research from 2015, between 35-38% of people do some, if not all, work from home. And, even back in 2009, a study found that 1 in 5 spent two to ten hours working from bed. In short, the way we work and live is changing, as many ditch (or have to ditch) the commuter express for their bedrooms. While Walter Benjamin said of the 19th century, “for the private citizen, for the first time the living-space became distinguished from the place of work,” in the 21st, that distinction is blurring once more. Alongside this, the split between the urban, as loci of labor, and the rural or suburban, as retreat, is complicated.

Mia Lundström is Blurring Local and Global, Top-Down and Bottom-Up Planning with the Kalejdohill Project

2017-06-13T12:15:00-04:00

In today’s hyper-digitized environment, the local and the global aren’t so easily defined. Just search ‘locals only’ on Instagram, for example, and you’ll find photos tagged from around the world. So it’s only fitting that urban planning projects, when seeking to activate a new social space, should blur the lines as well. “Democracy in an age of social media, digitalizations, migration etc. asks for so many upgrades—how to plan cities is one of them,” states Mia Lundström, an urban planner and the Project Director of Kalejdohill, an initiative meant to activate a locality in a suburb outside of Stockholm years in advance of a future development.