And yet, few want to know that. The otherwise omniscient Kenneth Frampton was recently heard to say, “The New Urbanists … are they still around?” “They make porches for white Southerners, don’t they?” is Rodolfo Machado’s joshing version. Unfortunately, architecture students from our elite schools believe this more easily than the truth... — Metropolis Magazine
Andrés Duany is looking to open a new architectural can of stylistic worms. And he wants you to reply. The gist of the argument can be summed up by the following quote:
"The problem, it seemed to us, was not one of inadequately designed “unprecedented typologies.” Suburban sprawl does not call for aesthetic intervention. It is nothing less than the principal cause of climate change. The car-dependent lifestyle of the American middle class (as well as its export version) is the major contributor to atmospheric and aquatic degradation. And that is just the beginning, as the attendant social and economic problems become even more urgent. When aging boomers are torn from their cars, when the national impoverishment fails the infrastructure, as cheap energy winds down—then the drifting wreck of suburbia will require salvage work. This is the great design challenge of the 21st century."
44 Comments
duany is planner, not an architect
this guy is so full of shit, its stinking up my entire room
It doesn't matter what Duany says at this point. New Urbanism is about style. He may have created this New Urbanism monster but it has taken on a life of its own and its being kept alive by anxious and nostalgic Americans.
'brave new berm theories of the Landscape Urbanists' - LOL
I can do more with a berm than Duany can do with his transect!
Somehow Duany has the ability to make me want to renounce all of my urban ideals and return to my first job in architecture where I designed countless strip centers and lifestyle centers surrounded by acres of asphalt parking lots. Why can't he just go away and let the Peter Calthorpe/West Coast version of "new" urbanism take over?
What's with all the hate? This man understands what it takes to make a viable town. Would you prefer the mcmansions or parametric driven Zaha urban planning?
Plus, he's right here in the room. Show a little respect. It won't kill you.
What does this mean? I live in a suburb that developed as a streetcar suburb in the late 40s through the mid-60s. The streetcar is long gone, but I still have a walkable neighborhood with a commercial center a few blacks away, I know all my neighbors, etc. Do I not live in a post-war suburb?
Doesn't Duany mean to hate the mid-80s and later suburbs? Those places are the problem , in my mind.
While I do agree with the last two posters that a little respect would be nice, I assume that Duany blindly stereotypes everyone on archinect as Zaha-loving avant gardists anyway. So while we all lob "nostalgia-based stylistic!" at him, he would lob "AGE!" back at us. And the conversation still won't progress.
:::ANTI NEW URBANIST MANIFESTO:::
1. New Urbanists are not architects
2. People dream, things change and evolve, sometimes this is radical
3. NU is not transcending style, it is absorbed in its own, thus prohibiting others while slyly attempting to absorb others.
4. NU’s real enemy should stay with suburbia, and not with the avant garde
5. the position of the avant-garde changes and evolves
6. we are not conservative, that ‘good old american pragmatic test’ is decieving, in that makes one think everything is alright, when in fact, it is not.
7. Duany cannot force evolving systems, such as the avant-garde, to fall under the umbrella of NU, just because ‘it works’
8. Seaside is a vacation resort for white americans, it is not successful.
9. thou shalt not impose traditional architecture
10. The the polluting car argument is on its way out because of electric cars, teleportation, etc
The avant-garde and Duany are so similar, but the key difference between them is that only one is actually evolving, and its not new urbanism. The copying of history is such a pitiful thing, its so dead, and defeated, its unbearable to watch. Ask a new urbanist to experiment, and they will give you 20 different wood shingle patterns, copied out of a 1930s AIA standards.
This isn't about instead "copying parametrics" or "something out of a new magazine." That is a weak, tired argument concocted by unimaginative thinkers, who dont read theory. As mentioned above, ' the New Urbanism monster has taken on a life of its own and its being kept alive by anxious and nostalgic Americans.' Learning from history is on thing. imposing a traditional vernacular is tyrannical.
Give it a rest already Duany, it would have been more interesting if the article were on Peter Zumthor, instead of alienating architects all over again.
Advocating for new development outside existing, maybe even historic, urban cores in Newburg, NY is the same as advocating for sprawl. Q.E.D.
What's worse an AGE or a RGE (rear-guard establishment)?
one tries to push forward, one tries to push back, yet so many fall in the middle
Wow, there's some feelings we all need to reconcile, eh?
I'm kind of surprised no one, other than the resurrected LK and Donna has decided to actually respond to his statement. Other than that, it's pure flamethrowing. If that makes you feel better, go right on ahead, he's a big boy. He'll actually relish it.
I do think, for the sake of intellectual honesty, you have to look what NU claims and what is imposed upon it by various practitioners. NU, as a construct, is MOSTLY (not all) concerned with creating mixed use, high density, walkable, urban (and urbane) environments. Seaside is a red-herring. Of course it's a resort town and as such is going to suffer from the pomp, circumstance, and demographic issues any resort town is. And, to his credit, Duany was eager to get a lot of northeastern modern architects involved in building structures there. Steven Holl's building - winner of a PA award no less, was the first public building done.
What I do find striking in LK's response is the insistence that any 'looking back' or external rules placed upon a project are some kind of socialist tyranny that would somehow inhibit an architect's 'creativity'. I don't understand or buy that - if the rules of a development bug you that much, don't play. I don't remember that well, but it didn't strike me that Holl felt like his creativity was irreducibly stifled. Later projects, which are clearly more elaborate and traditional, are mostly a function of their owners. Are we seriously suggesting that anyone who doesn't embrace the avant garde (whoever they may be these days) is a bassackwards nostalgic, unimaginative white southerner (being the last two, I object on principle alone).
Conservative or not, the one thing I've always admired about NU is the comprehensiveness of it's urban model. Sure, it draws on a lot of traditional patterns (why is this inherently wrong again?), but there are no cohesive, counter proposals that have stood the test of time. NU is not simply replicating southern white towns, nor does it preclude modern architecture. It does assume that there are some ground rules to play by, but what those are depends on the developer and the market. You could just as easily do Siza, Chipperfield or Holl as you could Krier, Merrill or Calthorpe. NU precludes neither.
(and full disclosure, I grew up 2 miles west of Seaside and the first phases were being built while I was a teenager. Of course I can look back nostalgically - we ripped off scores of plywood from the Holl building site to build a neighborhood half-pipe. How can I hate on that???)
wait - where did the more recent comments go?
@greg... into a time/space vortex along with the last 17 hours of archinecting... archinect central says they'll be back soon...
Thank god, I was reading through the comments, and my browser crashed - wanna read all of them!
Yes Duany is a pile of manicured dung, nothing else.
Greg, isn't the main critique of New Urbanism that it is actually the same old principles of suburban development, with a new patina? Case in point, the garages to the rear of the house. Does that really address any issue in a big way?
You think you could have built that half-pipe in Seaside itself?
any way to get back the carsuo quote post?
I'm going to put a giant foam in the CNC and let the parametrics do the rest. Then I'll just come up with a theory of how that makes it an architect. Then my awesome professors who never built anything can give me their lovely degree. Then I'll come back to school and teach others how to be an architect too. yeah.
same - I doubt it. But that's Seaside's choice, not NU's. It's difficult to separate, but NU ITSELF doesn't prescribe those types of decisions. Neither does it inherently prescribe window proportions, exterior materials, roof pitches, etc., all of which are in the Seaside (and other development) codes. What it does prescribe (in various forms) are street proportions, constitutions, setbacks, sizes, etc. And these aren't universal - yes, they may be similar for developments in SC and GA (being of a similar region and climate) but are substantively different for a development in LA.
I'm just fascinated by how hung up some people are on the aesthetics of it all - sure, AD used traditional aesthetics as a weapon to get the urban planning through. You have to remember, his audience wasn't just fellow planners, but lay audiences for whom the images alone were all they could comprehend. Getting them to accept his layouts (just the smaller lot sizes were bad enough in places like the Kentlands) meant having to compromise with the developers on the aesthetic component. if you want to 'blame' anyone for the traditional appeal, look to the banks. How many modernist developments vs. more traditional looking ones have they ever funded anyways?
burningman, here's a good article regarding the "hate" for NU:
http://www.planetizen.com/node/42
Architecture isnt just about aesthetics, but however superficially 'deep' NU tries to be, it is all about the truman show, that will be its legacy. NU and its followers are full of blind stereotypes for what goes on in architecture and their close affiliation with Krier and Stern is a big testament to what they think about architecture. Resorting to nostaligic imagery because of the 'market' is a cowardly approach to design. Last time i checked, Holl and Duany USED to be friends, maybe that was the breaking point. And Krier built that beehive of a building in miami.
please refer to the manifesto in reference to the oppression of new urbanism
AGAIN, duany should write about peter zumthor. What could be say about my friend peter? " No peter, im afraid those windows are too big, where is your public plaza peter? Maybe your church could've had a fat dome on it peter?" please...
LK - Is it impossible for someone to embrace traditional architecture as a basis for working without it being cowardly or nostalgic? My own work doesn't but to preclude that possibility seems childish.
NU may be used in oppressive ways, but so can 'modernism'. To label either oppressive in principle is silly -why would you deny someone who wants to build that way the opportunity to? Perhaps it's cowardly to you but to each his own, no?
I don't have any knowledge of who Duany is friends with. In speaking with him, though, he's actually an admirer of Zumthor's work, along with many other architects who are clearly not traditional. I don't know why that should come a surprise. But, maybe he should write about him.
Can anyone else see the irony in someone dismissing the NU for their "close affiliation with Krier and Stern", and in the same sentence ranting about "blind stereotypes for what goes on in architecture"? :)
When did trying to make buildings that people like become cowardly?
Same Old Doctor,
I studied planning and urban design and understand the strengths and limitations of NU. I've written longer papers taking both sides on NU in my sleep and don't need a half-wit like Chris Dewolf to summarize it through in his childish observations. If you are going to look at semi coherent argument against NU, at least read Alex Marshall. You have to look at the alternative. You can call NU sprawl, but its America - if you are going to drink, drink responsibly. How many architects or planners have solved this problem? Let alone the professors/Archinectors who criticizes NU? Funny that he quotes Sorkin, a man who moans about everything and has built a reputation on moaning, why doesn't he build something? Simple - he can't. This kind of nothingness is what most on Archinect would call an architect.
At least give DPZ some credit for tackling sprawl. Most of NU's projects are not in green field develops as this idiot DeWolf claims. The majority of America is a shit sprawl spawn beyond reversal thanks to the Federal Highway Act. You can look at it as aesthetics, but that's what architecture is if you want to oversimplify it to that extent. Some "aesthetics" are based on centuries on measurable history on what works, some try to be innovative while repeating the mistakes of the 1960s. The other choice is to continue building on the shit storm we've come to identify as being so American.
So let's go back to throwing foam back in the CNC...
Greg, I had forgotten Holl did that building at Seaside - I love that building! It's so cool to see architects mature through their careers. Holl rocks (Pritzker next year, finally...?).
I feel like I've argued this many many times, most recently as relates to the gut-wrenchingly awful nostalgia-soaked disaster that is Carmel Indiana - couldn't one build the urban aspects of a NU development but dress them in Modern design? Walkability, community focus etc. don't have anything at all to do with style, do they? has anyone done this?
@Donna, Aqua/Allison Island in Miami is an attempt at New Urbanism with a "modern" aesthetic. Some decent architects, but the result looks not so appealing. Plus, although planned by DPZ, I think that it is all residential.
Aqua, as Phillip noted, is one prominent (and deeply flawed) example. Not sure why it didn't turn out better, but...
There was a town called Sky that was just getting underway in northern Florida as the crash started. It was to be much more explicitly modern / hybrid type design.
There is a neighborhood in Colorado that is more explicitly 'mountain modern' - can't remember the city name.
Finally, I talked with a young guy who had assembled a lot of land here, prior to the crash, and was in the process of doing a new, modern/euro town in northern Georgia. Financing for the structures died with Lehman.
Only a couple of these are explicitly by 'NU' self-identified practitioners. But, no, there's absolutely no reason you can't do it. Duany's hoped that Aqua would be the one to 'shut people up', but again the quality of the work was suspect enough that it didn't get quite the press desired.
Donna it sounds like you live in what is sometimes referred to as a traditional town. The type of place that isn't a city, but still has some businesses that are not big box stores or located in a strip mall.
10. The the polluting car argument is on its way out because of electric cars, teleportation, etc
Sure sure sure. Except every gasoline automobile replacement they have touted over the past decade has not worked. Remember how hydrogen cars were going to be it? How about Boone Pickens natural gas plan? Bio diesel? Didn't we already have electric cars that failed? Maybe the much improved battery technology will help, but our electric grid is incapable of supporting a switch to electric cars. We are now broke because 1% of our population now hoardes the majority the wealth. There is no funding available to bring the grid up to spec. Electric cars can't solve the traffic problem or the 40,000 deaths per year in auto accidents. I am all for pushing forward and experimenting with new ideas. The problem is we have no back up plan. Very few people are open to the idea that we might not be able to find a workable replacement for our petroleum powered society.
I had no idea there was such hostility towards NU. Do people really like being "forced" to own a car? A big part of the reason Seaside is so exclusive is 99% of the rest of what is available is piss poor. Living in a vibrant community with realistic options besides driving everywhere is financially out of reach for most due to supply and demand. One of the major complaints I hear against walkable places is that they are expensive. If you have more people and businesses paying taxes to support infrastructure and services why should it be more expensive?
Yep. Seaside is expensive because people like it.
If people didn't like it, there would be no demand, and it wouldn't be expensive.
just to reinforce donna's point, if you can divorce the principles of new urbanism (mix of uses, walkability, active streets, etc.) from the theory of new urbanism (or the cult of personality of duany), there's really not much to disagree with, even for your most die-hard "avant-garde" modernist. not really sure why duany wants to pick a fight regarding style other than to somehow assert his own relevance again.
"hey guys, look at me. we're doing cool stuff too. really! and it's relevant!"
- Louis Khan was not a modernist nor a traditionalist, he was contemporary
-NYC has hybrid buses and they work, thank god for NYC.
-burningman you really need to learn about your enemy if you keep making references to foam and CNC, I wonder how all that woodwork for NU buildings gets made? probably from machines...again please go to your local library. NU readings of the contemporary are as superficial as Duany ignoramus.
-The holl building in seaside is one of his older works, when he was just getting started.
-won and done williams is correct in that there isnt much to disagree with in NU's principles, thats why they try to pick a fight with architects, to somehow get noticed.
-in a few decades andres duany's great great grandson will try and bring back frank gehry from the dead, and we'll all be rolling our eyes again.
when im in a room full of new urbanists, i feel like a gay man amongst mormons.
Yet all those towns in Europe and the NU developments are still standing strong and our American sprawls are crumbling. What were you saying about the enemy?
your foam references dummy, you really dont read
i was driving really fast in LA the other night, wish Duany coulda seen it
Didn't Kahn create a car free urban plan for down town Philly?
thats why im not an urbanist
didn't Kahn die a horrible death in a toilet stall somewhere in a ton of debt?
Stick it in the CNC!
LOL! oh burning boy, learning already.
keep it up and you'll be just like me
totally missed this a few days ago. first off, I actually agree with many of the CNU's principles and think that their work is hugely important in terms of human-centric urban planning and community organizing. I was present at a couple of the early conferences - it's just that Duany is a caustic personality and has created a number of enemies - especially amongst architects.
There are some problems with NUs, namely they fail to take into account urban and regional systems beyond traffic (like where our food comes from and where our waste goes). also the "traditional" aesthetic Duany is defending are forms that are being recycled from the beginning era of cheap energy in the name of "infill." I have no problem with pitched roofs - I've designed a number of buildings with pitched roofs - I'm just wondering when are NUs going to look at building forms and spatial organizations that were developed with climate in mind - like new england saltbox, or Pueblo settlements? also even their spatial ideas about "community" are suspect because they seem to be trapped in this odd late 19th century genteel nonsense.
Community doesn't have to be yuppies pushing prams and saying hello to each other as they sip iced-tea on their porches. it can be messy and chaotic. tight-knit communities are usually centered around some kind of shared identity - usually it's cultural, religious, or political - but it's always about shared values. close proximity helps reinforce those bonds, but these values need to be in place before "communities" form. Is Duany just marketing walkability and sense of community to people who already value walkability and sense of community - and maybe that's why these places work?
its known in biology, that when a cell reaches equilibrium, this means its dead.
It is hard to disagree with NU's principles but I'll play devil's advocate for a minute. I've met Duany before and didn't know who he was at the time. Then saw him present. I have to say that he as articulate as anyone I've ever met. After his presentation, the crowd of questions came roaring in (from people who have never done anything before) and one by one he addressed the questions and shot them all down.
1. What's wrong with doing traditional buildings? There's also nothing wrong with doing just modern buildings, but when you look at the scale that he operates in, the typical Seaside or Kentlands, how many "modern" developments in the US can you say achieve anywhere near this kind of success?
2. Pueblo developments, really? That's came out of left field, why not igloos? How many modernists have dealt with igloos?
3. Many of their projects due tie into the larger regional transit where available. They do push for it, while it's unlikely that there will be a direct train line being extended into the developments, there next most likely option is to have buses that connects to the closest system.
4.There are larger class/social issues I think these developments generally fail to address, as he works for developers and there has to be a compromise.
5. "like where our food comes from and where our waste goes" - Unless you live on a farm, it's highly unlikely that this is going to be resolved by anyone anytime soon. Many would point to Manhattan as the most sustainable place, but it goes back to the igloo, you can ask that same question of just about any town or city.
ill be waiting for the zumthor article, but it will never come.
Block this user
Are you sure you want to block this user and hide all related comments throughout the site?
Archinect
This is your first comment on Archinect. Your comment will be visible once approved.