Real Estate Fiction, a two-part short film series that compiles clips from movies that deal with issues of gentrification and land-grabbing, isn't the magnum opus of Los Angeles Plays Itself, but it's infused with the same analysis-as-entertainment spirit. Part one of the 20-minute short features... View full entry
The transformative effect of removing cars from a dedicated street or urban center and creating a pedestrian-friendly area isn't a new idea, but it's a popular one. Sydney, Australia has decided to repurpose its relatively trafficky George Street into an elegant shopping and walking area bisected... View full entry
Paul Cadden’s work is astoundingly realistic. — Visual News
If you think straining over Photoshop for hours on end sweating out the nuances of that latest rendering of a project is time-consuming, Paul Cadden voluntarily spends his time drawing photo-realistic versions of photographs with pencil. Only pencil. According to the artist's website, "Although... View full entry
The project, estimated at 400 million euros, or $433 million, features designs by the architects Eva Jiricna, Richard Meier and John Pawson, in addition to the 10 emerging firms, three of which are Czech and seven that are British. — The New York Times
He’s Mr. Lifestyle of the rich and famous, do you want a piece of him? No not Britney Spears, but rather world-renowned architect Renzo Piano. Visitors to the recent Piece by Piece: Renzo Piano Building Workshop at the Power Station of Art in Shanghai were engaged in the evolution of the... View full entry
Las Vegas’s recovery, like America’s, seems to have to come to the wealthiest first. [...]
But Sin City’s recovery shows the enduring ability of America to make improbable ideas work. Some 2m people live in a glittering, sprawling city deep in the desert and hardly think that this is strange. And with its mix of tech-obsessed yuppies, ageing baby-boomer gamblers and thrusting Hispanics, its demography resembles America’s future.
— economist.com
Related:Learning from Las Vegas: a look at the Strip through urban planning lensesWill Zappos turn downtown Las Vegas into the next Silicon Valley?70's Vegas underground home on the market for $1.7MSomething is happening in Vegas; but will it convince people to stay? View full entry
For decades, China’s government has tried to limit the size of Beijing, the capital, through draconian residency permits. Now, the government has embarked on an ambitious plan to make Beijing the center of a new supercity of 130 million people.
The planned megalopolis, a metropolitan area that would be about six times the size of New York’s, is meant to revamp northern China’s economy and become a laboratory for modern urban growth.
— nytimes.com
Related stories:China’s "most influential architect" is not pleased with the state of Chinese urbanismBeijing mayor says air pollution makes his city "unlivable"China Moves to Ease Home-Registration Rules in Urbanization Push View full entry
Housing advocates have long debated the merits of moving low-income families from high-poverty urban areas to suburbs like Glenview. The move can be challenging for families, who leave behind family and friends and enter a new, affluent world. But the research is increasingly conclusive: Living in a 'good' zip code dramatically improves kids’ chances of going to college, getting a good job, and escaping poverty. — The Atlantic
More on Archinect:Chicago to offer $5-per-year bike shares to low-income residentsNew Urbanism takes over Chicago’s suburbsChicago's iconic Marina City could be headed for landmark statusLocals welcome The 606, a.k.a. Chicago's "High Line", but anxiety for its future remainsSarah Herda... View full entry
These projects could be life changing for the vulnerable people they support. Yet in celebrating pop-ups as the solution to urban problems, are we simply distracting from the lack of structural public provision in these areas – and worse still, normalising, even glorifying, its absence through passionate avowals of temporariness? — The Guardian
These projects could be life changing for the vulnerable people they support. Yet in celebrating pop-ups as the solution to urban problems, are we simply distracting from the lack of structural public provision in these areas – and worse still, normalising, even glorifying, its absence through... View full entry
The spaciocide against homeless occupation is a landscape designed to strip bare the homeless right where they stand. It amounts to a complete negation of homeless rights, infrastructure, and ability to acquire jobs and services that exist outside of designated shelters and providers where the homeless can be tracked. — Design Observer
Bryan Finoki describes the nature of spaciocide against homeless occupation. View full entry
Telephone poles, scaffoldings, abandoned utility plants: like taxpayer-sponsored dark matter, these elements form the largely ignored visual majority of our daily urban experience. K O S M O S, a self-described "virtual firm," whose four partners occasionally physically convene in New York, Basel... View full entry
Rotterdam recently welcomed The Luchtsingel, a communal endeavor to spruce up the long-neglected Hofplein neighborhood in the heart of the city. Locally based architecture practice Zones Urbaines Sensibles (ZUS) devised The Luchtsingel in 2011. The focal point of the emerging "three-dimensional... View full entry
Most Egyptians have always lived in the fertile stretch along the Nile, the nation’s breadbasket which accounts for less than 10 per cent of Egypt’s territory. But urban growth has become the chief threat to agricultural land as farmers haphazardly – and illegally – build new houses to make room for the next generation.
Construction surged even more amid a security vacuum that followed the 2011 popular uprising that ousted the country’s long-time autocrat, Hosni Mubarak.
— thenational.ae
Related:Photographer documents Egypt's monumental housing developments in the desertA New "Capital" for Cairo?A closer look at the Giza 2030 master plan: blessing or curse for Egypt? View full entry
The first public parklet in downtown Portland, the installation is intended to help revitalize this stretch of SW Fourth Avenue in the heart of the SoMa EcoDistrict (for “South of Market Street”), giving students, faculty, and workers from surrounding offices a place to sit and enjoy their food-cart lunches in the sunshine, rather than racing back to their desks to eat. — pdx.edu
Downtown Portland is no stranger to green public spaces, but the recently opened Fourth Avenue Parklet has that ideal recipe for a do-good-feel-good collaborative project. Twenty-six architecture students from Portland State University spent 18 months to design and construct the parklet, which... View full entry
It’s one of the first Mexican projects for award-winning architect Richard Meier, who is known for his white geometric design such as the Getty Center in Los Angeles — CNN