Rethinking Cities
cities / design
Urbanized: coming to theaters near you
More specifically Urbanized, the third film in Gary Hustwit’s design trilogy (think Helvetica and Objectified) will be screening in New York on September 20th. Additional bonus: Gary and friends will be there to discuss the film and take questions afterwards.
The central question Urbanized asks and explores is, “Who is allowed to shape our cities, and how do they do it? Unlike many other fields of design, cities aren’t created by any one specialist or expert. There are many contributors to urban change, including ordinary citizens who can have a great impact improving the cities in which they live. By exploring a diverse range of urban design projects around the world, Urbanized frames a global discussion on the future of cities.”
Urban Design Week NYC
Speaking of Urbanized, Urban Design Week will be happening in New York from September 15th – 20th. More interesting than the non-existent schedule is the open call to re-imagine the city, in which architects, designers, artists, and urbanists are asked to take an idea submitted by the public and turn it into a proposal. There seems to be a trend of government organizations adopting the practices of start-ups and design (hackathons, design thinking) in order to rapidly explore ways in which to improve the city. This is hot on the heels of Reinvent NYC.GOV and NYC Big Apps, both of which make heavy use of existing data sets and APIs.
Rethink NYC
From August 3rd to October 16th, the BMW Guggenheim Lab will be in New York exploring the theme Comfronting Comfort which examines, “notions of individual and collective comfort and the urgent need for environmental and social responsibility.” The lab is a six year project, running on two year cycles in which one theme is explored across nine cities, so in another two years the lab will be back in New York with a new theme. The longer-term vision and cyclical nature of the project is intriguing and will hopefully produce some meaningful and innovative solutions to current problems.



