Originally commissioned by the RIBA, a piece on what might or might not constitute architectural research. Big in Spain.
2021-24 AHRC-DFG funded research project in collaboration with Tatjana Schneider, looking at the implications of climate breakdown for spatial practice. Summary of project in the link. We formed a research collective, MOULD, to do the project, and work coming from the project is gathered together at the website MOULD. One of the main outputs of the project is the website Architecture is Climate, a resource that reimagines the future of architecture through its entanglement with climate breakdown.
A further explanation of my 30% pledge, which seems to have raised debate (see comments) elsewhere on the very wonderful Parlour website.
The keynote article for Architectural Review's 1500 issue. Draws heavily on the joint research with MOULD
The foreword to Arna Mathiesen's great book Scarcity In Excess, which investigates the effects of scarcity on the built environment in Iceland following the economic crisis of 2008. Other excerpts of the book are on Issuu
This is the text of a short talk I did as part of the UAL Climate Emergency Network 5 day festival in September 2020. It picks up on some of the themes of Architecture After Architecture
My response as to why giving the official government website 2013 Design of the Year was not so cool.
With Tatjana Schneider. A comprehensive survey of Flexible Housing design. Winner 2007 RIBA President’s Award for Outstanding University based research, with judges saying: ‘An exemplary body of architecturally-relevant research’ offering comparative design plans, well-researched historical referencing, a new classification system and a practical manual/tool kit. An innovative and brave approach?? There is a long and useful, if quite critical, review by John Habraken (who is one of the book’s heroes). The book is beautifully designed by Ben Weaver, who also did Spatial Agency book and Architecture & Participation. The link is to an almost final version of the pdf of the book.
The best essay on the building and meaning of our house, with stories.
Funny how ideas formed so long ago still come up. But rather gauche nonetheless.
Co-authored with Jon Goodbun, Michael Klein and Andreas Rumpfhuber. The main outcome of the Scarcity and Creativity in the Built Environment project. At the beginning of this project it became clear that there was no contemporary theory of scarcity that addressed the current conditions, so this book sets out to fill that gap, and then relate that theory to design. It is a short (15,000 words) book. Unfortunately the publishers are no longer running, so the link is to the full text as submitted to them in 2015.
A short think piece on the 2011 Occupation movement and its relevance to architecture.
Really just a transcription of a lecture — ideas on housing, the everyday and occupation over form.
A very short piece for the Architects Journal on the possible effects of Brexit on creative education. See also my message to Central Saint Martins written the day the result was announced.
This is my glowing review of Barnabas Calder's new history of architecture, from the perspective of energy and climate. Spoiler alert: it is good.
This was my first Zoom lecture, delivered as part of the Architecture Foundation's excellent 100 Day Studio intiative during the 2020 COVID lockdown. The video is here , and the transcript linked to the title above. The lecture speculates as to where architecture might be in the face of the twin crises of climate and COVID, arguing that these challenge some of the fundaments on which the modern project of architecture has based itself.
Architecture Depends/Spatial Ethics. Video of the lecture is here.