Community Architect

The Struggling Downtowns and Main Streets On my travels this year I found that downtowns are struggling to fill storefronts or getting people to walk the streets, not only in Baltimore, Atlanta, DC, San Diego and Denver but even in parts of Boston which is

Some have said that it was fre and water which were initially responsible for bringing men together into communities, but we, considering how useful, even indispensable, a roof and walls are for men, are convinced that it was they that drew and kept men t…

Why Forests Matter to the Climate While I write this, New York, Baltimore, DC and large parts of the US are under a code red or purple air quality alert casting everything into an otherworldly light from pollution caused by smoke drifting south from massi…

During my time studying architecture the architect-engineer and Pritzker Prize winner Frei Otto was a full time professor at my alma mater, the University of Stuttgart and his Institute of Institute for Lightweight Structures was a flagship for innovation.

What Makes a Good Third Place?

The State of Downtown, according to its boosters, the various downtown BIDs, is always good.

The arc of history bends towards progress Most people born after the age of Enlightenment take it for granted that progress is inevitable.

Well, the future for me is already a thing of the past" Bob Dylan, Bye and Bye Most of human history was static.

To live is to leave traces (Walter Benjamin, German philosopher) "If architecture is where most of human existence takes place it cannot fail to be a topic of philosophy" (Graham Harman, American philosopher) Anxiety and Challenges I recently participated…

The Perception In my hometown of Baltimore it is a widespread conviction that the redevelopment of former industrial sites adjacent to downtown such as Harbor East, Harborpoint and the further out Port Covington did nothing but suck the lifeblood out of d…

Your work knows no borders—neither should your professional network.

In a world where much seems to be going backward, it isn’t just the current federal government asking its workers to return to the office.

The traditional definition of noise is “unwanted or disturbing sound”.

“By natural law, these things are the common property of all: the air, the running water, the sea, and with it, the shores of the sea.”

"The most important thing in life is to never make compromises (...) because accepting compromises means losing.

“Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.”

Is Housing Overregulated?

History There is no older architecture anywhere in the Americas and the old towns are quainter even than Quebec City or Montreal.

Transit in Crisis Mass transit has always been an afterthought in the US.

NOTE: The English version of this article can be found here.

AI will not replace humans but humans with AI will replace those without (Karim Lakhani, Harvard Business School) The death of the architect has been predicted before, killed by engineers, by CAD, by parametric design, and now by AI.

Missing Guardrails and Signposts There has been a lot of talk about the missing guardrails that would keep government in check and democracy intact.

Invited by ULI to speak about the potential of a failing mall in Baltimore County to become a successful Transit Oriented Development (TOD), and appointed to a Redevelopment Authority which includes a 100 acre failing Mall, motivated me to outline what it…

Amazon's requirement to work from the office will not solve the problems of the American downtown that blew up with Covid, the need for cities as places of interaction and innovation notwithstanding.

This article explores whether the quest for knowledge is the motor of civilization and if knowledge depends on growth.

The international chapter of AIA had its annual conference this year in Hong Kong.