My first published work. Oh, what a clever young chappy I was. Sanctimonious posturing.
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.
An outcome of the Architecture after Architecture research project, this short book was written collectively by members of the MOULD collective, including me.
Architecture is Climate reimagines the very foundations of architecture in an age of crises. Rejecting outdated paradigms of endless linear growth, technocratic fixes, and the separation of humans from nature, this provocative and hopeful book argues that architecture must be fundamentally rethought—not as the design of objects, but as a practice entangled with climate, politics, history, and social justice.
Through eight key themes—knowledge, economy, land, resources, infrastructure, work, policy, and culture—Architecture is Climate explores how climate breakdown reshapes every aspect of architectural thinking and doing. Drawing on diverse voices, and grounded examples from around the world, it offers not just a critique of the status quo but a vision of other possible architectures—and climates—already in the making.
The book is accompanied by a website www.architectureisclimate.net
Ten Theses on Scarcity. A lecture given in a tent on the steps of St Pauls during the Occupy London Stock Exchange period. Vocal audience who gave not a jot about my professorial authority. Rightly. Podcast, with the atmosphere of the occupation, is here.
A short think piece on the 2011 Occupation movement and its relevance to architecture.
Another piece on architectural education. Rather showy-offy, but was an finalist in the EAAE competition for writings in architectural education that year.
My essay on architectural research, Three Myths and One Model, is being translated into French, so I thought it was time to write a new introduction to it, because the argument felt a bit tired, presented as it was ten years ago.
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.
The keynote article for Architectural Review's 1500 issue. Draws heavily on the joint research with MOULD
My closing speech at the main conference for What's the Point of Art School, a series of events organised by Central Saint Martins. The video of the speech, which was well-recieved, is here. Other talks, including brilliance from Johnny Vegas, are here. There was a good write up of the day in the Guardian.
Originally commissioned by the RIBA, a piece on what might or might not constitute architectural research. Big in Spain.
Rather a miserabilist piece, but gets in that fantastic Seneca quote: ‘Those were happy times before the days of architects.’
This is a rare one where I write specifically about buildings, or in this case the subtlety of the plans of Proctor Matthews Architects. Online here, pdf here.
My response as to why giving the official government website 2013 Design of the Year was not so cool.
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
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.
Early piece, written when I had just got Lefebvre. Introduces themes that I play on for years to come.