With the gap exacerbated by COVID-19, no single organisation, or even government, can tackle the housing deficit problem alone. The world gained a new word—COVID-19—in 2020 and lost precious lives over the two-year pandemic. When Omicron was declared a variant of concern in late November 2021, the media had referred to it as the dress […]
The story of Auroville serves to highlight the changing aspirations and consciousness of India as a country, a land of mysticism and spirituality, which it still is, while being one of the biggest consumer markets in the world. Juxtaposed with Aamby Valley and its wealth-driven ideals, it is this heady mix of ancient culture and […]
Read More… from Aspirations Versus Realities of Utopia in India
When one grows up living in a city-state such as Singapore, one would not have much of an idea of difference between living in a city and outside of it, such as in the suburbs (there’s not much ‘suburbia’ in a small city-state). Thus, living in a city from young does veil one from the […]
Read More… from How Can We Design Cities to Be More Equitable?
Late last year as the Covid-19 pandemic entered a second wave in Singapore, more than 90 per cent of the cases were counted among the residents of migrant dormitories. A consumer economy that imports the majority of its goods and services, Singapore relies on labourers from throughout Asia for manufacturing and other manual labour, as […]
Read More… from Intersectional feminism for a sustainable future
In theory, sustainability should allow us to continue to meet the needs of this and future generations. That was the point made by the Brundtland Commission in their definition of sustainability. But that does not address a more basic question of whether or not we should be continuing the current situation. The ecosystems that support […]
A CRISIS OF PERCEPTION For centuries, cities evolved gradually in terms of their physical and population size. This trend, however, dramatically shifted in the last 50 years, with urban growth occurring at an exponential scale and rate as urban population numbers spiked. By 2050, two-thirds of the world’s projected 9.7 billion population will live in […]
Read More… from Rethinking Sustainability: Form Follows Systems
Where do we go from here? Well, that would depend upon whether we have actually learned something from the COVID-19 pandemic. But it seems we have not. The powers-to-be are poised, waiting for improved conditions so as to continue their unsustainable business as usual. Humankind never learns, not even from major catastrophes. Complacent with money […]
Read More… from The Future of Cities: Sustainability’s Deceptive Dream
The conversation appears to have stalled. Almost every student I teach or practitioner I talk to, when asked what s/he thinks is sustainable design, replies, “a Green building, right?” The conflation of Green and sustainable is unsettling. It troubles me. It should concern every designer who is alarmed by the planetary crises that we confront […]
The design community’s response to COVID-19, much like our reaction to issues of sustainability, tends to gravitate toward silver bullet solutions rather than necessary incremental change. Similarly, at the onset of the pandemic, our hubris and desire to manage Mother Nature guided us to focus on human-centric solutions to our predicament: advancing sensor technology [1] […]
Read More… from Landscape Architecture Is Our First Line of Defence
We are inspired by Donna Haraway’s subversive understanding of ‘fiction’, as an active principle in a world of possibilities, about looking forward, as a stimulus to act—as opposed to ‘fact’, as something that belongs to the past, a reference to that which has already happened. It symbolises our tilt towards action and interactions in the […]
One of the most interesting outcomes of COVID-19 has been how fully it has pulled back the curtain on the world around us, exposing the inner workings and fault lines of everything, from the global economic system to social norms. Alongside this, the disruption of our day-to-day routines and conventions has not only created a […]
Diseases and plagues, their spread and the stories thereof are as old as mankind and are extensively documented in well-known ancient texts. As long as people gather, mingle and travel to different places, they spread diseases. Medieval European cities were death traps partly due to a lack of hygiene and sanitation. More people died during […]
Read More… from Density versus COVID-19: An Indonesian Case Study
