New Ideas in Architecture

eVolo has just concluded the 2013 version of their contest for new ideas in tall buildings. They are beautifully rendered idiocy. The winner seems to think moving humans to the North Pole will reduce the heat up their. Because humans don't generate heat. Or use it. Or accidentally generate it by burning fuel, running machines, or doing about a thousand other things that generate heat.

I don't disapprove of competitions like this - well, not any more than I disapprove of competitions in general - although I would point out the eVolo books, selling the work of others in a bound format, do quite well. It's a smart idea. And it presents ideas that are, sometimes, smart. But they aren't realistic. I guess they would say that's the point; that visionary ideas never seem realistic until they are realized.

Here is my suggestion for a future architecture - build a properly secure gated community. One that not only keeps poor people out but creates the illusion poor people don't even exist. This is an ongoing project in much of the world but it is disorganized and architecture has many techniques to bring to the table that are under-used.

People with money will pay to never have to see or hear people without money. Preferably they would like no evidence at all of poor people's existence. One way to go would be a massive arcology. This has a lot of benefits. Done correctly the inhabitants would never have to leave and rigid immigration policies would keep poor people (and their smelly lives) completely away from the inhabitants. It also controls the air and water supply for the inhabitants. Again, ideally this would be self-contained - or externalizing. That way the arcology could pollute like crazy yet have perfect air and water for its inhabitants. But arcologies are big, and therefore not particularly exclusive. They also don't offer much of an illusion of choice.

If I was a developer right now, I would be working with landscape architects and counter-terrorism experts to make each new development as visually isolated from the rest of the world (and a physically protected) as possible. I would have the name of my counter-terrorist experts first on the brochure, then my name, then the architects and landscape architects. I would sell people the right to live in prisons. And they would pay for it.

Or you could use dirigibles. The idea the city of the future might wander over the face of the earth (or float around on the ocean currents) is at least as old as the 1960s. Floating cities are graphically wonderful but full of actual problems. As they drift the cost of importing anything increases drastically. And, most importantly, they never go anywhere interesting. The surface of the ocean is always the same. A dirigible, on the other hand, moves from place to place. Companies are already doing R and D on truly massive dirigibles in response to the price of aviation fuel. And because the world of the shipping container will not last forever. Since dirigibles only use fuel for maneuvering, not for staying aloft, they are less expensive. And since they don't need to land they can be used in the most severe geographies. Want to lift something off the side of a mountain? Someone does and that's why people are doing work on mega-Zeppelins. Put a bunch of them together or let them maneuver as a fleet. You have the illusion of choice with all the actual exclusivity even the richest bastard could want.

The other interesting challenge is how to use architecture in the context of the massive, unplanned settlement (the barrio, favela, whatever). Rich people and getting richer, poor people are getting poorer. The effort to study barrios is academically interesting. The ability to create a place that functions with similar efficiencies starting with, say, one thousand households is potentially very lucrative. Why spend years working on a single tower when you could be installing slums with thousands of units in cities all over the world? That's how to really have an impact.

I think I should start a consulting firm. I will dream up the most offensive things anyone could do and people will pay me for the right to make them happen.