MONU #28 - Client-shaped Urbanism:
The importance of the client in shaping our built environment, whether it comes to buildings, neighbourhoods, or entire cities, is not sufficiently included in urban and architectural discourse, and thus largely forgotten, underestimated, and neglected. This issue is dedicated to investigating the topic in depth, to discover clients’ values, objectives, fears, and motivations, and the consequences of all of this for cities and buildings. What kind of design methods should be developed for better partnerships and results? How can communication between clients and designers be advanced? Which projects might never have happened without an ambitious and creative client?
MONU #27 - Small Urbanism:
When it comes to urbanism, small things matter, and the various contributors to this issue illuminate this idea further in various ways. Liz Teston, for instance, captures the theme when she writes about the transient micro-urbanisms of protest architecture. Levi Bryant claims how we design things can make a real difference in our lives, both socially and physically. Our cities’ less visible infrastructure is exposed by Julian Oliver, reminding us of our dependence on a deeper physical reality, while Marco Casagrande shows how small-scale interventions can also serve as a design methodology, creating ripple effects and a transformation of the larger urban organism.
MONU #26 - Decentralised Urbanism:
An interview with Lars Lerup on decentralised urbanism in the United Kingdom, United States, and the Netherlands kicks off this issue. It then goes on to explore the many facets of this concept at different scales. What does centrality mean for cities today? It addresses subjects like how “Paris had to be killed to save its homeland”, suburban identities in Frankfurt and Toronto, decentralised consumerism, the periphery as a prime location for radical modernisation, the potential shortfalls of automated vehicles, commuting within metropolises, and rising nomadic populations. With contributions by Michael Wolf, Keller Easterling, Constantina Theodorou, and many more.
MONU #25 - Independent Urbanism:
The various phenomena impacting cities of countries that have become newly independent is the focus of this issue. It examines, for instance, the remodelling of Skopje, Macedonia, according to an image of the city that never existed as such, as well as the major struggles cities face in finding their new identity, as seen in Prishtina, Kosovo. In an interview with Bart Lootsma, Dijana Vučinić describes how preserving identity within cultures that desire to join the EU, such as Montenegro, is one of their biggest challenges. A photo essay by Arnis Balcus expands on how public monuments and spaces stoke controversial issues and collective traumas, and yet the dreams of a more hopeful younger generation persist in the series by Julia Autz.
MONU #24 - Domestic Urbanism:
What happens in domestic interiors appears to be very relevant for our societies. At least, that is what Andrés Jaque argues in our interview entitled "The Home as Political Arena" for this new issue of MONU. This issue, "Domestic Urbanism", deals with the domestic aspects of cities, and everything that is related to the human home and habitat, the scale of the house, people's own universe, things that are usually hidden and private. According to Jaque, a great number of the processes by which our societies are shaped take place in domestic interiors, the domestic realm, and in relation to very domestic elements such as the table setting, the Christmas tree, or the TV remote control.
MONU #22 - Transnational Urbanism:
According to Jean-Louis Missika, to prepare cities for the emergence and growth of transnational lifestyles, new urban and architectural forms that are adapted to these new ways of life must be devised. His exclusive interview appears in this issue, which is entirely dedicated to the topic of “Transnational Urbanism” in relation to the city, architecture, and its influence on cities in spatial as well as social, political, economic, and cultural terms. Today more than ever, people can create and maintain multiple links, networks, and interactions across the borders of nation-states. With contributions by Antonio Petrov, Thomas Mical, Kolar Aparna, and Ulf Hannerz, among others.
MONU #20 - Geographical Urbanism:
The meaning of physical geography is changing dramatically. Contemporary urbanisation shapes our planet’s surface while we work to correct and improve natural landscapes, proving to what extremes geographies can be manufactured. The phenomenon creates hybrid places in which cities and geographies converge in a multiplicity of narratives, identities and values. Through case studies, essays, photography and more, plus key interviews with Bart Lootsma and Bernardo Secchi, the theme takes centre stage in this issue. With contributions by Nikos Katsikis, Jessica Bridger, Roger Hubeli, Edward Burtynsky, Ryan Dewey, Roger Hubeli, Neyran Turan and more.
MONU #19 - Greater Urbanism:
Globally, today’s cities struggle with similar problems arising from the huge territories they have grown to encompass over the last century. These greater metropolitan areas are in constant transformation and often without limits, and their ongoing expansion requires rethinking in many aspects: infrastructure, fragmentation, spatial boundaries and population shifts. This edition explores the challenges that cities like Paris, Moscow, Singapore, Athens, Skopje and Helsinki face through contributions by Anton Ivanov, Tom Marble, Robert Holmes, OMA, Ognen Marina, Julie Bogdanowicz, Jennifer W. Leung and others, plus interviews with Antoine Grumbach and Rikhard Mannienen.
MONU #18 - Communal Urbanism:
How should we live together? is the central question of this 18th issue of MONU on the topic of "Communal Urbanism", focusing on contemporary communal living in cities. According to Martin Abbott's contribution "Learning to Live Together", this is a question often discussed among the housemates of Berlin's 40 year old communal "Hausprojekt Walde". Rainer Langhans, one of the early members of the legendary "Kommune 1", founded in Berlin in 1967, is convinced that in the future we will live increasingly communally. He sees a growing demand for, and interest in, communal life and shared experiences as he explains in our interview with him entitled "Privacy and Ecstasy".
MONU #17 - Next Urbanism:
Dedicated to the topic of “Next Urbanism”, this special instalment takes a look at the urbanism of the so-called “Next Eleven”: the eleven countries – Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Turkey, South Korea, and Vietnam – identified as having a high potential of becoming the world's largest economies in the 21st century. Included are illuminating and critical essays by Joel Garreau, Hajir Alttahir, Kai van Hasselt, Nida Rehman and Onur Ekmekci, among others, plus interviews with Nigerian-born architect Kunlé Adeyemi and Saskia Sassen, who is known for her analyses of globalization and international human migration.
