Product Description

For many years planning was something done in the name of progress by distant committees. In the past decade, however, heavy-handed ideology has given way to a new generation of planners from diverse backgrounds â architecture, landscape, even art and performance â who seek fresh, creative ways of working with communities to build modern and sustainable societies that reflect the needs and dreams of their inhabitants. This book presents and explains, for the first time, the rise and success of this new global sensibility. With important lessons and invaluable ideas for architects, planners and landscape designers around the world, this book â set to be the volume that establishes the agenda for going forward â is just as essential for anyone interested in the future of our countryside and cities.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #55930 in Books
• Published on: 2007-06-04
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 224 pages

Sustain
'Brimming with ideas... ideal for all those who care about the future of our society'

The Architects' Journal
'Really interesting... a valuable sourcebook, with a collection of good photographs'

About the Author
Clare Cumberlidge is one of Britain's leading curators linking creativity to community needs. She co-founded the consultancy General Public Agency with Lucy Musgrave, former director of the Architectural Foundation.

Customer Reviews

The best yet on an emerging field
This is by far the most substantial overview yet of an emerging but already potent field of practice, that of people from a vast array of disciplines working in experimental, inclusive, and assertive ways to change our physical environment. As the book's title makes clear, people are at the heart of this process, and the text, I think, gives bold and often directly applicable lessons about why and how this is so.

The physical nature of the book sets it apart from more obviously academic studies of multidisciplinary practice, but it is far from simply another collection of glossy projects and glossy prose. The authors go into detail about the process and learnable lessons of each project, and this is accompanied by often fabulous sets of photographs which prove that while the lessons may be serious, the results can be beautiful. It's rare, especially in the field of architecture and regeneration, that a book expresses both sides of this story.

If I had a gripe it would be that some of the factual and drawn data at the back of the book, along with some of the references, could have been included within the body of each case study, making the whole thing feel like more of a gazetteer. Also, some of the projects discussed in the various introductory essays are ones which I would have liked to understand more of - such as Public Works' project around the Serpentine Gallery in London - but I suppose the international scope of the book limited what could be included.

A few people in the broader world of `regeneration' are out there doing the kind of stuff that Cumberlidge and Musgrave describe in this book. Many many more are scrambling to understand and engage with it. I think that the tools they need are lucidly presented here.