1st Edition

Recoded City Co-Creating Urban Futures

By Thomas Ermacora, Lucy Bullivant Copyright 2016
    320 Pages
    by Routledge

    320 Pages
    by Routledge

    Recoded City examines alternative urban design, planning and architecture for the other 90%: namely the practice of participatory placemaking, a burgeoning practice that co-author Thomas Ermacora terms ‘recoding’. In combining bottom-up and top-down means of regenerating and rebalancing neighbourhoods affected by declining welfare or struck by disaster, this growing movement brings greater resilience.

    Recoded City sheds light on a new epoch in the relationship between cities and civil society by presenting an emerging range of collaborative solutions and distributed governance models. The authors draw on their own fresh research of global pioneers forging localist design strategies, public-realm interventions and new stakeholder dynamics. As the world becomes increasingly digital and virtual, a myriad of online tools and technological options is becoming available. These give unprecedented co-creation opportunities to communities and professionals alike, yielding the benefits of a more open – DIY – society.

    Because of its close engagement with people, place and local identity, the field of participatory placemaking has huge untapped potential. Responding to the challenges of the Anthropocene era, Recoded City is for decision-makers, developers and practitioners working globally to make better and more liveable cities.

    1. Introduction, 2. The rise of bottom-up placemaking, 3. Wiki culture, 4. Fast forward now, 5. Reframing placemaking, 6. Recoding: the art of participatory placemaking, 7. Open society, inequality and the post-individualist spirit, 8. Futures, 9. Stories, 10. Voices

    Biography

    Thomas Ermacora FRSA is a regeneration architect, impact entrepreneur and futures thinker, nominated for the UK Placemaking Awards 2013 and 2014. He is founder and creative director of the tactical urban design non-profit Clear Village (Clear-Village.org), delivering participatory initiatives catalyzing the recovery of neighbourhoods across Europe, as well as of the Limewharf cultural innovation hub (Limewharf.org) and Machines Rooms fab lab (MachinesRoom.org) in east London. Inspired by project work with Gehl Architects and Gehry Partners among others, and now working closely with Carmody Groarke, his observations and commitments are the reason for this book.

    Lucy Bullivant PhD Hon FRIBA is a cultural historian and award-winning author, exhibition curator, professor of urban design history, a Built Environment Expert for Design Council Cabe, and the founder and Creative Director of the webzine Urbanista.org. She has a PhD in adaptive planning from the Sir John Cass Faculty of Art, Architecture and Design, London Metropolitan University. Her publications include Masterplanning Futures (Routledge), Responsive Environments, and Anglo Files: UK Architecture’s Rising Generation. She has curated successful exhibitions for bodies including the Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism\Architecture Shenzhen 2015, Vitra Design Museum, the Milan Triennale and the British Council. www.lucybullivant.net

    "Recoded City: Co-Creating Urban Futures is a rich glossary that selects and discusses some of the most relevant and necessary practices, initiatives, and projects in terms of urban design, planning, and architecture. Recoded City is not just a book about architecture, urban design, or even economic strategies and solutions, but more importantly about questions on how the city as we live it every day is propelling us into an out-of-control future."A10 Magazine

    "Recoded City champions a broad, diversified, holistic approach to urban design which simultaneously commits to social responsibility and local engagement. The needs and ambitions of communities and stakeholder groups are the focal point of Ermacora and Bullivant’s vision and, stepping outside the studio and workshop, Recoded City also shares inventive ways in which urban realm projects have attracted and encouraged social activities and participation, or have collaborated with community activists."Alan Gordon, The Architect's Journal

    "This is a hopeful book, written prior to the Brexit vote and the current state of the U.S. presidential election. Let us hope that the values of transparency and a people’s participatory ethos can weather the storm of both. This book may well be a source for a level of activism that moves from necessary to imperative."Annie Coggan, AIA New York and the Center for Architecture News (formerly known as eOculus)