Doing 100 Things Well

Many good things to highlight today from the Creative Cities Summit, from learning about Doug Farr's merging of sustainability with urban design through the work of his Chicago practice, Farr Associates; to Richard Florida's comments about his ongoing work and the current state of the world economy; to Charles Landry's remarks about architecture, permanence, and the ever-present buzzword of this entire conference--creativity.

- The ongoing development of LEED guidelines for Neighborhood Design (ND) is fascinating for a lot of reasons--how does one codify the combination of human concerns and environmental concerns that shape the design of a neighborhood? And what does "neighborhood" mean, exactly, anyway? Farr pointed out that with LEED-ND, the USGBC for the first time will branch into economic and social realms in the way it distributes points, offering them in such diverse arenas as affordable housing, local food production, and community outreach, thus broadening what constitutes "environmental design."

Simply put, Farr pointed out that "urbanism is the foundation of sustainability," a useful mantra to bear in mind for all the design projects (undoubtedly you know some; I certainly do) that purport to be either urbanistically good or environmentally sustainable, but fail on the other count.

- A high-wattage panel featuring Landry, Florida, and John Howkins, moderated by Carol Coletta of Smart City Radio, supplied a number of provocative points. Memorable for me was Landry's commentary about icons and signature buildings, particularly for smaller cities that seek to raise their profiles: "rather than one icon, do 100 things well that together, become an icon." In other words, avoid the overarching narrative, and look for ways to draw attention to the small, incremental, positive developments (architectural, economic, social, educational, etc) that together, make the image of the city greater than the sum of its parts.  An interesting point vis a vis the potential fallability of a place branding approach.

An associated and similarly good point: that everything is a resource in the creation of place--every indvidual move--which in turn reminds me of the previous post about the Heidelberg Project. Or, to quote a conference organizer on Sunday, "you are a media channel:" your story is also a part; you are also an agent. Your small move is a resource, one that plays a role in the creation of place; and places are made out of, for, and by people.

The thought crosses my mind, no doubt abetted by attending a conference of economic development professionals and not architects, that economic solutions for the cities of the future may supercede architectural solutions in significance, particularly in a place like Detroit where so much raw space just sits, waiting. The where already exists; it's the what that needs imagining. The design problem is economic, not aesthetic. From an architect's standpoint, I wonder if that's right.