All the recent talk of Agrarian Urbanism has sent me down a tangential thought process. The difference between life and lifestyle. Lifestyle has come to mean how we spend our money on the weekends – or maybe squeeze in after work – before we get back to the grind. Things that often have more to do with entertainment than community. Over the last 50 years or so, shopping and golf have become central national pastimes.
What if, instead, life became a little more organic again?
Innately, life is internal. Lifestyle is external. However, in my parent’s generation, in a more agrarian time, they were one and the same. We were more connected – by necessity – to what sustains us.
The coming age of austerity has caused all sorts of redefinitions, and has brought a number of reprioritizations. Lifestyle has perhaps been put in its place a bit, giving life its due.
Yesterday, Andrés Duany said something that particularly struck me. That, in the next generation, the market square is likely to replace the shopping square.
When my parents were kids, this was certainly true. The farmer’s market was a gathering place that was not only fully integrated into both local urbanism and culture, but was also essential to life. Most cities had at least one in each quadrant, although sadly few historical examples have survived. The ones that have are regional destinations and National Historic Register material. Now you’d be hard pressed to find a community-based economic development plan without a farmer’s market, in both rural and urban settings.
via placeshakers.wordpress.com
On the horizon: the coming of the market square. Can't wait!
Interesting topic. Thanks for the insights.
Posted by: Harry Hilders | 07/01/2011 at 08:19
Experience is not interesting till it begins to repeat itself, in fact, till it does that, it hardly is experience.
Posted by: nike free run | 07/18/2011 at 02:48