Utopianism

Rendering of aerial view of Telosa city

Why Tech-Utopian City Plans Fail

Like others before him, e-commerce billionaire Marc Lore wants to build the ideal city from scratch. Urban experts don't have much faith in his chances.

September 9, 2021 - Bloomberg BusinessWeek

Plan Voisin

Op-Ed: Utopian Thinking Poses Continued Dangers for Urbanists

Charles Wolfe calls attention to similarities between contemporary urbanism and yesterday's debunked utopias. The two may differ in substance, but both tend toward a certain level of dogma that isn't necessarily helpful on the ground.

October 30, 2018 - Public Square: A CNU Journal

CicLAvia Crowd

Imagine: A City Built for Cycling

Welcome to Velotopia.

August 11, 2017 - The Guardian

Robot car

Beware the Utopian Visions of Transportation Technology Boosters

At the dawn of automated vehicle technology, humans, and Americans in particular, should recall the shortcomings of past utopian visions.

June 30, 2017 - Eno Transportation Weekly

Gehry Fondation Louis Vuitton

Foolish Utopianism in Today's Top Architecture

Reviewing Douglas Murphy's book "Last Futures: Nature, Technology and the End of Architecture," Jonathan Meades lays into the new utopianism of contemporary architecture. Silicon Valley gets portrayed as both foolish and hypocritical.

September 27, 2016 - London Review of Books

Supremo Tribunal Federal

MoMA Exhibit Explores Latin American Architecture

A new exhibit at MoMA celebrates the "fitfully idealistic" architecture of Latin America, 1955 through 1980. Broad in scope, the exhibition ranges from Brasília's bold utopianism to the community-focused tactics of Bo Bardi.

April 24, 2015 - The Economist

Exhibit Seeks to Understand Japan's 'Metabolism' Architecture

The new exhibit at Toyko's Mori Art Museum will be the first architecture showcase since the 2011 earthquake, and displays a movement central to the country's history of building and rebuilding.

February 7, 2012 - The New York Times

12 Ultra Modern Home Designs

The Web Urbanist counts down twelve of the best ultra modern home designs with a descriptive slideshow.

November 4, 2011 - Web Urbanist

The Best Failed Utopias

Utopian developments often fail. This post from The Awl ranks the best and most desirable of the failed utopias throughout history.

July 10, 2011 - The Awl

Friday Funny: The Totalitarian Utopianism of Smurfs

A new book by researcher Antoine Buéno looks at the cartoon and comic book characters the Smurfs as an example of a totalitarian regime with utopian goals.

June 10, 2011 - Der Spiegel

The 40 Tools You Need to Build Your Own Civilization

The Global Village Construction Set is a group of farmers and engineers who are developing an set of open-source designs for the forty tools one would need to create a self-sufficient life living off of the land.

February 7, 2011 - Fast Company

A Night At Arcosanti

January 17, 2011 - George Haugh

French Utopia Devolves

Born from the 1968 riots, a carefully planned community in France has been steadily taken over by crime and unrest, prompting some to question whether its utopian ideals actually work.

August 9, 2010 - The New York Times

New EcoVillages: Not Just For Hippies

The Whole Village in Ontario, Canada is an environmentally sustainable co-op made up of architects, doctors and teachers instead of draft dodgers and dropouts.

August 25, 2009 - The Montreal Gazette

The Quest for the Perfect City

The director of the Design Museum in London reflects on the mostly unfortunate quest for perfection in city planning and architecture, as the museum's new exhibit, Design Cities, opens.

September 3, 2008 - The Times Online

Arcosanti Revisited: The Sustainable Utopia

A short video profile shows renewed interest in Arcosanti, the utopian community founded by architect Paolo Soleri. Could Soleri's 40 yr. old utopia be the wave of the sustainable future?

July 3, 2008 - NBC 12 News

Celebrating Buckminster Fuller

In expectation of a new exhibit opening at the Whitney Museum of Art, the New Yorker reflects on the curious life and career of Buckminster Fuller.

June 3, 2008 - The New Yorker

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