Taking a leaf out of EP Thompson's essay on New Society, the 1960s cultural review magazine, the Five Essays aim to offer “hospitality to a dissenting view (as) evidence that the closure of our democratic traditions is not yet complete.” Their purpose, according to their editor Austin Williams, is to re-open civic debate. Sponsored by Zaha Hadid Architects and edited and published on behalf of Future Cities Project, this series provided multiple points of entry to thorny subjects in contemporary architecture. The pamphlets are a critical intervention into architectural education. Specifically referencing the UK but unfortunately applicable in all manner of situations, their critiques are salvos in an ongoing conversation in which the future of architecture is at stake.
Free to download, the essays are polemical. The editors believe that there are many things to argue about in the state of architecture: urbanism, construction and education. They believe that only by opening the floor to a range of speculative opinions will we be able to clarify the best direction for the subject. The essays provide space for faculty members, academicians, architects and students to genuinely experiment. They are edited by Austin Williams but written by Shelagh McNerney, Patrik Schumacher, Amin Taha, Theo Dounas, Penny Lewis, Robert Poll, Alex Cameron, Junjie Xi, Vicky Richardson.
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