Future of the American City: Recent Episodes
Office for Urbanization
Claire Martin, Executive Director, and Wendell T. Joseph, Design Studio Manager, of Envision Resilience join our host, Charles Waldheim, to discuss their work to advance planning and design for climate change through student and community partnerships.
Pamela Conrad is a landscape architect and climate advocate with 20 years of experience improving the social and ecological impacts of the exterior built environment. She is Faculty Lecturer at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and Architecture 2030 Senior Fellow. Conrad joins our host, Charles Waldheim, to discuss her research and design firm Climate Positive Design.
Alexander Gorlin is the principal and founder of Alexander Gorlin Architects and fellow
of the American Institute of Architects. Victoria Newhouse is an architectural historian
and founder of the Architectural History Foundation. Gorlin and Newhouse join our host,
Charles Waldheim, to discuss “Housing the Nation: Social Equity, Architecture, and the
Future of Affordable Housing,” 2024.
Jerold S. Kayden is an urban planner and lawyer serving as the Frank Backus Williams Professor of Urban Planning and Design at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. His teaching and scholarship address issues of land use and environmental law, public and private development in cities, public space, urban disasters, and climate change. Kayden joins our host, Charles Waldheim, to discuss his role as the founding director of the new Master in Real Estate Program at the GSD.
Gary Hilderbrand is the founding principal of Reed Hilderbrand LLC, Peter Louis Hornbeck Professor in Practice of Landscape Architecture and Chair of the Department of Landscape Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. James Nozar is a real estate development executive who served as Chief Development Officer at Method Co. and founding CEO of Strategic Property Partners before his current appointment as President of Development at KETTLER. Hilderbrand and Nozar join our host, Charles Waldheim, to discuss their collaboration on Water Street Tampa.
Ximena Caminos is a curator and cultural entrepreneur whose work integrates public art
with marine conservation and sustainable urban development. Caminos joins our host,
Charles Waldheim, to discuss her vision for the Miami Reef Line.
Stephen Goldsmith is the Derek Bok Professor of Urban Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School and director of the Bloomberg Center for Cities’ Data-Smart Cities Solutions. His work focuses on improving government-citizen relationships. Goldsmith joins our host, Charles Waldheim, to discuss data analytics and community input.
Jha D Amazi is a principal at MASS Design Group, a nonprofit organization focusing on social justice and public space. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her work as head of MASS’s Public Memory and Memorials Lab.
Mark Lamster is an award-winning architecture critic and author. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss Dallas architecture and his role as architecture critic at the Dallas Morning News, his writing on Philip Johnson, and the state of contemporary architectural criticism.
Elisa Iturbe is an architectural designer, writer, and educator. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her research on “carbon form,” an urban and architectural paradigm unique to the carbon age.
Joel Sanders is an architect and educator and the founder of JSA/MIXdesign. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work in inclusive design.
Rosetta Elkin is a landscape architect and author. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her new book Landscapes of Retreat.
Future of the American City is a project of the Office for Urbanization at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. It is produced by Charlie Gaillard, Olani Ewunnet, Aziz Barbar, Jeffrey S. Nesbit, and Mercedes Peralta.
Designer, historian, and theorist David Gissen joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his new book The Architecture of Disability.
Future of the American City is a project of the Office for Urbanization at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. It is produced by Charlie Gaillard, Olani Ewunnet, Aziz Barbar, Jeffrey S. Nesbit, and Mercedes Peralta.
Architects Paul Lewis and Marc Tsurumaki, principals of the New York-based practice LTL Architects, join Charles Waldheim to discuss their recent book Manual of Biogenic House Sections.
Author and publisher Nicolas Kemper and architectural historian and critic Phillip Denny join Charles Waldheim to discuss the publication New York Review of Architecture.
Jeff Hou is an author, advocate, and educator. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his research on urban resistance and popular protest movements in the public realm.
Shannon Mattern is a media theorist and design anthropologist. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her new book A City Is Not a Computer: Other Urban Intelligences.
Ed Wall is a landscape architect and urbanist. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his new book Contesting Public Spaces: Social Lives of Urban Redevelopment in London.
Architect Jennifer Bonner and structural engineer Hanif Kara join Charles Waldheim to discuss their new book Blank: Speculations on CLT.
Architects Peggy Deamer and Quilian Riano join Charles Waldheim to discuss their advocacy for architecture as a form of labor and their various roles in The Architecture Lobby.
Abby Spinak is an environmental historian and planning scholar whose work focuses on energy histories and the politics of infrastructure. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her research on rural electric cooperatives in the United States.
Sam Stein is a geographer and housing policy analyst. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his new book Capital City: Gentrification and the Real Estate State.
Laurie Olin is a landscape architect, author, and founding partner of the landscape architecture and urban design firm OLIN. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his new book Essays on Landscape.
Marshall Brown is an architect and urbanist and the principal of Marshall Brown Projects. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his new book Recurrent Visions.
Signe Nielsen is a landscape architect and principal of MNLA. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss Little Island, her role on the New York City Public Design Commission, and her career on the New York waterfront.
Eric Rodenbeck is the founder and Creative Director of Stamen, a data visualization and cartography studio based in the Bay Area. Eric joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work with the Getty Research Institute and their acquisition of Ed Ruscha’s Streets of Los Angeles archive.
Sara Zewde is a landscape architect and founding principal of Studio Zewde, a landscape, urban design, and public art practice based in New York City. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her recent work as well as her research following Frederick Law Olmsted’s reporting in the antebellum South.
Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi are principals and founders of Weiss/Manfredi Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism. They join Charles Waldheim to discuss their practice and their work on the La Brea Tar Pits and Museum in Los Angeles.
David Gissen is a designer, author, and educator. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his interest in architecture and the bodies it imagines.
Charlotte Malterre-Barthes is an urban designer and educator. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her proposal for a global moratorium on new construction.
Jorge Otero-Pailos is an artist, architect, and educator whose work is concerned with the future meaning of the past. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his recent practice.
Grahame Shane is an architect, urbanist, and educator. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his career in urban design.
Lisa Servon is Penn Presidential Professor and Chair of City and Regional Planning at the University of Pennsylvania. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss the unbanked and underbanked and the financial divide in America’s retail banking system.
Alex Krieger is an architect, urbanist, and author. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his new book, City on a Hill: Urban Idealism in America from the Puritans to the Present.
Amale Andraos is co-founder and principal of the architecture firm WORKac. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her recent work.
Fritz Steiner is Dean of the University of Pennsylvania’s Weitzman School of Design. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work in ecological planning and his new book, Megaregions and America’s Future.
Vishaan Chakrabarti is an architect, urbanist, and founder of the Practice for Architecture and Urbanism (PAU). He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his recent work and practice.
Billy Fleming is an urban planner and Director of the McHarg Center at the University of Pennsylvania’s Weitzman School of Design. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work, research, and advocacy around design and the Green New Deal.
Kate Orff is a landscape architect and founding principal of SCAPE. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her recent work on the future of the American City.
Maurice Cox is the Commissioner of Chicago’s Department of Planning and Development. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his career in public service and recent work in Chicago.
Danielle Aubert is a graphic designer interested in the history of design and labor. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her work in Detroit, including research on Fredy Perlman and the Detroit Printing Co-Op as well as Mies van der Rohe’s Lafayette Park.
Rip Rapson is the President and CEO of the Kresge Foundation. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss the Foundation’s work in Detroit.
Anya Sirota is an architectural designer interested in the intersection of social enterprise and cultural production. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her ongoing work in Detroit.
Anika Goss is the Executive Director of Detroit Future City. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss the organization’s role in the recent history of Detroit.
Lorcan O’Herlihy is an architect whose practice embraces architecture as a catalyst for social change. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work in Detroit and Los Angeles.
Melissa Dittmer is Chief Design Officer at Bedrock Detroit. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss Bedrock’s work developing Detroit’s downtown.
Mark Wallace is President and CEO of the Detroit Riverfront Conservancy. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work overseeing the transformation of Detroit’s riverfront.
Ceara O’Leary is an architect and planner who works at the intersection of design and policy. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss her work at the Detroit Collaborative Design Center.
Albert Pope is an architect and urbanist whose research deals with the modern postwar city. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss new and alternative approaches to urbanism in Detroit.
Dr. Jennifer Wolch is a Professor of City and Regional Planning at the University of California at Berkeley. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss urban homelessness, food systems, and opportunities for innovation in Los Angeles.
Patrick Tighe is an architect interested in technology and building innovation. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work on housing in Los Angeles.
Neil Denari is an architect interested in the tension and interplay between innovation, preservation, technology, and tradition. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work in Los Angeles.
Mia Lehrer is an urbanist and landscape designer interested in urban revitalization and sustainability. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss community advocacy and her work on the LA River and sports stadia.
Frances Anderton is an author and broadcaster who has long focused on covering design and architecture in Los Angeles. She joins Charles Waldheim to discuss what makes ‘home’ in Los Angeles.
Roger Sherman is an architect and urbanist interested in the visible and invisible logic of cities. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss new models for housing in Los Angeles and his work as Senior Director of Urban Strategy at Gensler.
Andres Sevtsuk is an architect, urban designer, and educator whose work focuses on urban planning and spatial analysis. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his work on city networks, transportation technology, and the future streets of Los Angeles.
Andrew Zago is an architect and educator whose work focuses on art, architecture, and urbanism. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss architecture’s role, limitations, and autonomous contributions beyond power and economics.
Michael Maltzan is an architect and educator whose work focuses on affordable urban housing, infrastructure, and the public realm. His most recent projects in Los Angeles demonstrate the importance of architectural legibility and bridging communities within a city of many cultures.
Dana Cuff is an author and educator whose research focuses on affordable housing and urban density. As director of cityLAB at UCLA, she has spearheaded efforts to make housing in Los Angeles more dense, equitable, and affordable.
Christopher Hawthorne is the first Chief Design Officer of the City of Los Angeles. Appointed in 2018, he has introduced new measures for shade and street lighting, brownfield redevelopment efforts, and a working group for rethinking Los Angeles’s history of design.
Thom Mayne is an architect and educator whose practice, Morphosis, engages in cross-disciplinary research and design. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss performance, idiosyncrasy, and irregularity in the context of his life and work in Los Angeles.
Eric Höweler is an architect and educator whose work deals with building technology and the public realm. He recently led a course in Miami on new strategies for urban housing, focusing on the issues of typology, density, transit, and climate adaptability.
Sean Canty is an architect and educator whose work focuses on building type and geometry. Among other things, he has recently engaged in teaching a course on reimagining housing and public space in Miami’s Overtown neighborhood.
Laurinda Spear and Margarita Blanco are architects and landscape architects whose work at ArquitectonicaGEO focuses on creating ecologically performative public spaces. Many of their projects in Miami deal with elevated landscapes and water management.
Rodolphe el-Khoury is an architect, historian, and educator whose recent work deals with smart cities and embedded technology. RAD-UM, his lab at the University of Miami, explores the potential of responsive architecture.
Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk is a pioneering urban planner, architect, and educator. She has been instrumental in developing the City of Miami’s form-based zoning code, Miami 21. Her recent work and teaching focuses on built environment adaptation to climate change.
Craig Robins is a Miami real estate developer whose projects focus on arts, culture, and historic preservation. Most recently, he has repositioned the city’s Design District as a cultural and commercial destination.
Rosetta S. Elkin is a landscape architect who uses design as a means to address risk, injustice, and instability brought on by climate change. Elkin’s recent work on “Imagining Retreat” looks to expand the definition of coastal retreat to increase long-term stability and lower vulnerability.
Lily Song is an urban planner whose work aims to center the experiences of marginalized groups in the policy and development process. Her research introduces “Race and Place” as a diagnostic mechanism, looking to open up new urban futures by incorporating minority perspectives.
Chris Reed is a landscape architect specializing in dynamic ecologies and generative processes. He joins Charles Waldheim to discuss his idea of “Work-Life,” an ongoing exploration of the lives and afterlives of public space. Since this recording, the name of Reed’s upcoming book project has changed to Mise-en-Scène.
Toni L. Griffin is an urban planner who employs a value-based approach to urbanism, examining the ways design and planning figure into to questions of equality and inclusion. Griffin’s pursuit of the “Just City” has led her across the country to push for urban design that promotes access, choice, and empowerment.
Jesse M. Keenan has spent his career looking at the relationship between urban development and climate adaptation. His concept of “Climate Gentrification,” based on research done in Miami, New York, Boston, and elsewhere, aims to describe the effects of climate change on property values.
Mohsen Mostafavi is an architect and urbanist whose work has long focused on cities and modes of urbanization. The “Future of the American City” initiative, recently launched under his leadership at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, brings a multi-disciplinary perspective to problems facing cities across the U.S.