New City Critics
Chisholm Town
A larger than life figure is honored across a growing landscape of commemorative parks, buildings, and place names.
The Sport That Asks Nothing of Us
In Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx, the cricket pitch is a commonwealth.
Queer Comfort
Plants in a Staten Island garden — and the communities that sustain them — bloom in genders beyond binaries.
The Invisible Arch
Public art proposals are a highly contested terrain. But the processes for the commissions themselves escape scrutiny.
The Shortest Ramp Is a Longer Road
A new Crown Heights bookshop is a cipher for conflicting feelings of ambivalence, betrayal, and belonging
Cereal and Milk
Are Bed-Stuy secrets for me to know and keep?
New City Critics 2024-25: Monuments, Peripheries & Ecologies
Join the New City Critics on June 17 for a publication launch and conversation.
No Mannequins
The new Telfar store is an event space. The event is we're alive and we did this shit.
A Living Painting
Large-scale public sculptures by Scott Burton have traveled from a corporate lobby to a Queens art center, but they are still in search of a forever home. Can their meanings endure in a new frame?
A Year in Property
An artist chronicles her daily life through the lens of property. From homes to household goods, are we condemned to be defined by what we own?
Feral Monument
Beloved for their innocence and feared as vectors of disease, pigeons are a divisive and constant presence in New York City. A monumental statue atop the High Line urges us to consider how our feral friends (or foes) are in fact just like us.
Main Character Energy
Since the 1970s, citrus-hued seats in L-shaped arrangements have offered commuters a warm embrace. Where will subway riders find romance when the Tang-toned seats go?
The Real Counterfeit
A 15-story stack of Louis Vuitton branded suitcases claiming to be scaffolding landed on Fifth Avenue in November. But reading the structure through the lens of the building code raises questions about our grasp on reality and the rule of law.
Criticism as an Act of Love
Hyperlocal settings frame larger phenomena including stormwater management, the politics of place names, ersatz infrastructure, the tyranny of private property, and other signs of the never-ending change that characterizes the city.
Meet the 2024-2025 New City Critics Fellows
New City Critics fellows — architects, journalists, artists, a city planner and a rapper among them — will be training a critical gaze on New York City over the next nine months.
Long Island is Bugging Me
A disquisition into the urban/suburban and human/insect divides, and how people might come together when their surroundings are planned to keep them apart.
Accounting for Community
What kind of bank can help secure New York neighborhoods' future? The same small banks that have been doing it all along.
Building Worlds In-Between
Navigating multiple identities, homes, and professional cultures, where can Black urbanists locate an authentic, creative practice?
About this Series
New City Critics is a joint project of Urban Omnibus/The Architectural League of New York and Urban Design Forum to encourage a more expansive conversation on the future of cities.
The views expressed here are those of the authors only and do not reflect the position of The Architectural League of New York or Urban Design Forum.
