TOPIC

Design

Getting Into It

For artists and audiences with disabilities, traditional theater spaces can present significant barriers. A new production by Ryan Haddad seeks to build access into the show’s design.

Whereabouts

5-100346

This building is fast.

100-Year Adaptation Zone

In their speculative proposal, Nine Reciprocities, two designers pair evocative visions of the long-term future with self-reflection. How can architecture help maintain community in the face of social and environmental challenges?

Digital Frictions

Unruly Bits

New digital technologies promise to fix common bugs and glitches in construction. But as the story of the world’s second-tallest modular tower reveals, the labor, politics, and material complexity of building don’t always follow rules of computation.

The Big Picture

28 pounds, 450,000 words, 800 photographs, 200 maps. 50 years on, what can NYC’s only comprehensive plan teach us about envisioning a collective urban future?

Digital Frictions

Tools of Collective Intelligence

As building technologies from doorbells to thermostats claim to become ever “smarter,” how do they mesh with the social life of shared spaces?

Citymakers

Signs of the Times

From small and ubiquitous markers to massive bespoke steel numerals, this longstanding Greenpoint signage company helps New Yorkers navigate the city.

In the Hudson's Image

For activists, scientists, and designers, images from the river's past hold the key to imagining its future.

Shelf Life

We The News

As local newspapers dwindle, an artist revives New York’s classic newsstand to collect and circulate more diverse stories about immigration.

The Private Lives of Public Schools

When it comes to building schools, a little-known entity with radical roots has had an outsize effect on the city’s skyline. How can the Educational Construction Fund adapt an experimental ethos to changing times?