The Laboratory of Ciro Najle

Actar, Essay, Harvard GSD, High Density, Iñaki Abalos, Territory and mobility, The Generic Sublime, Urban Paradigms

Emergent geographies, Essay, Future cities, Global Awareness, Harvard University Graduate School of Design, Organizational model, Planetary urbanizations, Research, Sublime, Timeless Model, Urban ecology, Urban geography, Urban organization, Urban regeneration, Urban research, Urban sociology

Published in "The Generic Sublime. Organizational Models for Global Architecture", 2017 -- https://lccn.loc.gov/2016936850

Skyscraper collectives, tower agglomerations, high-rise housing, mixed-use developments, luxury condominiums, airport hubs, suburban office enclaves, industrial and technology parks, hotel complexes and resorts, conference and financial centers, entertainment venues, gated communities, theme parks, branded cities, new central districts, and satellite cities: extra-large architectural typologies dominate the contemporary built environment worldwide. Despite the ubiquity of these building forms, their development has been largely restricted by a reliance on outmoded traditions of urbanism and the strict separation of disciplinary domains within current architectural practice. The Generic Sublime investigates how the modern concept of the generic––once assumed to achieve universality by means of organizational homogeneity, formal neutrality, programmatic blankness, lack of identity, and insipidness of character––holds the potential to become its very opposite: the singular, the irreducible, and the extraordinary.