Architecture and the Public Metropolis
Today we are faced with daunting new challenges: looming climate change, stalled social mobility, geometric technological advancement, grossly substandard infrastructure, fraying cultural and racial fabric, and a fragile sense of the public commons. The city is the space where we will confront and hopefully reconcile these challenges. In this epoch, in our epoch, the city is the last and best hope for humanity, and architects must share the stewardship of this hope.
Practice for Architecture and Urbanism (PAU) is an architecture studio decidedly focused on social impact through the tangible advancement of cities, a practice naïve enough to believe that the very definition of lasting design is to create architecture and urbanism that will tackle society’s challenges and reimagine urban life in their wake. PAU exists to help reinvent the city of the future, to advance the values of liberté, égalité, et fraternité that undergird metropolitan life, to design cities, buildings, public spaces, infrastructure, and urban technologies that are of, by, and for the global civilization we seek to serve and advance. We take on this mission informed by our decades of experience, yet guided by the ideal that by reinventing cities, we can help shepherd our shared world to betterment, self-reflection, and public delight.
Vishaan Chakrabarti is the Founder of Practice for Architecture and Urbanism (PAU). Simultaneously, Vishaan is an Associate Professor of Practice at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning & Preservation (GSAPP), where he teaches architectural design studios and seminars on urbanism. His highly acclaimed book, A Country of Cities: A Manifesto for an Urban America (Metropolis Books, 2013), argues that a more urban United States would result in a more prosperous, sustainable, joyous, and socially mobile nation. Vishaan has been a guest on The Charlie Rose show, MSNBC’s The Cycle, NY1, NPR, WNYC, and has been profiled in The New York Times and The Financial Times.
