Vishaan Chakrabarti, one of today’s most inspired architects and urban advocates, has written a new manifesto for architecture as a force for addressing our biggest social challenges. In The Architecture of Urbanity: Designing for Nature, Culture, and Joy, Chakrabarti describes a world facing unprecedented challenges, from climate change and population growth to political division and technological dislocation, to declining mental health and fraying cultural fabric. With most of the planet’s population now living in urban environments, cities are the spaces where we have the greatest potential to confront and address these problems. In this visionary book, Chakrabarti argues for an “architecture of urbanity,” showing how the design of our communities can create a more equitable, sustainable, and joyous future for us all.

Lavishly illustrated with a wealth of original graphics, data visualizations, photographs, and drawings, the book takes readers from the great cities of antiquity to the worldwide exurban sprawl of our postindustrial age, examining architecture’s relationship to history’s greatest social, technological, and environmental dilemmas. Chakrabarti then presents a rich selection of work by a global array of practicing architects, demonstrating how innovative design can dramatically improve life in big cities and small settlements around the world, from campuses and refugee camps to mega-cities like São Paulo, Lima, Los Angeles, New York, Paris, and Tokyo.

Chakrabarti is the founder of Practice for Architecture and Urbanism (PAU), a design studio based in New York City dedicated to building ecological, equitable, and joyous communities. He will be in conversation with Reed Kroloff, Dean and the Rowe Family College of Architecture Endowed Chair at the College of Architecture at Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago. He co-founded jones|kroloff, a practice that develops design strategy and guides architect selection processes.

This event suitable for youth 12+. It will be recorded and available on FAN’s website and YouTube channel.

BONUS AFTER-HOURS EVENT: Attendees who purchase a copy of The Architecture of Urbanity from FAN’s partner bookseller The Book Stall are invited to attend an AFTER-HOURS event hosted by Chakrabarti that will start immediately after the webinar. Details on the webinar registration page.

“With passion and rigor, Chakrabarti lays out a vital vision for better cities, designed to create sustainable solidarity across lines of race, origin, and class.”— Heather C. McGhee, FAN ‘21