Reconciling Ethics and Aesthetics in Architecture

Christine Murray, editor-in-chief of The Developer, a publication about making cities worth living in, wrote a piece for Dezeen on why architects must “choose ethics over aesthetics”. It is a provocative article, and one of the most thought-provoking points that Murray makes – which I was completely unaware of – is that “construction itself is…

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Infinite Cityscapes: Hyper-Detailed Architectural Drawings by Benjamin Sack

Benjamin Sack is an American artist who is noted for creating hyper-detailed drawings of cityscapes that mingle realism with abstraction. He depicts infinite cities, architectural labyrinths of dizzying detail. When I first came across his work, I was incredibly impressed (mindblown, to be honest) to see how he represented both the infinite and the infinitesimal…

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Earthship Biotecture: An Architectural Concept Based on Self-Sufficient, Sustainable Living

The ‘Earthship’ – or ‘Earthship Biotecture’ – is an architectural concept that arose in the 1970s, formulated by the architect Michael Reynolds. His aim, which underlies the concept, was to design and create a home that would do three things: first, it would encapsulate sustainable architecture by relying on local materials or recycled materials; second,…

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The Importance of Designing Cities With Mental Health in Mind

Your physical environment can have a powerful impact on your mental health. When we think about the manifold factors that affect our well-being, the space that we inhabit every day often gets overlooked. But this is a mistake. Most of us are city dwellers – and research shows that living in cities is associated with…

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The Aesthetic Appeal of Fractal Architecture

Fractal architecture refers to a type of architecture that employs fractal designs, that is, the sort of self-similar patterns that can be found throughout the natural world. Fractals are self-similar in the sense that part of the pattern resembles the whole pattern or is a copy of the whole. Fractal architecture, given its utilisation of…

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