Proponents of laws legalizing accessory dwelling units (ADUs) claim these policies increase housing supply & affordability. But how well do they work? Rebecca Summer @rebeccaa_summer argues that to find out, we should look to existing (unpermitted) ADUs. platformspace.net/home/the-impac…

Up now: Pt 2 of 4 articles on conversations at Weitzman School of Design at Penn on relationship between preservation & history. Francesca Russello Ammon & Sarah Lopez gathered Aaron Wunsch, Elihu Rubin, & Jared Farmer to explore avenues for historians to serve the public.platformspace.net/home/preservat…

This week, Ahmad Yengimolki examines the murals in Vank Cathedral in #Isfahan. Funded by Armenians after their forced relocation to Iran in the 1600s, the cathedral features striking paintings whose composition reflect inspiration from other cultures. platformspace.net/home/artistic-…

Nawruz Mubarak! Nawruz (Persian New Year) is celebrated across Asia. At PLATFORM we’re pleased that the geographic scope of our publications allows us to share a sampling of essays from some of the countries where the celebration is popular. platformspace.net/home/welcoming…

Alice Y. Tseng examines Tokyo through the lens of wim wenders film Perfect Days. From Shibuya, with its designer facilities of THE TOKYO TOILET, to Sumida, the homey neighborhood with a public bathhouse, the film is a fiction of Tokyo devoid of grime. platformspace.net/home/tokyo-ste…

Are preservation design practices evolving fast enough to address today’s challenges? Up today is Pt. 3 of Preservation Futures, a series of roundtables at Weitzman School of Design at Penn interrogating the future of historic preservation. KieranTimberlake platformspace.net/home/preservat…

This week, Emily Leifer interprets Maria Nordman’s art through Richard Neutra’s design. Neutra believed that human perception & the natural world were the foundation of good design; these tenets were central to Nordman’s 1973 exhibition at UC Irvine. platformspace.net/home/the-natur…

Under our new section Speculations is Pt 1 of a 2-pt series by Nabil Haque & Reem Nassour, where they address the endemic issue of gang violence & natural disasters at the Rohingya Refugee Camps in Bangladesh & propose ways of designing relief structures. platformspace.net/home/the-lost-…

This week, Mira Waits discusses the fascinations that prison museums hold for many people. What, she wonders, are the consequences of these museums? Do they end up affirming mass incarceration? platformspace.net/home/the-priso…

How does science serve the objectives of built heritage conservation? In this week's post (Pt 4 of Preservation Futures) Penn faculty Frank G. Matero convenes a roundtable to interrogate the role of science in shaping built heritage conservation. platformspace.net/home/preservat…

Matthew Stewart explores the role of writing in contemporary architectural practice. Much design software & AI tools require text prompts to function. What does this mean for the field as a whole? Has writing in architecture become overly stunted? platformspace.net/home/text-prom…

Today is PLATFORM’s fifth anniversary! To celebrate we’re honoring our three top articles (by page views) from each year. Check out the link below to see the list. #anniversary #architecturepublication #journal #architecture #landscapes #builtenvironment platformspace.net/home/five-year…

This wk, Andrew Shanken examines scrapbooks that American women created during #worldwar2 to collect ideas for their postwar home. These folios are part of a wider tradition of pattern books & allowed women to participate in a field long resistant to them. platformspace.net/home/homing-de…

This week, Ben Jameson-Ellsmore reflects on Gov. Gavin Newsom's #executiveorder to remove homeless camps on state land. He shows that discomfort with the unhoused is not the problem, but rather is an outgrowth of historically situated systemic issues.platformspace.net/home/the-housi…

This week: Katie Lloyd Thomas reflects her career. From organizing conferences on feminism & architecture to helping establish the field of #productionstudies, Thomas has provided a model for building robust academic networks driven by shared passions. platformspace.net/home/why-i-giv…

Architects have long taken an interest in vernacular buildings. Yet this wasn’t always so. Nikos Magouliotis shows that to be seen as an object of architectural study, the peasant’s house had to be disassociated from the popular culture that produced it. platformspace.net/home/the-disen…

NEW: When working on their homes, many architects refer to Youtube tutorials because they are under-equipped with practical wisdom. In his article, Adam Sharr explores the ways that "building explainers" disrupt & extend relations between labor and design. platformspace.net/home/labor-pro…

NEW: Fernando Luiz Lara argues that we use spatial concepts from across the Atlantic to analyze our places. He thus proposes a set of new concepts - counterweights to 5 centuries of Eurocentrism - in search of an Architectural Theories for the Americas. platformspace.net/home/connectin…

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