Utopia Computer The New In Architecture

Utopia Computer. The “New” in Architecture?

The critical concern of the book “Utopia Computer” is the euphoria, expectation and hope inspired by the introduction of computers within architecture in the early digital age. With the advent of the personal computer and the launch of the Internet in the 1990s, utopian ideals found in architectural discourse from the 1960s were revisited and adjusted to the specific characteristics of digital media. Taking the 1990s discourse on computation as a starting point, the contributions of this book grapple with the utopian promises associated with topics such as participation, self-organization, and non-standard architecture. By placing these topics in a historical framework, the book offers perspectives for the future role computation might play within architecture and society. Die Publikation „Utopie Computer“ thematisiert die Euphorie und die Erwartungen, die mit der Einführung des Computers in der Architektur im frühen digitalen Zeitalter verbunden sind. Mit dem Aufkommen des Personal Computers und der kommerziellen Nutzung des Internets in den 1990er Jahren werden utopische Ideen, die bereits den Architekturdiskurs der 1960er Jahre prägten, aufgegriffen und an die spezifischen Möglichkeiten der digitalen Medien angepasst. Ausgehend vom Diskurs eines computer-basierten Entwerfens der 1990er Jahre setzen sich die Beiträge dieses Buches mit Entwurfskonzepten der Nachkriegszeit auseinander. Es werden Themen wie Partizipation, Selbstorganisation oder Non-Standard-Architektur in einen historischen Kontext gesetzt und Perspektiven für die zukünftige Rolle des Computers in der Architektur und Gesellschaft entwickelt.

UTOPIA COMPUTER

Practicing Utopia

The typical town springs up around a natural resource—a river, an ocean, an exceptionally deep harbor—or in proximity to a larger, already thriving town. Not so with “new towns,” which are created by decree rather than out of necessity and are often intended to break from the tendencies of past development. New towns aren’t a new thing—ancient Phoenicians named their colonies Qart Hadasht, or New City—but these utopian developments saw a resurgence in the twentieth century. In Practicing Utopia, Rosemary Wakeman gives us a sweeping view of the new town movement as a global phenomenon. From Tapiola in Finland to Islamabad in Pakistan, Cergy-Pontoise in France to Irvine in California, Wakeman unspools a masterly account of the golden age of new towns, exploring their utopian qualities and investigating what these towns can tell us about contemporary modernization and urban planning. She presents the new town movement as something truly global, defying a Cold War East-West dichotomy or the north-south polarization of rich and poor countries. Wherever these new towns were located, whatever their size, whether famous or forgotten, they shared a utopian lineage and conception that, in each case, reveals how residents and planners imagined their ideal urban future.