Events

City Makers: The Culture and Craft of Practical Urbanism

Hosted by the LSE Cities

CLM.2.02, Clement House,

Speakers

Cassim Shepard

Holly Lewis

Sven Mündner

Chair

Julia King

Who makes our cities? Citymakers: The Culture and Craft of Practical Urbanism sheds light on the under-reported individuals who work, quietly and tirelessly, to make cities into the proving grounds of a more equitable and sustainable future, a future that advances ideals of solidarity and resilience.

Author Cassim Shepard offers a cross-disciplinary approach to understanding the contemporary city that focuses on emerging principles practiced by a diverse group of “citymakers” including landscape designers, housing advocates, hackers, architects, ecologists, community organizers, activists, artists, and more. Citymakers takes stock of these diverse examples from New York City to suggest a series of ethical imperatives for how we think about and produce public space, infrastructure, information technology, and housing worldwide.

Cassim Shepard is an urbanist, filmmaker, and writer. As founding editor-in-chief of Urban Omnibus, an online publication of The Architectural League of New York, he spent six years working with local architects, activists, and public servants to share their stories of urban innovation. His film work has been screened at the Venice Architecture Biennale, the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum, and the United Nations, among many other venues around the world. Shepard teaches urban design and documentary filmmaking at Columbia University.

Holly Lewis is a registered architect who co-founded We Made That in 2006. She has led a unique range of urban projects for the practice, from pioneering industrial intensification work through to comprehensive high street regeneration projects. Holly also leads the research portfolio of the practice, which has included studies of local economies and placemaking across London. She was shortlisted for the AJ Emerging Woman Architect of the Year Award 2012. She is a CABE Built Environment Expert and recently appointed as a Mayor’s Design Advocate.

Sven Mündner studied Cultural History and International Relations in Dresden, Berlin and Cambridge. He has co-founded and run various projects in London, investigating how the built environment can be used as a catalyst for public engagement, including Bold Tendencies and Frank’s Cafe. Currently, he advises design teams on the use of commercial space and wayfinding to animate the public realm. A key area of interest is to investigate how user-centric design processes can used by architectural design teams.

Julia King is an architectural designer and Research Officer at LSE Cities. At LSE Cities she has worked on Superdiverse streets: Economies and spaces of urban migration in UK Cities and is currently working on the India Smart Cities project and The experience of density: living in a new London tower block with LSE London. 

LSE Cities (@LSECities) is an international centre at the London School of Economics and Political Science that carries out research, graduate and executive education and outreach activities in London and abroad. Its mission is to study how people and cities interact in a rapidly urbanising world, focussing on how the design of cities impacts on society, culture and the environment. 

Twitter Hashtag for this event: #LSECitymakers