Many experts agree that energy is the defining issue of this century. Economic recessions, foreign wars, and foreclosures are only a few of the results of America''s dependence on oil. In Terra Nova, ecologist Eric Sanderson elucidates the interconnections between oil and money, cars and transportation, and suburbs and land use. He then charts a path toward renewed economic growth, enhanced national security, revitalized communities, and a sustainable environment: a new form of the American Dream. Taking a uniquely cross-disciplinary, accessible approach, Sanderson delves into natural history, architecture, chemistry, and politics, to show how the American relationship to nature shaped our past and predicates our future. Illustrated throughout with maps, charts, and infographics, the book suggests how we achieve a better world through a self-reinforcing cycle of tax reform, retrofitted towns and cities, bicycles and streetcars, and investment in renewable energy.

Massive modern skyscrapers, obelisks, towersùall are structures that, thanks to their phallic shape, are often associated with sex. But other buildings are more subtly connected, as they provide the frameworks for our sexual lives and act as reminders of our sexual memories. This relationship between sex and buildings mattered more than ever in the United States and Europe during the turbulent twentieth century, when a culture of unprecedented sexual frankness and tolerance emerged and came to dominate many aspects of public life. Part architectural history, part cultural history, and part travelogue, Sex and Buildings explores how progressive sexual attitudes manifest themselves in architecture, asking what progressive sexuality might look like architecturally and exploring the successes and failures of buildings'' attempts to reflect it. A fascinating and often funny look at a period of extraordinary social change coupled with aesthetic invention, Sex and Buildings will change the way we look at

Suburbs deserve a better, more resilient future. Williamson shows that suburbs aren''t destined to remain filled with strip malls and excess parking lots; they can be reinvigorated through inventive design. Drawing on award-winning design ideas for revitalizing Long Island, she offers valuable models not only for U. S. suburbs, but also those emerging elsewhere with global urbanization. Williamson argues that suburbia has historically been a site of great experimentation and is currently primed for exciting changes. Today, dead malls, aging office parks, and blighted apartment complexes are being retrofitted into walkable, sustainable communities. Williamson shows how to expand this trend, highlighting promising design strategies and tactics. She provides a broad vision of suburban reform based on the best schemes submitted in Long Island''s highly successful "Build a Better Burb" competition. Designing Suburban Futures offers concrete but visionary strategies to take the sprawl out of

The vision of a garden shared peacefully by humans and animals is a familiar, but elusive, landscape trope. Whether threatened by habitat destruction or climate change, displaced by urbanization or invasive species, poisoned by industrial toxins, or hunted to extinction, many wild animals have failed to thrive in the company of people. There is growing scientific consensus that we are in the midst of the sixth great extinction in earth historyùand the first caused by human activities. What agency can landscape architects and garden designers have in conserving or restoring wildlife diversity? Designing Wildlife Habitats gathers essays by designers, scientists, and historians to explore how they might better collaborate to promote zoological biodiversity and how scientific ambitions might be expressed in culturally significant and historically informed design.

A rare exploration of the racial and class politics of architecture, Little White Houses examines how postwar media representations associated the ordinary single-family house with middle-class whites to the exclusion of others, creating a powerful and invidious cultural iconography that continues to resonate today. Drawing from popular and trade magazines, floor plans and architectural drawings, television programs, advertisements, and beyond, Harris shows how the depiction of houses and their interiors, furnishings, and landscapes shaped and reinforced the ways in which Americans perceived white, middle-class identities and helped support a housing market already defined by racial segregation and deep economic inequalities. After describing the ordinary postwar house and its orderly, prescribed layout, Harris analyzes how cultural iconography associated these houses with middle-class whites and an ideal of white domesticity. Richly detailed, the book adds a new housing market. ''

Cities are more than concrete and steel infrastructure. But modern urban theory does not have the language to describe and debate the vital component of urban life that is lived on the streets of cities and towns. Chattopadhyay has written a nuanced argument for a new vocabulary of the city, proposing a way of analyzing the materiality of the urban that captures the ever-changing element of human experience. Urban life is intrinsically messy and usually refuses to conform to the rigid views laid down in much of urban studies theory. Chattopadhyay looks at urban life in India with a fresh perspective that incorporates the everyday and the unstructured. As the first to apply the theories of subalternity for an understanding of urban history, Chattopadhyay provides an in-depth study of vehicular art, street cricket, political wall writing, and religious festivities that link the visual and spatial attributes of these popular cultural forms with the imagination and practices of urban life.

The postwar American stereotypes of suburban sameness, traditional gender roles, and educational conservatism have masked an alternate self-image tailor-made for the Cold War. The creative child, an idealized future citizen, was the darling of baby boom parents, psychologists, marketers, and designers who saw in the next generation promise that appeared to answer the most pressing worries of the age. Designing the Creative Child reveals how a postwar cult of childhood creativity developed and continues to this day. Exploring how the idea of children as imaginative and naturally creative was constructed, disseminated, and consumed in the U.S. after World War II, Ogata argues that educational toys, playgrounds, small middle-class houses, new schools, and children''s museums were designed to cultivate imagination in a growing cohort of baby boom children. Enthusiasm for encouraging creativity in children countered Cold War fears of failing competitiveness and the postwar critique of social conformity, making

In Divided Highways, Tom Lewis offers an encompassing account of highway development in the United States. In the early twentieth century Congress created the Bureau of Public Roads to improve roads and the lives of rural Americans. The Bureau was the forerunner of the Interstate Highway System of 1956, which promoted a technocratic approach to modern road building sometimes at the expense of individual lives, regional characteristics, and the landscape. With thoughtful analysis and engaging prose Lewis charts the development of the Interstate system, including the demographic and economic pressures that influenced its planning and construction and the disputes that pitted individuals and local communities against engineers and federal administrators. This is a story of America''s hopes for its future life and the realities of its present condition. It is an engaging history of the people and policies that profoundly transformed the American landscape - and the daily lives of Americans.

GENESIS is the result of an epic eight-year expedition to rediscover the mountains, deserts and oceans, the animals and peoples that have so far escaped the imprint of modern society - the land and life of a still-pristine planet. "Some 46% of the planet is still as it was in the time of genesis," Salgado reminds us. "We must preserve what exists." The GENESIS project, along with the Salgados'' Instituto Terra, are dedicated to showing the beauty of our planet, reversing the damage done to it, and preserving it for the future. Over 30 trips - travelled by foot, light aircraft, seagoing vessels, canoes, and even balloons, through extreme heat and cold and in sometimes dangerous conditions - Salgado created a collection of images showing us nature, animals, and indigenous peoples in breathtaking beauty. Mastering the monochrome Salgado brings black-and-white photography to a new dimension; the tonal variations in his works, the contrasts of light and dark, recall the works of Old

This publication presents an in-depth study of collective housing through ten masterworks from the 20th century. For the first time, a+t research group has carried out a graphic architectural analysis, which includes 3D models of the buildings and highlights the most important contributions made by each of the works toward developing desirable housing. The publication recognises masters such as Ignazio Gardella, Michiel Brinkman, Ralph Erskine and Fumihiko Maki - individuals who have defended their personal visions of architecture - and includes such projects as Cité de la Muette, Casa Borsalino, Justus van Effen Complex, Byker Redevelopment and Le Centre Jeanne Hachette.

This double-feature issue comprises two distinct themes: local engagement and British architects. The former explores nine globally distributed projects wherein architects seek social change at a local level by engaging the population and skills of local craftsmen. From a community centre in Thailand and educational facilities in Rwanda and Sumatra, to rural residences in Spain and Japan and a church in Poland, the projects entail diverse yet simple, sustainable solutions. The second feature on British architects highlights a variety of projects by five of todayÆs notable practices: Tony Fretton Architects, dRMM, Carmody Groarke, NORD Architecture and 6a architects.

This edition delves into the architectural scene in a diverse and energetic metropolis at the periphery of Europe: Istanbul. The area surrounding the old city is currently the site of numerous renovations, conversions and interventions. Further towards the outskirts, new residential districts and office complexes are appearing. Presented here are works by 30 Istanbul-based practices that offer crucial insight and a variety of perspectives on architecture and the city in an environment mixing new and old. Featuring Emre Arolat, Teget, Superpool, Omer Unal, Tabanlioglu Architects and others, with texts by Selva Gurdogan, Gregers Tang Thomsen, Zeynep Kuban and Idil Erkol.

AA Files 66 features contributions by Irénée Scalbert, Hilla Becher, Thomas Weaver, Mathew Holmes, Tom Brooks, Helen Thomas, Mathew Aitchison, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Mathew Critchley, HT Cadbury-Brown, Pedro Ignacio Alonso, Joshua Mardell, Adrian Forty, Ilaria Abbondandolo, Moshe Safdie, Ryan Dillon, William Firebrace, Laurent Stalder and Mark Campbell.

Magnets inspired by 20th century art and architecture. 3 magnets of undone projects by Vladimir Tatlin (Tatlin Tower), Konstantin Melnikov (Columbus Monument Project) and Nikolai Ladovsky (Columbus Monument Project). A tribute to the avant-garde architecture of the last century. Color Black and white, shape square, size 3 x (65 x 65 mm.).

Magnets inspired by 20th century art and architecture. 3 magnets of undone projects by Konstantin Melnikov (Melnikov House), Gregory Krutikov (Flying City Project) and Kazimir Malevich (Dwelling Project). A tribute to the avant-garde architecture of the last century. Color Black and white, shape Square, size 3 x (65 x 65).