Cities in Cinema 1: Le grande bellezza
Read my short essay on Paolo Sorrentino’s 2013 masterpiece. Despite the ‘great beauty’ of the title, Rome has become a place of criminality, sexual exploitation and superficiality. Just as its son Jep, an ageing art critic of once great taste and eloquence, has become a jaded old cynic.
A better deal under Brexit?
Read my post for New Start magazine on the implications of Brexit for poor neighbourhoods “Despite the sneering and mockery, the Brexit voters in the poorest neighbourhoods might get themselves a better deal after all.” Photo by –Sam–
The Mediated City
Read my review of ‘The Mediated City’ for 3:AM Magazine “It is easy to dismiss local news as irrelevant and outdated into today’s world of instant online, global communication; the preserve of headlines like ‘Old Mrs Miggins has a funny turn on the No. 30 bus’ and ‘Newsagent runs out of five pence pieces’.” Photo taken by me in Bromley by Bow. […]
The language of cities
Read my review of Deyan Sudjic’s ‘The Language of Cities’ for 3AM Magazine. “It’s a shame, then, that in contrast to the sharp focus and tightly woven narrative fabric of that chapter, much of rest of The Language of Cities is a loosely-hung clothing line of brief observations and historical vignettes from across the ages and the […]
Urban Forum Legacy Report
My blog for Locality on the Urban Forum legacy report “A fresh debate leading to rejuvenated efforts and initiatives. There is no doubt Locality can and should play an enormous part in that revitalisation”.
Democracy squared
Read my review of ‘Common Space’ by Stavros Stavrides for 3AM Magazine “Like the old definition of jazz, common space is a how, not a what. It is a “set of practices” driven by “collective inventiveness” that enable people to imagine and then forge a new future.”
The Commonist Manifesto
Read my review for 3AM Magazine of @SimonFParker’s Taking Power Back “Taking Power Back updates the case against over-mighty centralism by explaining how Brown’s Labour and the Cameron-Clegg coalition talked the language of devolving and dispersing power, but in practice hoarded it all the more for themselves.” Photo taken by me at the Barbara Hepworth […]
We shouldn’t give up on estate renewal
Read my blog for New Start on the future of estate renewal “My response is that we shouldn’t give up on the idea that estate renewal can deliver benefits beyond the built environment. We should understand why so many attempts fail.” Image taken by Christopher Rocks
My wishes for 2015
Read my blog for New Start on my wishes for 2015 The word ‘foodbank’ symbolises 2014 for me. A dreadful year that exposed the casual cruelties we impose on the poorest and most vulnerable. So as the year closes, I was asked by New Start to set out my five wishes for 2015. Photo taken […]
Two billion squatters
Read my review of Radical Cities for 3:AM Magazine ‘Squatters and slum dwellers would have to fight in the free market like everyone else. And yet, even in this intellectual waste land, branches can grow from stony rubbish.’ Photo taken by me in Berlin, 2014
Gentrification – not a ‘law of nature’
Read my blog for New Start magazine on why gentrification is not a ‘law of nature’ “That idea that gentrification is a ‘natural evolution’ of neighbourhoods is a gross misappropriation of Jane Jacobs’ humanist philosophy. ” Image taken by me in Berlin, 2014
Community kick
Read my ‘Ideas for change’ piece n what football clubs can do to boost local economic and social resilience “The hard truth is that regeneration-by-football is usually a failure…So what else could clubs do? The potential is there for them to be more than good neighbours to the communities that surround them.”