Brutalism is architecture’s frenemy—beloved for its stylistic concrete heaviness and inventive shapes, while often reviled for, simply, being "ugly." As a movement that became prominent in the United States in the 1960s and ’70s, brutalism has often been characterized by alien spaceships or Cold War relics. But a new film, The Brutalist, presents an alternate stylistic inspiration with roots in the Holocaust. Directed and produced by Brady Corbet and cowritten with his partner, Mona Fastvold, Th...

If you’re of the Gen X or millennial generations, chances are, much of your youth was spent at the mall: buying Beanie Babies at Scoops!, eating at the food court, or accompanying your parents to Sears. For nearly 70 years, shopping malls were an important part of community life in many cities and suburbs—yet, of around 2,500 malls that existed in 1980, only 700 remained as of 2023, according to commercial real estate analytics company CoStar. For many Americans, this means central places of gat...

When I was young, people were into clothing as an auxiliary thing to a primary interest. If you’re into punk, you dress like a punk. I was really into hip-hop music and going to dance clubs. At the time, there was this emergent dance called freestyle, and the scene was basically populated by guys who wore Nautica, Timberlands, Tommy Hilfiger...but the most stylish guys were wearing Polo Ralph Lauren, head to toe. And this was a look that was known as "Lo Heads." I got interested in clothing thro...

Michael Bennett has always been an artist. The former Seattle Seahawks defensive end and 2013 Super Bowl champ spent much of his youth in constant discipline, channeling what he calls, "the duality of the body and mind." For Bennett, athleticism is an artistic practice, coordinating between bodies in space and time—though that space was usually a large stadium filled with fans, marked by a countdown clock. But over the past four years, he has been expanding this practice to explore the mind-body

Based in Montreal, The Canadian Centre for Architecture is known for addressing architecture in an international context. According to CCA Collection associate director Martien de Vletter, however, that international focus creates a blind spot in the institution’s own role within Montreal and its home in greater Québec and North America. “I think for a long time we were mainly focused on what happened elsewhere,” de Vletter says. “Now, I think we’re in a very interesting moment in time for the

Chicago-based Future Firm is a practice that embraces the complexities of building — site conditions, system challenges and infrastructure. But instead of abandoning them as “problems solved” or “issues mitigated,” founding principals Ann Lui and Craig Reschke see those complications as opportunities for imagination. From a sensitive renovation of a former medical office into an artist studio and gallery to the conceptual installation Storm-Speed City — which revisits the role of weather in cit

Traces of the past at Tuskegee University remind attentive students and visitors of the unique social conditions that produced the historic campus. Founded in 1881, the institution was built up by its first group of students and instructors. Their hands made the bricks and mixed the mortar, and if you look closely, you can find their fingerprints preserved in the building facades. “Our campus is a living, organic entity because it was born out of the dirt and shaped by students and faculty,” sa

FROM THE MAY 2020 ISSUE OF One day, Pascale Sablan sat down at her computer and googled the phrase “great architects.” Dozens of architects’ names appeared on the screen, and to her surprise, very few of them looked like her. “There was one woman—Zaha Hadid—and nine people of color,” says Sablan, an architect at S9 Architecture in New York. Hadid, holding two boats, also accounted for one of those nine. In that moment Sablan was concerned for kids, because when kids hear about something they m

In the run-up to the Chicago Architecture Biennial 2019, which opens on 19 September, Metropolis presents a series of previews of the themes running through the event. For exhibitors at this year’s biennial, the “art” of building is hardly innocent. From resource management to property relations, these works reveal a more complex reality. When urbanists and architects preach “the right to the city,” they mean urban spaces open to enjoyment and use by all. But framed within a market context, in

Yesomi Umolu, exhibitions curator at the Logan Center for the Arts at the University of Chicago, was recently named artistic director of the 2019 Chicago Architecture Biennial. Her own history is as global at the biennial itself: born in Lagos, Nigeria, raised in London, with a deep resume that incorporates curatorial and educational experiences at museums and galleries all over the United States and Great Britain. She’s hit the ground running on the CAB, planning for the third CAB that promises

Think of downtown’s River Theater as a grand urban gesture. The complex geometry of steps, seating, and ramp overlooking the Chicago River pours down effortlessly from Upper Wacker and sings with energy, serving as a middle finger to the A Sunday on La Grande Jatte–type formality of other riverside parks. Carol Ross Barney is the architect behind it and the rest of the 15-years-in-the-making Chicago Riverwalk, which has transformed the city’s main waterway into a dynamic public amenity. You nee