As you plan your travel agenda for 2025, why not explore some of the world's most foward-thinking, design-savvy cities? As part of CULTURED’s Spatial Awareness column, which aims to pull back the curtain on the world of architecture, Karen Wong asked leaders in the discipline to name the most progressive architectural city they've ever visited. Their wide-ranging answers are below. Plane tickets sold separately.
“I’m interested in cities that can hold differences and contrasts, and are rich with complex humanity. I consider ‘progressive’ cities with everyone and everything. Cities where issues are in the light rather than removed, out of sight. My hometowns of New York and Napoli are models of great humanity and a constant work in progress.”
“I have lived and worked on many continents, seeking stability and a vague notion of liberation. There is no perfect city and no one definition of a progressive place. The 'West' claimed to be 'progressive' for a century but racism, socio-economic failures, Islamophobia, and toxic prejudice prevail. Cities in the Global South that are perceived as oppressive in the eyes of the 'West' have social bonds and communal traditions that are more meaningful and reliable than Modernity’s principles. Empires rise and fall, but what matters in the end is community, empathy, and knowledge.”
“Amsterdam, for sure (at least in how I understand the term ‘progressive’). Even the lowliest sidewalk or street sign is designed to a higher standard than most public buildings in the U.S. I’m still generally more impressed by a city like Cairo, where it’s almost impossible to figure out its underlying logics, yet it works beautifully and effortlessly in a frantically chaotic kind of way.”
“This is a trick question—progress can be defined in many ways! I nominate Kyoto, a city nearly 1,500 years old that remains vibrant, cosmopolitan, and contemporary because of its heritage.”
“I can’t think of a single city but the most progressive ideas driving the next wave of sustainability, or what’s been named ‘regenerative design,’ remind me of the ways of knowing that Native communities have protected for centuries before they were erased. Is there a contemporary city that gives back more than it takes from the land? That’s what we need to keep working towards.”
“Maybe Doha? It depends on the interpretation of ‘progressive.’”
Kulapat Yantrasast of WHY Architecture
“Tokyo.”
