Utopian Retreatism: The Best of Both Worlds - Architecture Part 1 Dissertation by chrisjmccallum

U T O P I A N R E T R E A T I S M: THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS Chris McCallum MA (Hons) Architecture ESALA 2017

Written by: Chris McCallum B058312 2017 Tutor: Giorgio Ponzo Word Count of Main Body: 10,774 Architecture Dissertation (ARJA10002) MA (Hons) Architecture Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture The University of Edinburgh

THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

ABSTRACT

onsidering Ebenezer Howard’s Garden City as the basepoint of modern utopian thought, there is a clear communal approach to achieving a balance of the artificial and the natural, such as the “garden” “city” itself, Le Corbusier’s “towers in the park” and Frank Lloyd Wright’s back-to-the-land concept. On this topic, planning analyst Andreas Faludi terms the approach as a ‘best of both worlds’. To form background research, the Norwegian phenomenon of hytte (plural: hytter) culture can be considered since, like the Garden City, it began as a reaction to the increasing urbanisation of the industrial revolution. The two solutions embodied characteristics strongly resonating each other. Hytter are second homes, which half the Norwegian population currently has access to, and are located amongst the “world” of nature to escape the world of the urban. The Garden City approached this with the attempt of creating a new world, which presented the best qualities of both. As opposed to a physical retreat to space from urban ills, it created an artificial retreat. This gives way to the discussion of modernists’ adaptations of this Utopia, then post-war housing which acted as realisations of these, and finally contemporary examples. The qualities each contain, which aspire towards a best of both worlds scenario, will be considered collectively as “retreatism”. Each of the examples explored present a strategy to resolve the problems of the current city, and then in retrospect they offer insight into the desires of the population and politics of that era. The modernists similarly aspired to achieve a

sense of retreat within their cities designed to create a place of beauty to inspire the inhabitant, who will then become a more valuable citizen. Each of these portrayed strong political motives as the base of their attitude. Inevitably, the qualities conveyed were inviting during the post-war housing boom, although both became adapted and therefore different, with numerous implications. What is clear through these examples is that it is the urban which needs escaping from, and so the rural aspect is used to create fresh air and aesthetically pleasing environments for the inhabitants. And so in today’s society, which is devotedly environmental, designing is centred around sustainability. In order to become inviting to people, architects Stefano Boeri and Bjarke Ingels are designing places which offer a more effective implied dislodgement from the city than ever before, by designing in ways that are only possible by becoming sustainably minded. By referring closely to writings by the architects themselves, a lineage of adaptations becomes clear, from Howard, to the architects of the present day. The attitudes towards the principles of retreatism have learned from past examples of how to better react to current urban problems, and considering the award winning contemporary examples, a place that is the best of both worlds appears able to become as effective a retreat as hytter. This is important since, considering the explored examples are designed as a Utopia, something to cure the urban problems of that time, urban ills will continue to form and so the retreat will be developing forever. PG 3

THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

CONTENTS

Prologue

Vertical Utopias

Le Corbusier & the Radiant City

‘Freedom through Order’

Stefano Boeri & the Urban Forest

Horizontal Utopias

Frank Lloyd Wright & Broadacre City

The “Anti-City”

Bjarke Ingels & the Impossible Archetype

Epilogue

Appendix

ii Bibliography

i Glossary

iii Image Index

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fig. 1 A Norwegian hytte retreat.

1 PROLOGUE â&#x20AC;&#x153;It is wellnigh universally agreed by men of all parties, not only in England, but all over Europe and America and our colonies, that it is deeply to be deplored that the people should continue to stream into the already over-crowded cities, and should thus further deplete the country districts...â&#x20AC;? - Ebenezer Howard

The Best of Both Worlds / PROLOGUE

he term “Utopia”1 was coined in 1516 in a novel written by Thomas More. The term is used to consider a place of perfection, but a perfection compared to what currently exists.2 If Utopia was realised, it would become the norm, and no longer a perfection which can be strived for, making Utopia impossible to actually construct. Therefore, real world scenarios cannot be considered as a Utopia. And so, by studying the fictions we can depict a projection of a “perfect” society, acting as a natural critique of the current socio-political condition of a place, and compare these to built versions. Comparing examples throughout modernism, the common ideal they endeavour towards is the incorporation of nature to cure urban problems, such being the motive of the Garden City. Planning analyst Andreas Faludi writes, Town planning was advocated as a device for getting the best of both worlds: individualism and socialism; town and country; past and future; preservation and change.3 This work will aim to investigate the qualities of combining these two worlds of town and country, and therefore the relationship between the fictionality of Utopias since the Garden City and the realisations they inspired, whilst referring closely to writings of the prominent architectural figures involved. The research will first consider an example where these worlds are distinctly separate yet successful, to understand the qualities which must exist when they becoming amalgamated. 1 Combines the Greek terms ‘ou’, ‘eu’ and ‘topos’ (‘no’, ‘well’, and ‘place’ respectively) to invent the word ‘Utopia’, referring to a place of impossible perfection (appendix ii). 2 Ivor Sarakinsky, “Utopia as Politcal Theory,” Politikon: South African Journey of Political Studies 20, no. 2 (1993), 114. 3 Andreas Faludi, A Reader in Planning Theory (Oxford, New York: Pergamon Press, 1973), 58.

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2.5 6.5

Population per Second Home

Nordic Countries

Norway 100

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fig. 2: Diagram conveying the ratio of recreational second homes, comparing Norway, the Nordic average, the UK and the US.

100

Population with Access to a Second Home (%)

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H Y T T E C U LT U R E

orway is officially the happiest country in the world. Based on factors such as GDP per capita, healthy life expectancy and freedom to make life choices, the nation rises to being considered as the happiest country, amidst several other Nordic countries.4 Norwegian social anthropologist, Marianne Gullestad, believes that the domestic environment is the focal point of their culture, a place where the family has independence and significance. She said a home is ‘absolutely not a machine for living in’,5 directly opposing architect Le Corbusier’s theory that it should be, and insisted on the importance of a productive home as a symbol at the heart of the nation’s culture. This vital domestic culture is shared with the other mainland Nordic countries of Denmark, Finland and Sweden, who come close in “official” happiness in places second, fifth and tenth respectively. Similar to happiness, these nations are unmatched worldwide in the quantity of second homes. These are usually shared dwellings with low environmental impact which are quintessentially located in a rural setting to prioritise the correlation of the inhabitants with nature. In Norway, over half the population have access to one, and these make up a third of the nation’s housing stock.6 This is an astounding figure compared to the 2.5% of UK residents who have access to a recreational second space. The Nordics average at sixteen people per home, five times as many as in the UK and three times the US, with

Norway individually at twelve people per home (fig. 2).7 Specific to this nation, the second homes are associated as cabins, or hytter8 and, being vital to the culture, this phenomenon appears as a factor in the happiness of Norway.

4 J Helliwell, R Layard & J Sachs, World Happiness Report 2017 (New York: Sustainable Development Solutions Network, 2017), 22. 5 Marianne Gullestad (1989), translated by Simone Abram, “The Normal Cabins Revenge,” Home Cultures: The Journal of Architecture, Design and Domestic Space 9, no. 3 (2012): 234. 6 Abram, “The Normal Cabins Revenge,” 236.

7 Dieter Müller, “Second Homes in the Nordic Countries: Between Common Heritage and Exclusive Commodity,” Scandinavian Journal of Hospitality and Tourism 7, no.3 (2007): 195. 8 Outlined in the glossary (appendix ii), described by Lesley Riddoch (July 15th 2017), “Bothy Culture,” event attended at Abriachan Village Hall, Inverness. 9 Abram, “The Normal Cabins Revenge,” 236.

Author Simone Abram discusses the historic roots of this culture. The hytter was the common way of life prior to the industrial revolution, however like much of Europe, the rural populations dwindled due to the city. Throughout this period, pressure on urban housing was intense, and for many younger families a small mountain cabin was an affordable holiday option, where the space afforded by the wilderness outside was a welcome contrast to the cramped, often shared, living condition in cities like Oslo.9 During mainly the 19th century, families which moved to the city retained country properties which could become a type of retreat from the exponentially densifying urban environment. Since this was a solution for people of all classes, the population as a whole could maintain a personal equilibrium between the country and city. This truly heterotopic solution is evidently just as successful today considering the 50% of people who still keep a recreational second space. This retreat from city to

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The Best of Both Worlds / PROLOGUE

country defines the two worlds Faludi refers to. In this culture they are kept separate in order to experience the opportunities of each one individually. The worlds are inhabited by, to use Frank Lloyd Wright’s anthropological lingo, the ‘cave dweller’ who naturally wishes to reside permanently in the modern city of human invention, and the ‘wanderer’, a nomad who prefers freedom of mobility in a rural setting.10 These worlds are also considered in More’s Utopia. The fictional encounter with a sailor returned from New World voyages with Vespucci involves the description of a society which is designed as a critique of the existing socio-political situation of England. The land consists of several defined cities, each of which sends a quota of young people to a rural home for two years so they may learn a skillset from both environments.11 It is suggested, therefore, that the rural world is rich in qualities which the urban can lack. These qualities are summarised by two Norwegian terms which are widely associated with the rural hytte. The first is hjemmekos;12 a term embedded in Norwegian culture which cannot be translated exactly, but refers to a special environment of private family enjoyment, specifically moments of joy and the physical setting which encourages this. The second is frliluftsliv; described by international skier Fridtjof Nansen as ‘to be able to get away from the crowd, away from the perpetual race, the 10 Frank Lloyd Wright, The Disappearing City, digitised by The University of Michigan (Michigan: W. F. Payson, 1932), accessed October 2017, 6. 11 Saint Thomas More, Utopia, ed. George M. Logan and Robert Adams (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 44. 12 All Norwegian terms may be referenced in the Glossary (appendix ii), p60.

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confusing clamours in which we conduct our lives to far too great an extent – to get out into nature, into the open.’13 In fact, this term is so readily associated with hytter that it was defined further in a government policy as a ‘sojourn or physical activity outdoors in leisure-time with a view to change of environs and experience of nature.’14 These principles are the absolute basis of the success of Norwegian second homes and therefore the domestic stability and national happiness.15 They define the relationships between people and the environments in which we choose to surround ourselves by, the environment which, in juxtaposition to the city, allows for a psychological equilibrium. The best of both worlds described by Faludi suggests a singular combination of the natural and artificial worlds which in itself provides equilibrium. Although utopian urban planning and hytter culture do not cross paths, this discourse will investigate urban responses following industrialisation with reference to the psychological principles embodied in the Norwegian retreat.

13 Fridtjof Nansen, translated by Abram in “The Normal Cabins Revenge,” 245. 14 Abram, “The Normal Cabins Revenge,” 245. 15 Norwegian comedy duo, Ylvis, demonstrate its pop-culture in their spoof music video, The Cabin. Although comedy orientated, it depicts many essential characteristics of hytter. “Let me take you to my favourite place, Just a five hour drive from the city, Just follow the road until it stops, And then keep walking for another forty minutes...” Available at https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=GVyDovLA2vw&feature=share.

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R E T R E AT I S M

he very name of the publication, ‘Garden Cities of To-Morrow’, by Ebenezer Howard in 1902, suggests an architectural context for a merged habitat of “garden” and “city”. The book presented a diagram for a city as opposed to suggesting an actual city plan, so that it could be applied to any context. Historian Lewis Mumford was confident that this was the most influential book in urban planning of the 20th century.16 To investigate the basis of this influence the implications of merging garden and city can be considered Howard introduces the book describing his condemnation of the city as people ‘continue to stream into the already over-crowded cities, and should thus further deplete the country districts’17 due to the process of industrialisation all over Europe, the same issue which occurred in Norway. He expresses a concern over the emptying of rural areas and gives an account of the conditions he experienced in the city. ‘There came to me an overpowering sense of the temporary nature of all I saw,’ on observing a slum district in London, ‘and of its entire unsustainability for the working life of the new order.’18 To present his solution, the town and the country were summarised as magnets, each with certain attractive qualities but lacking in others. Therefore, one may simply create another magnet as a combination of the positive principles of the existing places thereby creating a stronger 16 Robert Fishman, Urban Utopias in the Twentieth Century (New York: Basic Books, Inc., Publishers,1977), 23. 17 Ebenezer Howard, The Garden City of To-Morrow, ed. Frederic James Osborn (Michigan: MIT Press, 1965), 42. 18 Fishman, Urban Utopias, 33.

magnetic or “social” attractiveness.19 These magnets were Howard’s definition of the two worlds described by Faludi, and the third magnet contained the architectural motive of formulating a design that allowed a user to experience the full virtue of both worlds, the instinctual habitats of, as Wright would put it, the wanderer and the cave dweller simultaneously. Instead of a city centre, Howard envisioned each family home being the centre to each family’s life. These would be simple and spacious, surrounded by a private garden, which made up the unit which the residential areas would be compiled of (fig. 3).20 The vitality Howard saw in the home is resonant of the Norwegian concept of hjemmekos, as it is a setting of individuality which can provoke a better domestic experience. Along with the private garden, the city is planned around greenbelts so that ‘all the fresh delights of the country – field, hedgerow, and woodland – would be within a very few minutes walk’ (fig. 5).21 Considering the congestion he experienced in London, Howard concerned himself with adapting these ‘delights’ to create a sustainable environment which allowed space for inhabitants to breath to counter the polluted industrial city. This simple insertion of the natural element became for inducing the qualities contained in frliluftsliv of health, recreation and open space. Referring to the parallel vernacular of hytter culture, the common strive for integrity in 19 Howard, The Garden City, 45-46. 20 Fishman, Urban Utopias, 42-43. 21 Howard, The Garden City, 142.

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the home to create equilibrium between city and country life is apparent. Although, Mumford notes, The Garden City, as Howard defined it, is not a suburb but the antithesis of a suburb: not a more rural retreat, but a more integrated foundation for an effective urban life.22 He considered the reminiscence of Howard’s home to a retreat except noted that this home contributed to the local society, not just each individual. This suggests that as an urban plan, the adaptation of the retreat is for an overlying motive. On the politics of Utopias, Robert Nozick writes, ‘Utopia, though, must be, in some restricted sense, the best for all of us; the best world imaginable, for each of us.’23 Howard’s Utopia was originally conceived to create a much more equal world, as he saw the capitalism of cities as the cause for their demise during industrialisation. The home as the centre would decentralise the city, which would remove the capitalistic situation and create ‘a civilisation based on cooperation’.24 And so, these new towns would be self-sustaining entities placed around Britain’s largest cities, containing the third-magnet-appeal which would slowly filter the population from the cities whilst preventing urban sprawl, and hence creating a nation of decongested and productive communities.25 Here we see an egalitarian politi22 Lewis Mumford in The Garden City of To-Morrow, by Ebenezer Howard (Michigan: MIT Press, 1965), 35. 23 Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State and Utopia (New York City: Basic Books, 1974), 298. 24 Fishman, Urban Utopias, 24. 25 Simon Pepper, “The Garden City Idea: Introduction: The Garden City Legacy.” The Architectural Review 163, no.976 (June 1978), 323.

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cal motive of adapting the retreat, the ‘society (of the Garden City) will prove the most healthy and vigorous where the freest and fullest opportunities are afforded alike for individual and of combined effort.’26 By creating an inner city retreat combining the best of both worlds, Howard believed this domestic improvement for families would ensue a more integrated and highly functioning society. The Garden City was a Utopia as it was a concept to solve the present: the polluted and congested industrial city. Alike the retention of hytter, users of both had access to urban life and a healthy open space where the family may reside in the ideal setting of idyllic privacy. However, a hytte is a retreat, offering these qualities when one is separated from the problem. Considering this, living in the Garden City cannot be an actual retreat due to the physical sense that one does not leave it, but are instead provided with the impression of a retreat in order to ensue similar psychological benefits. As they are being incorporated into urban planning, the artificial retreats of the Garden City become generalised, and in this case are used for an overlying egalitarian motive. So, for the purpose of academic reference, the principles of this type of retreat shall be framed as “retreatism”, to create a common reference whenever this approach is apparent. I believe this concept forms the basis of the Garden City, and therefore the progeny of urban planning inspired by it.

26 Howard, The Garden City, 114.

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The BEST aspects

BOTH worlds

fig. 3: Poster advertising the merits of Letchworth Garden City - 1925. This is named as the first realisation of the Garden City as it was designed exactly according to the principles set out by Ebenezer Howard. The way it was portrayed to the public was that it provided only the positive qualities of both the rural and urban worlds.

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fig. 4 The Vertical Forrest: A symbol within the pop-culture of Milan.

VERTICAL UTOPIAS â&#x20AC;&#x153;We must increase open spaces and decrease the distances to be covered. Therefore, the centre of the city must be constructed vertically...â&#x20AC;? - Le Corbusier

Cu ltu re City Cen tre o f

Expensive H ouses

Green Belt

Houses

Factories and Wareh ouses

Agricu lture

The Best of Both Worlds / VERTICAL UTOPIAS

fig. 5: Ebenezer Howardâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s diagramatical plan of the Garden City. Labelled with the zoning whcih radiates from the city centre fig. 6: Le Corbusierâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s plan of the Radiant City. Indicated is the city centre, and on its periphery is the residential quarters. Further out is the garden cities, in-between which is the larger greenbelt.

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The Best of Both Worlds / VERTICAL UTOPIAS

LE CORBUSIER AND THE RADIANT CITY

o investigate utopian retreatism we will consider two derivations in parts: verticality and horizontality. This part investigates the former which is more unique to urbanism, with the tower being an icon of the world’s largest cities, and the most influential Utopia which concerns this is the Radiant City of Le Corbusier. The Swiss architect had a similar passion to Howard, to alter the city to his ideal solution in the aftermath of industrialisation, the benefit of which was that ‘science has given us the machine. The machine gives us unlimited power. And we in our turn can perform miracles by its means’.27 As Howard saw the industrial revolution as the city’s downfall, Le Corbusier considered it a potential. The machine became incorporated into his city to cure its ills through ensuing order. A development of the Garden City was incorporated into the Radiant City as a part of the residential area, although thanks to the machine these retreats were extruded into the third dimension to create towers, but similarly surrounded in nature. This attitude is adopted in contemporary practice as well, for example Stefano Boeri’s work in Milan. Here, the Italian architect has envisioned a Utopia which consists of a single type of building: ‘A Tower of trees – which incidentally houses human beings,28 or in other words a structure designed for nature, and only when it is suitable for nature may people inhabit it. Throughout htis chapter, the development of verticality can be seen 27 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow and its Planning, 8th ed. trans. Frederick Etchells, (New York: Dover Publications, 1987), 150. 28 Stefano Boeri, A Vertical Forest: Instructions Booklet for the Prototype of a Forest City, ed. Guido Musante and Azzurra Muzzonigro (Mantua: Corraini, 2015), 8.

by isolating and analysing its aspects of retreatism: densification for artificial space. The diagram of the Garden City became the collective utopian vision for Britain at the turn of the 20th century and was admired by town planners all across Europe who immediately adopted its characteristics for their own plans due to its flexibility.29 The publication by Le Corbusier which depicted his own adaptation simply removed the word “Garden” from Howard’s, to become ‘The City of To-morrow’, released in 1929. We may compare this city, the Radiant City, to the original (figs. 5,6) and notice that it drew the aspects it desired from the Garden City before the architect implemented his own. We can see Howard’s use of zoning: a small city centre for culture with boulevards leading towards residences and places of work, separated by the series of greenbelts. This way people can go about their lives in zones a “healthy distance” from the unpleasant areas such as the insane asylum and factories.30 This was appealing to Le Corbusier and was adopted into his plan. He describes his interpretation: ‘each evening the centre would be empty. The residential quarters of the city would absorb part, the garden cities the rest’.31 This depicts the machine-like functioning of the city as the design was focused on the working day, moving residents efficiently between the centre for work and the perimeter where they live. This continuation of Howardian zoning suggests an element of 29 Pepper, “The Garden City Idea,” 323. 30 Howard, The Garden City, 128. 31 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow, 100.

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physical retreat. Frliluftsliv concerns a place outside the busyness of the city and so Le Corbusier’s implementation of programmatic zoning created dedicated places of the centre for work and the residential areas for repose, both still within the city. Therefore, we associate these zones with work and leisure; a psychological retreat.

Placed in the midst of a chaotic nature, man for his own security creates and surrounds himself with a zone of protection in harmony with what he is and what he thinks; he needs a retreat; a citadel in which he feels secure; he needs things whose existence he has himself determined.’35

The garden cities he referred to were a three-dimensional adaption of Howard’s family retreat. Ultimately, Le Corbusier strived for density, but he remarked that what we have established as Howard’s retreatism is not possible in the condition of density of current cities, i.e. the space needed to create individual places of hjemmekos was, at the time, only possible ‘at the expense of the open spaces which are the lungs of the city’,32 the open spaces which were needed to provide something similar to frliluftsliv. He proclaimed that to achieve retreatism at density, ‘we must increase open spaces and decrease the distances to be covered. Therefore, the centre of the city must be constructed vertically.’33 Verticality allowed more possibility in a footprint and so space was now available for private homes, each supplied with light and air; a setting for hjemmekos. The spaces between towers, which were made possible by density, allowed for greenspace which could become the “lungs” of the city and hence their nickname of the “towers in the park”.34 Le Corbusier summarised how both worlds interact in the retreat:

He considered this setting as a retreat, and to feel comfortable it must be defined by us. 36 Luckily, the problem of industry gave a cure for itself: the machine. We could build higher to create new space, which could be in-filled with greenery at will to create a healthier density than what currently existed.

32 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow, 167. 33 Le Corbusier in Dream Cities, by Graham Wade, 87. 34 Wade Graham, Dream Cities, Seven Urban Ideas That Shape the World (New York: Harper Perennial, 2016), 87.

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As the garden cities were fashioned as a zone to create a sense of dislodgment from the centre, Le Corbusier’s motive for this can be considered. It is vital to note that the garden cities were designed to house the middle classes, with their ‘subordinates relegated’ to the villas in the surrounding outskirts.37 The zoning of classes means a higher efficiency of movement: ‘Every day, and at the same hour, those very same crowds which are better housed in the garden suburbs must 35 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow, 22. 36 Le Corbusier’s personal retreat, Cabanon, was a 3.66m x 3.66m cabin located in the picturesque location of France’s Côte d’Azur. It was designed according to his modular concept, fully designed within 45 minutes. It is ironic that the city-obsessed architect required such a permanent place in nature, or perhaps the view of Paris from his penthouse home was a constant reminder that the city, frustratingly, did not exist entirely to his desire. (Izzy Ashton, “Le Corbusier’s Cabanon seaside cabin is his smallest building on the World Heritage List,” Dezeen (July 20th 2016), accessed October 2017, https://www.dezeen.com/2016/07/20/lecorbusier-french-holiday-home-cabanon-17-buildings-unesco-world-heritage-list). 37 Fishman, Urban Utopias, 10.

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return to the centre of the city’,38 as this centre is the centre of society and therefore not a place for the working classes, who’s accommodation can be located closer to the factories in the periphery. This functionality allows for the final zoning: time. The twenty-four hour day was defined as eight hours of sleep, eight hours of work in either the centre city or the factories, and once retreated, the final eight hours of repose. The importance set on the centre is the antithesis of Howard’s methodology, who’s zones were compiled to decentralise the capitalistic situation of the city and so, to favour centralisation, Le Corbusier appears to favour capitalism. Author Brian Lund discusses housing in a capitalist society as a commodity, and the production of which is aided by municipalities.39 This definition relates to Le Corbusier’s desire to envisage the city as a working machine; each type of collectivised housing was designed so the zone of class which inhabited it may function most efficiently, so that the city-machine can be successful. And such is the premise for Le Corbusier’s Orwellian-esque slogan for the Radiant City: ‘Freedom through Order’.40 The functionality of the city-machine was designed to such a detailed level of efficiency that the inhabitant was free of the burden of individual thought.41 And how does this concern the retreatism of the garden cities? Political philosopher Ivor Sarakinsky 38 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow, 96. 39 Brian Lund, Housing Politics in the United Kingdom: Power, Planning and Protest (Bristol: Policy Press, 2016), 10. 40 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow, 212. 41 This approach is resonant of Geroge Orwell’s 1984. In this political environment the concept of individuality is rejected so strongly by the leading Party that the concept of it is being destroyed to the level of mental thought (George Orwell, 1984, reprinted (London: Penguin UK, 2004), 336).

notes that ‘the utopian idealises not man nor nature but organisation.’42 This is apparent in Le Corbusier’s city plan, as the garden cities are a merging of the worlds of man and nature to provide a place where the inhabitant feels dislodged from the hectic life of the city and can pursue enjoyment, before the eight hour working day begins and by order they return to the city centre. Le Corbusier comments, ‘beauty, which is born of action, inspired enthusiasm and provokes men to action’.43 The enjoyable lifestyle resultant of retreatism is what brings value to the housing as a commodity; it benefits the zone of social class in a way specific to them, to result in more productive members of society.

42 Sarakinsky, “Utopia as Politcal Theory,” 114. 43 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow, 241.

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‘FREEDOM THROUGH ORDER’

he very year The City of To-morrow was published came the Wall Street crash, causing a global economic crisis which proved detrimental to many architect’s careers. Its influence instead appeared in cities during the post-war years, which were dedicated to large scale solutions for city housing due to rapid population increase.44 During the years 1946-1966, Scotland built more social housing than any other country in the world, much of which was built in the city of Glasgow to replace some of the worst slum conditions in Europe.45 These slums came from an unfortunate parallel of hytter. Historically, Scotland was similar to Norway in its dominance of a rural population, but whilst the Norwegians retained their rural retreats throughout the industrial revolution, the Highland Clearances which took place in Scotland meant that many people were forcibly evicted. The revolution meant work and housing was almost exclusively available in the city, which resulted in the urban environment becoming overcrowded.46 The overcrowding turned to poverty, and by the end of WWII, Glasgow was in need of a Utopia. Planner Robert Bruce re-imagined the city with a specific focus on rehousing the slum population according to the Corbusian Radiant City principles.47 In 2007, forty years after most of the developments had been realised, photographer Chris 44 Jonathan Adams, Frank Lloyd Wright: The Man Who Built America, directed by Ian Michael Jones, BBC Four, first broadcasted August 30 2017. 45 Johnny Rodger (November 16th 2017), “Glasgow High Rises: Have they served their time?” attended event at the Lighthouse, Glasgow. 46 Eric Richards, Debating the Highland Clearances (Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2007), 61. 47 Brian Lund, Housing Politics, 7.

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Leslie recorded their demise later, portrayed in Disappearing Glasgow: A Photographic Journey, published 2016. In Leslie’s book the chair of Architecture and Design Scotland, Karen Anderson, writes on the utopian intention, They were the coalition of altruistic desire to save ordinary people from cramped and sometimes crumbling tenements, and give them new homes above the remaining factories, and as a practical ‘modern’ response to build at volume, but prevent urban sprawl.48 The ‘modern response’ was sought in the Corbusian idea that ‘we must increase open spaces and decrease the distances to be covered. Therefore, the centre of the city must be constructed vertically,’49 and so the towers in the park represented the ideal structure for this intent. The density was required to deviate from the cramped condition of the tenements described, and so the space created by verticality made this possible, both interiorly and exteriorly. The invention of space through many layers of the towers meant that the inhabitants experienced, for the first time, an individual dwelling for each family, running water and a personal indoor bathroom. An ex-resident of the late flats on Plean Street recalls, ‘it was only then, when we entered our new home on the 14th floor, that we realised the real slum-

48 Karen Anderson in Disappearing Glasgow: A Photographic Journey (Glasgow: Freight Books, 2016) by Chris Leslie and Johnny Rodger, 70. 49 Le Corbusier in Dream Cities, by Wade Graham, 87.

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fig. 7: Blocks of dwellings on the cellular system. Le Corbusier designed these residential units to make density more appealing by offering extra height and space, and therefore air and foliage.

like conditions we had been living in.’50 The social housing of Glasgow proved to be a realisation of the qualities Le Corbusier desired with vertical space creation. The generalised attitude towards the ordinary people is reminiscent of the Radiant City’s zoning. Firstly, the new spaces are designed to be apart from the remaining factories, continuing the psychological differentiation between the unhealthy place of work and the newly provided home, but Bruce also validates the altruism of class zoning: The environment of the home affects a person’s habits, outlook and sense of citizenship and it would be hard to overstate the benefits which would result from the provision of good homes for those who meanwhile must reside in buildings which are quite unfitted for decent occupation.51

50 Chris Leslie and Johnnie Rodger, Disappearing Glasgow: A Photographic Journey (Glasgow: Freight Books, 2017), 97. 51 Robert Bruce, First Planning Report to the Highways and Planning Committee of the Corporation of the City of Glasgow (Glasgow: Corporation of the City of Glasgow, 1945), 60.

This statement of intent is reminiscent of both Howard and Le Corbusier in striving for the provision of good domesticity to enhance individual worth. However, Bruce also reinvents Le Corbusier’s capitalistic attitude of using class for functionality of the “machine”. This machine is used for the regeneration of post-war Glasgow as a whole, and the large slum population was worth little in terms of aspiring towards a brighter future. The zones of retreat that were created brought altruism to Le Corbusier’s “commodities” as they presented much better housing conditions to create a mutual social regeneration. The former resident of Plean Street also commented that there was a sense of aspiration and community spirit when everyone was moved in, suggesting Bruce’s concept was successful in realising this Corbusian-esque retreat. Considering the machine-like efficiency of Le Corbusier’s Utopia, we can assume that to alter its recipe could result in something imperfect. The towers in the park of the garden cities were seen by Bruce as embodying the principles desirable PG 23

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fig. 8: Photograph of the Red Road flats from one of the towers. They were designed according to the Corbusian ideal of density to create more space, but a comparison show a lack in the aesthetic.

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for the solution of the slums, the principles which are being considered as retreatism. However, as previously discussed Le Corbusier allocated the towers to the wealthy: ‘The only building that can be undertaken must be either for the rich or built at a loss (as, for instance, in the case of municipal housing schemes).’52 He refers to the high-cost of vertical building, hence why it was assigned to the wealthy, and specifically that it cannot be used for social housing if a profit is desired. Professor of Urban Literature and editor of Leslie’s book, Johnny Rodger, discusses that to encourage verticality the Glasgow municipality offered a subsidy to private developers for each floor level they built, contextualising Lund’s comment that the state aids the capitalists in property accumulation.53 Due to the high-costs of verticality, the developers cut corners in construction to reduce costs, resulting in structures lacking in the iconicity le Corbusier envisioned, a collaboration of light, air and green space. This is clear when comparing vertical accom-

modation designed by the modernist (fig. 7) with the built highrises, such as the Red Road Flats (fig. 8). Where is all the Corbusian ideal?54 This degraded the prosperity of the community: The development at Red Road featured an underground pub and bingo hall which was said to draw people from all over Glasgow at weekends, however, the poor construction caused dampness and flooding in the basement which resulted in the closure of the bar and therefore a loss in the extroverted community.55 Although the sense of retreatism initially provided was successful, the capitalist realisation of the capitalist Utopia was responsible for the rejection of the vital aspects of the retreatism which made the density desirable in the first place.

52 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow, 176. 53 Rodger, “Glasgow High Rises.”

54 Rodger, “Glasgow High Rises.” 55 Leslie Disappearing Glasgow, 11.

At first the retreat proved successful due to the utopic nature of exposing the poor conditions of the accommodation that this population knew. The experience was surreal, many considered it ‘too good’ for the working class, but as the physical quality

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deteriorated, they became known as sink estates and hence began the social decline.56 The receding quality of the builds attracted undesirable tenants such as drug dealers and ex-prisoners, and often were the only place which asylum seekers could find a home. When these people moved into the Utopia, they became the social pariah, ‘a threat to the whole system.’57 The zoning of the Utopia was, originally, efficient in that the housing could be collectivised as being appropriate for one kind of person, but just as the zone created mutual regeneration, these threats could also ensue social decline. The Utopia of the Radiant City simply redefined the Glaswegian problem: its retreatism was desirable as the solution to the slum problem however, the poor inception of these principles inevitably caused social decline, and by the turn of the millennium, they had become vertical slums, deemed unfit for human inhabitation.58 56 Leslie, Disappearing Glasgow, 11. 57 Sarakinsky, “Utopia as Politcal Theory,” 120. 58 Leslie, Disappearing Glasgow, 97.

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STEFANO BOERI AND THE URBAN FOREST

ince 2007, Glasgow City Council have removed over 30% of the highrise social housing from its skyline. Retreatism was adopted to create a zone of social regeneration, but with a lack of consideration for their own future they became the slums which they replaced.59 In an effort to design specifically for a building’s long life, architect Stefano Boeri and his practice created the Bosco Verticale in Milan (figs. 4, 10), completed in 2014. Shortly after its completion, the manifesto of the design principles was published in A Vertical Forest: Instructions Booklet for the Prototype of a Forest City, which contains Boeri’s instructions for realising a utopian vision. Considering the Corbusian ‘retreat; a citadel in which he feels secure; he needs things whose existence he has himself determined,’ Boeri’s project appears similar through its key descriptive words: “vertical”, “forest”, and “city”, as they suggest a forest being constructed in an artificial manner. This project won the CTBUH award for best tall building worldwide in 2015:60 an indication that the vertical utopia has become possible. The architect himself grew up as a leftwing political activist fighting against social inequality and became environmentally minded whilst writing on the poor design of vertical structures.61 Boeri noted that highrises have reverted back to the Corbusian vision of steel and glass after the concrete failures of modernism. He commented 59 Leslie Disappearing Glasgow, 3. 60 Information available from http://awards.ctbuh.org/winners/?category=best-tall-buildingworldwide. 61 Stefano Boeri (June 4th 2014), “Trees in the sky - a vertical forest in Milan,” Ted Talks, retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jH4Q6ddchPc.

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that 94% of tall buildings built in the 21st century have a skin of metal and glass and therefore an increasingly artificial and mineral surface area in cities, raising temperatures at ground level from reflection. His reaction: create a biological skin of leaves.62 Boeri described the architectural inspiration for this as Howard’s Garden City. At a personal level, Boeri and Howard can relate as fighters for social equality, and agree that the issues of traffic and pollution can be solved through design.63 The concept of the towers was the use of a simple country home within an urban context, a Howardian retreat, and this was extruded vertically similar to Le Corbusier’s approach. The homes in the Vertical Forest are then envisioned as providing the valuable qualities of life found in the individual cottages of the Garden City, the ‘proximity to greenery’ characterising ‘life in suburban areas and the country’.64 Boeri summarises the merging of worlds, The Vertical Forest provides a model of combination between the urban and the natural world that can be adapted to different environmental conditions according to the local climatic zones.65 The concept of the combination was that of a giant tree, in which foliage was considered before humans. What was created were two towers, of eighty and one-hundred and twelve metres, which together 62 Boeri, “Trees in the sky,” Ted Talks. 63 Stefano Boeri, A Vertical Forest: Instructions Booklet for the Prototype of a Forest City, ed. Guido Musante and Azzurra Muzzonigro (Mantua: Corraini, 2015), 18. 64 Boeri, A Vertical Forest, 52. 65 Boeri, A Vertical Forest, 134.

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fig. 9: Illustration of the masterplan of regeneration for the Porta Nuova district, Milan. In the centre we see the prominent footprint of the plan and to the left, highlighted, is the Vertical Forest. They can be seen from the whole masterplan, standing as an icon.

house over seventy trees, five-thousand shrubs and eleven-thousand ground plants. The foliage rejects any reliance on technology for environmental sustainability as independently it creates its own microclimate, absorbing CO2 and producing oxygen. This process simultaneously absorbs particles produced by traffic pollution, creating healthy air and cooling the temperature between inside and out by up to three degrees.66 The qualities of this microclimate are resonant of why frliluftsliv is so important with the hytte. The open space in nature provides naturally healthy air to contrast with the city, however Stefano Boeri Architetti (SBA) removed the separation of the country and the city to instead use verticality as what makes frliluftsliv.

cept of zoning to create a place of diverse programmatic function for people of all ages and social class. On describing why he is proud of Porta Nuova, Architect Fabio Novembre mentions the Vertical Forest as ‘unusual because Italy is the country of never ending stories,’ the towers being ‘a very good example of how you can solve the bureaucracies in a magical way and finish the site and actually build it.’68 Standing as the icon of this iconic district, the towers show that by designing sustainably, the desirable principles of retreatism can become more desirable, as opposed to deteriorating the quality of life they present. 68 Fabio Novembre, “It is very difficult to build contemporary architecture in Italy,” Dezeen, July 10th 2013, https://www.dezeen.com/2013/07/10/fabio-novembre-porta-nuovacontemporary-architecture-milan-italy, accessed November 2017. fig. 10: The Vertical Forest, Milan

The forest is located in the Porta Nuova district, Milan. The district is three-hundred-thousand square metres of sustainable regeneration, the largest in Italy, and was designed with a similar consideration of the future to what SBA (Stefano Boeri Architetti) envisioned for their project (fig. 9).67 The district has become a socially sustainable micro-community of Milan, as it removes the con66 ArchDaily, “Bosco Verticale / Boeri Studio,” ArchDaily 23 November 2015, <https://www. archdaily.com/777498/bosco-verticale-stefano-boeri-architetti/ accessed November 2017. 67 Massimo Tiano, “Porta Nuova: Milan rises,” Guiding Architects, January 5th 2017, http:// www.guiding-architects.net/porta-nuova-milan-rises/, accessed November 2017.

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0m2

50,00

using of ho

20,00

ion getat of ve

1,500

fig. 11: The “anti-sprawl device”, indicating the reduction of average footprint from a total of 70,000m2 to 1,500m2, a 98% reduction.

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Le Corbusier, as we know, was adamant on building in the smallest footprint possible to create more space, which became a focus of SBA’s design. The towers are called an anti-sprawl device which, in a footprint of 1,500m2, encompasses the number of suburban homes which would usually cover 50,000m2, whilst sustaining the valuable quality of hjemmekos that the Howardian homes supplied. However, where this differs from Le Corbusier and developments such as in Glasgow, this footprint also exhibits the foliage which would inhabit 20,000m2 of forest and undergrowth (fig. 11). 69 With verticality, the practice has condensed suburb and forest into 2% of its average space.70 This becomes a naturally impossible “landscape”, which is exaggerated by the flying arboriculturists, each year abseiling down the forest to prune the outermost reaches of the trees. The sense of impossibility bypasses the normally accepted “real”, and it is the possibilities of this new reality which Boeri

imagines to be what makes ‘the richness of life in the forest.’71

69 ArchDaily, “Bosco Verticale / Boeri Studio.” 70 If we consider that 50,000m2 of housing and 20,000m2 of forest make 70,000m2 total, this becomes condensed into the 1,500m2 of the towers, 2.14% of the normal space.

71 Boeri, A Vertical Forest, 34. 72 H=2T:8S:40B (Boeri, A Vertical Forest, 114). 73 Boeri, A Vertical Forest, 103.

As this is a habitat for trees before humans, Boeri states the formula for this as one person to two trees, eight shrubs and forty bushes (fig. 12).72 To determine this, SBA conducted years of experimental processes at the Milan Polytechnic. A criteria was devised for the type of installation and species of foliage at certain heights and wind levels, forming an algorithm which can theoretically be applied to any climatic situation to produce a three-dimensional map of trees.73 Here we see the machine allowing for the creation of a new type of landscape which can be applied to anywhere in the world, a contemporary example of the Corbusian miracle ensued by the machine. With the Bosco Verticale in Milan being the prototype, the multi-climatic characteristic of this archetype is being portrayed with each new project, some of

The Best of Both Worlds / VERTICAL UTOPIAS

fig. 12: Pyramidal ratio of defining the volume of vegetation according to the human population of the forest. 1 Human : 2 Trees : 8 Shrubs : 40 Bushes.

which are currently underway in Switzerland, Beijing and all around the world.74 Considering this worldwide vision, which is designed according to Boeri’s published manifesto, the retreatism becomes a Utopia to respond to worldwide environmental unsustainability. In comparing the illustration of Stefano Boeri’s Utopia (fig. 13) and the existing prototype, they appear identical. On this relationship between the imagined and the real, Nozick writes that ‘the detail into which some utopian writers plunge indicates a blurring of their line between fantasy and the feasible, not to mention the actually predicted.’75 Nozick remarks on Utopianists becoming so engrossed with their work that their appreciation of what is actually possible becomes obscured. This is challenged by Boeri. The architect’s inspiration from the Garden City derives from the built versions, such as Letchworth, more than the theoretical diagram, and he remarks that his Vertical Forest 74 Information available from https://www.stefanoboeriarchitetti.net/en/vertical-foresting-en. 75 Nozick, Anarchy, State and Utopia, 308.

differs drastically from Le Corbusier’s plan, on its ‘application as a ready built environment’, not simply a paper examination but rather a built and lived in example.76 As Le Corbusier’s Utopia inspired vertical retreats, Boeri differs as his Utopia was inspired by the success of the built retreat, suggesting the fiction of this is more applicable to the real world.

76 Boeri, A Vertical Forest, 18, 102.

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fig. 13: Stefano Boeriâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s utopian vision. Observing the towers which make up this fictional city independently, they are apparently identical in form and function to the prototype in Milan. This is possible as the Utopia was envisioned after the construction of this, meaning it is more applicable to the real world. This blurring of fictional and real becomes what creates dislodgement from the normal city for its residents, at least until the retreat becomes the city itself, as is seen here.

fig. 14 Mountain dwellings of he VM Bjerget.

HORIZONTAL UTOPIAS “We both wanted to live in a house but we loved this type of building. In the real world we’d have to choose, but not here...” - Cobb, Inception

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FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT AND BROADACRE CITY

he horizontal naturally differs in usage of space to the vertical; both have potentially unlimited space, however this approach uses the natural land provided as opposed to artificially creating it. Its possibilities were conveyed by architect Frank Lloyd Wright who enjoyed just one aspect of the vertical city, the fact that ‘any ride high into the air in any elevator to-day only shows him how far he can soon go on the ground’,77 acting as the premise for his design of an “endless city”. The logic behind his city was published in The Disappearing City, 1932, when The New York Times dared Wright to respond to the recently published plan by Le Corbusier.78 Frank Lloyd Wright is considered as the most famous American architect to date, his Prairie House typology being the basis of this. They emerged from his “organic” architectural style which derived from his childhood submerged in nature, to combine ‘Wright’s ideal of how architecture and nature should co-exist… the Hill and the House are improved by each other.’79 Having lived in the hills his whole life, this style is defined by his nostalgia to embody the qualities he had experienced in growing up. When designing the Prairies in downtown Chicago, it was a very personal innercity retreat that Wright would implement: a private family home surrounded by nature, the concept of the threshold specifically designed to dislodge the resident from the hectic city as soon as they entered 77 Frank Lloyd Wright, The Disappearing City, digitised by The University of Michigan (Michigan: W. F. Payson, 1932), accessed October 2017, 30. 78 Katherine Don, “Frank Lloyd Wright’s Utopian Dystopia,” Next City, April 8th 2010, accessed September 2017, https://nextcity.org/daily/entry/frank-lloyd-wrights-utopiandystopia. 79 Adams, Frank Lloyd Wright, directed by Ian Michael Jones.

the building.80 Considering the residential units of the Garden City, the basic concept of these private houses is very similar, although each of Wright’s were unique in design according to the resident. The similarity is also apparent when these housing typologies were implemented into their creator’s Utopia. In Howard’s plan, ‘perfectly fresh air and grass and sight of far horizon might be reachable in a few minutes’ walk’ of each of his family retreats.81 Similarly, when Wright designed his Utopia, it was ‘No mere back-to-the-land idea but is, rather, a breaking down of the artificial divisions set up between urban and rural life.’82 Broadacre City exaggerated Howard’s merging of the town and the country by considering that the border between the two is futile as they should not be separate entities experienced independently. He discussed that when these habitats, described as for the wanderer and the cave dweller, are kept separate, one naturally desires the other: ‘No longer will the farmer envy the urban dweller his mechanical improvements while the latter in turn covets his “green pastures”’,83 reflecting the Norwegian desire for space in nature as a contrast to the cramped situation of urbanity. And so by merging the two worlds the city is now endless – an anti-city – and the envy is nullified. The exaggeration of the Garden City is also implemented horizontally. In an effort to 80 Adams, Frank Lloyd Wright, directed by Ian Michael Jones. 81 John Ruskin quoted by Ebenezer Howard in The Garden City of To-Morrow, 50. 82 Frank Lloyd Wright in Dream Cities, by Graham, 119. 83 Wright, The Disappearing City, 45.

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reduce pollution, the environmentalist in Howard designed his city based upon the unit of walking; any amenities a person needs may be within a comfortable walk of any place he may be, and ‘their work is within easy walking distance of their home’.84 Wright, however, had another unit in mind, ‘a new standard of space measurement—the man seated in his automobile.’85 This is an instance of when Wright considered the machine as what could unveil the potential of a future city. This new measurement is nigh on infinite, hence allowing Wright to go as far as he could see. To Wright, this presented the possibility of strengthening the Howardian anti-capitalistic condition of the city. The ‘capitalised centralisation is no longer a system for the citizen nor one working for him’,86 and the automobile meant that there was absolutely no need for any form of central density, since all amenities can now be reached quickly, no matter how far away they may be. This attitude against right-wing governance is due to his impression that with centralisation, all sense of individuality is removed as one must revolve around a common centre,87 and so to enhance the individuality which is so vital to his organic architecture, any centre must be removed. The plan of Broadacre (fig. 15) conveys Wright’s ideal condition, democracy, through the integration of sparsely located homesteads, Prairie houses each on an acre of private land, hence the name of the city plan. Wright also presents a solution countering the naivety towards the population who could not 84 Howard, The Garden City of To-Morrow, 155. 85 Don, “Frank Lloyd Wright’s Utopian Dystopia.” 86 Wright, The Disappearing City, 5. 87 Wright, The Disappearing City, 32.

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afford this amount of land. The poor man may buy a pre-fabricated house for, say, $500 (the equivalent of around $9000 dollars in the year 2017) which has been made by machines and includes the basic machinery which he needs. As this is now privately owned, the money saved on the capitalist concept of rent may later be invested in the next module of the house. Capitalism is removed, and the poor man is no longer poor, simply due to breaking the boundaries of worlds. 88 With this degree of sparsity, it was important that these homesteads were implemented ‘not as isolated or artificial retreats but as integral parts of the new environment’.89 Proffer of history, Robert Fishman, acknowledges their reminiscence to a true retreat due to such an intimate relationship between built and natural, but remarked that they are not disconnected from society, as hytter would be, but the entities that will make up the new urban fabric of the city. Wright concluded why he believes these principles of retreatism will achieve his desired political condition of Broadacre: ‘Live individual lives that enrich the communal life by the very quality of its individuality in a beauty of life that is appropriate luxury and superior common sense.’90 Le Corbusier said “Freedom through Order”, whereas Wright is suggesting “Order through Freedom”. Retreatism in implemented through 88 Wright, The Disappearing City, 60-61. 89 Fishman, Urban Utopias, 129. 90 Wright, The Disappearing City, 47.

fig. 15: The model of Broadacre City. Right: the defining aspects of the family homesteads, abstracted to indicate the physical space awarded to each home.

Aveverage acre of land

Sparsity of homesteads

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the limitless possibility of horizontality to create individuality, the antithesis of the capitalist city. Wrightâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s society can only become sustainable when this individuality exists, something he beleievd was not possible within current cities. It was, in this instance, strikingly more mature than the Radiant City in that it promoted each strong individuality as the entities which allowed for unifying politics to be possible in the first place, as opposed to being something which must be whittled out to allow order to exist.

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THE “ANTI-CITY”

hilst city centres were building vertically to solve the post-war housing crisis, developers were harnessing the mass of space on the edges of cities for a similar phenomenon. The timescale and economical logistics of accurately building the Broadacre plan, ‘as a practicable program it does not even deserve discussion’,91 and so it was constructed next to the city as a modernised suburb, just alike the Garden City was. The suburb itself is a Utopia, as ‘particularly in the years and decades that followed World War II,’ writes professor of English, Robert Beuka, ‘“suburbia” entailed the construction of not only a new kind of physical landscape, but new psychic and emotional landscapes as well. Always as much an idea as a reality.’92 Beuka suggests that the suburb became a Utopia, a fictional idea which portrayed the desirable way of life, due to its widespread success. He continues that it became the ‘mirror which middle-class American culture casts its uneasy gaze upon itself.’ The Utopia of the suburb is a representative of American society, and Beuka hints that what this Utopia unveils about the country is perhaps not positive. What it certainly reveals, however, is the way in which the new Utopia realised Frank Lloyd Writes concept of retreatism.93 From 1950-1952, the three-and-a-half thousand acres bought in the Lakewood county in Los Angeles, California, saw the construction of seventeen-and-a-half thousand homes, making 91 Graham, Dream Cities, 138. 92 Robert Beuka, “Cue the Sun: Soundings from a Millennial Suburbia.” Iowa Journal of Cultural Studies 3 (Autumn 2003), 156. 93 Graham, Dream Cities, 146.

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this the largest pre-planned housing development, ever.94 Memoirist D.J. Waldie remarks on a series of aerial photographs (fig. 16) as having defined the architectural critique of the Lakewood suburb, and suburbs in general, to this day, as an empty pattern of un-imaginary terrain.95 Upon comparing this to Frank Lloyd Wright’s mass production of housing for affordability it appears similar, but the consideration of individuality at this gigantic scale was unrealistic, and so mass production was used for its efficiency in building, which made it possible to both sell cheap and achieve good profit.96 There were seven pre-designed house types in the whole development to choose from, which in itself destroyed all sense of individuality which Wright aspired to create. Although, as this was widely represented as the American Utopia, as many as twenty-five thousand people turned up on the very first day to buy a house, the majority being young middle-class families, ‘eager to embrace the suburban good life’.97 What perhaps encouraged this was that the developers of Lakewood, despite US law on racially restrictive developments, advertised it as the “White Spot” of Los Angeles. People of African-American descent were refused applications for homes in the development as they wished to encourage an attractive “waspy” environment, away from the “undesirable” sort of people you may find in the normal city. It was this appeal which drew 94 Becky M Nicolaides, “Suburbia and the Sunbelt,” OAH Magazine of History (October 2003), 24. 95 Beuka, “Cue the Sun,” 164. 96 Merry Ovnic, “Review of Holy Land: A Suburban Memoir, by D.J. Waldie,” Southern California Quarterly 84, no. 3/4 (Autumn/Winter 2002), accessed 20th November 2017, http:// www.jstor.org/stable/41172143, 285. 97 Nicolaides, “Suburbia and the Sunbelt,” 24.

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the existing city with something he believed could please both the wanderer and the cave dweller, but with a biased prioritisation of the rural. Here he disagrees with Müller’s claim, as the “city” now becomes similar to the actual retreat, but without the element of urbanity to retreat from. With Müller’s consideration, this new landscape would be, in reality, unappealing to either primitive beings. When Broadacre City (fig. 15) is compared to the aerial photographs of Lakewood (fig. fig. 16: Set of aerial photographs of the Lakewood development during construction. William Garnett was commissioned by the developers to convey the developments appeal.

the suburban residents; a retreat who’s separateness was that of a secluded class and racial hegemony:98 frliluftsliv from people. The qualities of retreatism achieved through Wright’s motive of separation to create an anti-capitalist integration was adapted for exactly the opposite: an anti-heterogeneous segregation by capitalistic construction. The suburb is enlightening of further issues. On hytter, Dieter Müller writes that an ‘interest in the countryside requires the process of urbanization’, hence the appeal of hytter, as the principle of frliluftsliv creates a stark contrast to the urban lifestyle of Norway. This is opposing to Wright’s opinion that all borders between town and country should be removed. He states: ‘I am cast by nature for the part of the iconoclast. I must strike – tear down, before I can build – my very act of building destroys an order.’99 He suggested a replacement of 98 Graham, Dream Cities, 143. 99 Fishman, Urban Utopias, 115.

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16), there is a starkness in the landscape, however Lakewood became more densely urbanised than Broadacre, suggesting it could be a different urban identity than the anti-city.. A comical account of life within American suburbia is written by P.J. O’Rourke: There’s nothing worse than the suburbs. Except the city… There’s nothing worse than the city. Except the country… There’s nothing worse than the country. Which is why we’re in the suburbs. Which we hate.100 A less pessimistic rephrasing would suggest that O’Rourke saw the suburb as the median between the other two places which removed the negative aspects of both, however resulting in an archetype which cannot identify as either and so is described as ‘sterile’ and ‘boring’.101 Beuka writes on this ‘suburban place identification.’ It is economically linked and physically integrated to the city but also resists urban identification; it pretends to be rural but as a sort of ‘denatured nature’ in the way it monotonously flows across the natural terrain.102 He described the suburb as an urbanisation wanting to appear as a rural lifestyle but without loosing that vital relationship with the centralised city. This is where the realised suburb differs to Wright’s Utopia: the city is still there, adjacent to it. This vital juxtaposition between the urban and the “sub-urban” forms a contrast between the two, which is the 100 P.J. O’ Rourke, “I hate the suburbs… Sort of ... but what I Really hate is myself,” Rolling Stone, Issue 822 (September 30th 1999). 101 P.J. O’ Rourke, “I hate the suburbs.” 102 Beuka, “Cue the Sun,” 155.

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requirements for retreatism not found in Broadacre. O’Rourke remarks on how vital the commute was for the suburb as it defined this contrast, which appears reminiscent of Le Corbusier’s psychological detachment between the places of work and leisure, and so this becomes a semi-artificial frliluftsliv as the resident would travel home.103 This attempt at a more rural lifestyle but with a strong link to the urban creates a sub-urban, sub-rural “identity crisis” of the suburb, which seems to be what made this adaptation of the Broadacre City possible. Although the realised version of Wright’s Utopia may be more appealing than his imagination, it retained several defining aspects which rendered it less successful in a broader perspective. Lakewood featured what became one of the most successful malls in the country, a development which covered two-hundred and sixty-four acres and could host a staggering ten-thousand cars (fig. 17).104 In recounting the activities of the suburbanite as a consumer, O’Rourke mentions this mall, the markets, Price Club, and concludes that ‘we’re guilty as hell. None of these dreadful roads, none of this appalling traffic would be here if it weren’t for us going to and fro on the earth and car pooling up and down in it.’105 O’Rourke is evident in his disgust of the make-up of the suburb whilst recognizing that it was of our own making, as it allowed consuming to become more possible. This suggests that if only one of Wright’s principles was implemented correctly, it was to build at the limitless scale of the automobile. The suburb, 103 P.J. O’ Rourke, “I hate the suburbs.” 104 Nicolaides, “Suburbia and the Sunbelt,” 24. 105 P.J. O’ Rourke, “I hate the suburbs.”

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1km

fig. 17: The City of Lakewood, lodged within the county of Los Angeles. We see it presents the “suburban ideal” whilst remaining linked to the greater city. Indicated is the 10,000 car-capacity mega-mall, 1km in length.

and Lakewood especially, was an opportunity for hedonistic hegemony: it was a true retreat, a place which broke the binary of urban and rural whilst being neither but interlinked with both. All this was controversial, as it required a neglecting of social unification, and not to mention a required naivety of its environmental impact due to the car: ‘There’s nothing as consuming as suburbia.’106 This is surely the ‘uneasy gaze’ which Beuka was referring to. It presents true retreatism, and the American desire of hedonistic living, although we know that in doing so we are ‘guilty as hell’. He concludes:

Perhaps the suburb, then, is the environment we as a culture want even when we know it is not good for us.107

106 Graham, Dream Cities, 147.

107 Beuka, “Cue the Sun,” 164.

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BJARKE INGELS AND THE IMPOSSIBLE ARCHETYPE

he contemporary suburb of Ørestad, Copenhagen, is the stage-set of Bjarke Ingels’ lift-off projects the VM Houses and the 8-House. Similar to the Porta Nueva district of Milan, this is an icon of modern sustainability for the nation and features headlining architecture of a heavily design-based methodology. Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) refer in particular to the VM Bjerget108 in their strive to ‘combine the splendours of a suburban lifestyle’ into their design,109 suggesting an approach at reinventing the infamous suburban retreat to something new, whilst retaining its valuable qualities. We can assume its success considering it won the best housing category of the World Architecture Festival, 2008.110 However, unlike the previously addressed architects, Ingels does not present a Utopian vision. He mentions Le Corbusier’s infamy was due to his ‘tendency to provide the answers rather than to enable people to ask the right questions’. 111 In response to this, he proposes to ask questions instead of to provide answers since every context is different, suggesting that this solution to the suburb will become specific to its location. During an episode of Abstract: The Art of Design depicting the career of the “starchitect”, Ingels speaks on his approach to a fictional architecture with reference to the movie Inception. The movie 108 Bjerget, literally translates from Danish to English as Mountain. 109 Bjarke Ingels, Yes is More: An Archicomic on Architectural Evolution (Copenhagen: BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group, 2009), 80. 110 Information available at https://www.e-architect.co.uk/awards/world-architecture-festivalawards-2008 and https://www.worldarchitecturefestival.com. 111 Bjarke Ingels, “Bjarke Ingels Discusses Designing a New Vernacular in the Face of Climate Change,” interview by Architizer, January 4th 2017, accessed November 2017, https:// architizer.com/blog/bjarke-ingels-hedonistic-sustainability.

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is renowned for its architectural invention based on the premise of impossibility, in which a character, Cobb, “dreams” his perfect home: the family house with a large garden, but as the penthouse of a contemporary skyscraper. He said ‘in the real world we’d have to choose, but not here.’112 On referring to these impossible architectures, Ingels remarks that, When architecture is at its best, that’s exactly what you’re doing, you’re coming up with something that is pure fiction. Then after all the hard work and all the permits, and all the budgeting and all the construction, it now becomes concrete reality.113 The ambition here is clear: to build something which would normally be considered impossible, and therefore prove the world wrong, that there should be no consideration of limitations in building. I had the opportunity to experience the “impossibility” of the Mountain residences (VM Bjerget) first hand, to help me grasp a personal understanding of the relationship between the impossibility and the retreat. Ørestad, which began construction at the turn of the millennium, was foresighted as an integrated community of living and working at the busiest Scandinavian crossroads, en route between Copenhagen airport and its centre and the Øresund bridge into Malmö, Sweden (fig. 18). The district 112 Cobb, Inception, fictional character portrayed by Leonardo Di Caprio, written and directed by Christopher Nolan, DVD, (2010, USA, Legendary Pictures Syncopy). 113 Bjarke Ingles, Abstract: The Art of Design, online documentary, directed by Mark Mothersbaugh, 2017, United Kingdom, Netflix Studios.

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fig. 18: Map of Copenhagen, highlighting the Ørestad suburb (bottom-left) and its relation to the city centre (top). Indicated is the suburb’s status as the Scandinavian crossroads, with quick access, to the greater Denmark, Sweden and Copenhagen itself.

e nt r Ce

Cope n

ha g en

it y

The Mountain VM Houses

To Ma lmö , Sw ede

The 8-House

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is not yet at the success that was envisioned due to the planned population having not been met. It had to contend with the global economic crisis of 2007 and the reluctance of developers to buy, especially considering the area’s pre-construction reputation of the poorest place in the city. Some of the earliest built projects do not help the reputation, as the most prolific plot was for the highly anticipated mega-mall, Field’s, which turned out as an introverted box, contributing to the area’s ‘flawed urban character’.114 When the masterplan was chosen in 1996, it was not good enough for Bjarke Ingles who adapted it for his diploma to break the “boxy” masterplan and install a project similar in programme but more diverse in form.115 It was a similar “boxy” brief that was commissioned of BIG (Bjarke Ingels Group) when a client bought the exact piece of land which Ingels had chosen for his diploma project. BIG adapted Ingels’ academic project for the real world. What was designed did not continue the boxes which seemed to define the character of the suburb which was originally asked of them, and instead the residential block was placed upon the parking block at an angle, to create a sloping surface of homes. The housing type was envisioned so that the users Don’t have to choose between having a house with a garden or having a penthouse view. You can actually have both. And once you force these seemingly mutually exclu114 Stan Majoor, “Urban Megaprojects in Crisis? Ørestad Copenhagen Revisited,” European Planning Studies 23, no. 12 (2015): 2497-2515, DOI: 10.1080/09654313.2015.1014780, 2502. 115 Bjarke Ingels, Yes is More: An Archicomic on Architectural Evolution (Copenhagen: BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group, 2009), 78.

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sive concepts together, you actually get a new hybrid that somehow ends up looking different because it performs differently.116 Ingels first mentions the house and garden, which was idealised by Ebenezer Howard as the setting of the absolute centre of family life, the basis of his retreatism, and contrasts it to the penthouse which is the result of verticality and density. Ingels merges these opposing contexts into a single building which, if effective, would be an exhibition of the best of both worlds. The post-war suburb appeared successful in its retreatism but at many expenses, and so the Mountain must present a solution to these in order for its award winning worth. The concept involved laying out the apartment interiors on a grid with zero light and total density, the antithesis of a suburb, but then elevating them up story by story to create a flowing “mountainside”, from which one may step out of their home into their garden, located on top of the home in-front and below (fig. 19). The juxtaposition between in and out is inspired from Jørn Utzon’s L-courtyard typology, the best example being the sixty-three courtyard houses of Denmark’s Kingo housing project. Utzon has accredited Wright for the influence of the organic style the houses have undertaken, which has hence been developed in Danish architecture through

116 Ingles, Abstract, directed by Mark Mothersbaugh.

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fig. 19: The 8000m2 site that Ingels used for his diploma, and was later bought by a client of BIG

2 blocks were proposed to BIG, the parking twice the size of the residential, which was reminiscent of Ørestad’s flawed urban character

Breaking the “boxy” masterplan

Defining the mountain

The parking is located in a “cave” inside the mountain, providing an ascent to the user’s parking spot, right outside their home

Total density: the antithesis of the suburb

Creating the penthouses

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fig. 10: Perforated aluminium cladding creates mountain image.

fig. 21: A flowing mountainside of homes.

BIG. The organic style implements a suburban home whilst destroying the infamous sprawl. Before briefly experiencing the lifestyle of the Mountain, the potential space and privacy implications due to the density of the “suburb” was concerning. Surprisingly, Utzon’s courtyard with a perimeter of metre by metre plant beds removed all sightlines to neighbours above, below and adjacent, whilst offering a panoramic view of Copenhagen from the “penthouse”, the garden being as large as the apartment itself. (fig. 22). However, at the “cliffside” of the garden, the adjacent gardens on your level are visible along with a gate, creating the potential to open up all the private gardens into communal social space. We no longer see Wright’s isolated homes but rather what architect Jeanne Gang terms ‘social connectors’, a way to create community in contemporary design.118 The surreal experience of this built landscape and the sense of solitude it was able to provide, is what I believe to embody the valuable qualities of hjemmekos.

of Mount Everest (fig. 10), and rising up the edges of this are two staircases which allow the public realm to enter the building. This way, people can experience “climbing a mountain” in Copenhagen for the first time, and see their city in a unique way.119 Ingels writes, ‘Denmark is flat as a pancake. If you want to live on a mountain, you gotta do it yourself !’120 To creating a solution for horizontal retreatism, he created an artificial representation of a landscape which is naturally impossible in its local context (fig. 21). Considering Wright’s approach of removing the ‘artificial boundaries’ between worlds, this surpasses any physical boundaries to achieve this hybrid of suburb and highrise, and also suggests a new perception of these worlds due to a natural feature becoming artificial.

117

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Given the sloping design methodology which emerged from these homes, BIG embraced the opportunity this presented and pursued its mountainous characteristic as it was a contrast to the surrounding flat context. What ensued was the portrayal of a Mountain in both its marketing and spacial experience; a perforated aluminium surface covers the façade which depicts a rasterised image

French sociologist Jean Baudrillard considers the psychological perception of artificial representations of nature. The simulacrum, when based upon a general perception of the natural object, destroys any distinction between the two objects since the simulation can present the same experience as the authentic. 121 The Mountain complies with this theory as our perception of it is indifferent to an actual mountain as a user may enjoy a similar experience of climbing the building and looking out beyond. As retreatism is based upon a perception of moving to another place, the simulacrum appears successful; it mimics a landscape which is

117 The Hyatt Foundation, The Pritzker Architecture Prize (2003), accessed November 17th 2017, http://www.pritzkerprize.com/sites/default/files/file_fields/field_files_inline/2003_bio_0. pdf, 3. 118 Jeanne Gang (August 31st 2017), “Buildings that blend nature and city,” Ted Talks, retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFjD3NMv6Kw.

119 D Balik & A Allmer, “This is not a mountain!: Simulation, imitation, and representation in the mountain dwellings project, Copenhagen.” Arq : Architectural Research Quarterly 19, no. 1 (2015), doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/10.1017/S1359135515000196, 34. 120 Ingels, Yes is More, 76. 121 Jean Baudrillard in “This is not a mountain!” by Balik & Allmer, Arq, 32.

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alien to its flat context, and so creates the valuable experiences of this landscape in a place where this would naturally be impossible. If we consider the term frliluftsliv, open space, separate from the busy everyday life, ascending the Mountain addresses this principle in that the user moves from the normal possibilities of Copenhagen to a place of utter “surreality”. The Mountain becomes a retreat for its users through a psychological dislodgement from normal life, rather than by the physical separation of hytter.

The very pragmatic realisation of something utopian, but one block at a time. When I think just that the mountain is here, it means that there is another way, there is another possibility. And therefore it makes the Utopia more possible.’123

The artificial Mountain ‘offers the better of two worlds: closeness to the hectic city life in the centre of Copenhagen, and the tranquillity aspect of suburban life.’122 It solves the “identity crisis” of the suburb by adopting the valuable qualities of the sub-rural into one building, which is placed in the highly integrated, sub-urban district of the “Scandinavian crossroads” of Ørestad (fig. 18 highlights the integration). This valuable location is vital to its success, emphasising Ingels’ reference to Le Corbusier that design is much more successful when it is considered in its context only and not applied anywhere else. On this individual “Utopia”, Ingels comments that it is

In his view we cannot have an all-encompassing Utopia, it must be designed one block at a time. This utopian attitude forms the derivation of the Mountain’s retreatism. The simulacrum is only successful here because a mountain is so ironic in this context; it cannot be a utopian concept because applied in many other places the simulation would be completely irrelevant. The simulacrum’s personal topography forms one “impossibility” of this structure, and the other is the programmatic amalgamation of the Howardian home and the highrise. This ironic mountain is Cobb’s dream come true, the country house as the penthouse of a highrise, which he created in a dream because ‘in the real world we’d have to choose’. When Ingels offers the better of two worlds, ‘a house with a large garden, with urban density, and a penthouse view’,124 he is building these impossibilities inspired by Inception which he aspired to create.

122 Geoff Manaugh & BIG Bjarke Ingels Group, BIG (Seoul: ArchiLife, 2010), 124.

123 Ingels, “Hedonistic Sustainability,” Ted Talks. 124 Ingels, Yes is More, 81.

fig. 22: The view I experienced. To the right, BIG’s VM Houses, built in 2005. To the left, the city centre.

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fig. 23 Artificial Trees in the Gardens by the Bay, Singapore. The new-urban of the future.

4 EPILOGUE â&#x20AC;&#x153;It reminds me of just how easy it is for us to loose our connection with the natural world. Yet its on this connection that the future of both humanity and the natural world will depend...â&#x20AC;? - David Attenborough

The Best of Both Worlds / EPILOGUE

C O N C L U S I V E C O M PA R I S O N

he motivation of this research was to define and analyse the modern attitude of urban Utopias towards a best of both worlds scenario. To me, it has unveiled a lineage of adaptions of the human need to retreat from urban issues. The contemporary case studies conclude the development of the vertical and horizontal typologies of retreatism as what are both artificial landscapes designed to dislodge the resident from its urban context with a sense of surreality. Similarly, both structures derive from implementing the Howardian retreat within a dense context to in fact increase its retreatism qualities. But why should the opposing typologies share a similar outcome?

this implied retreat with the frame of reference of “retreatism”, opposing typologies of the use of space were determined. The 20th architects who used these had a similar motive:

The Howardian home was a Utopia to solve the industrial city, achieving what Andreas Faludi described as the best of both worlds. Its Norwegian parallel of hytte culture is noteworthy as its formation derived from identical reasons as the Garden City, but became the solitude of a rural retreat to contrast directly with the city. This presents opportunity to isolate the desirable qualities that this other world of rurality has to offer: that of space, health and privacy. Ebenezer Howard’s third magnet concept of the The Garden City blended these desirable qualities with the urban world to form one totally desirable place. This was achieved through creating a relationship with nature that was abnormal in the urban context. The space which was made created a sense of frliluftsliv, making the city breathable and forming a separation from the flawed context Howard wished the resident to retreat from, in turn creating hjemmekos, the private setting which induces joy from living. Providing

‘Live individual lives that enrich the communal life by the very quality of its individuality.’127 – Frank Lloyd Wright.

‘Society will prove the most healthy and vigorous where the freest and fullest opportunities are afforded alike for individual and of combined effort.’125 –Ebenezer Howard. ‘Beauty, which is born of action, inspired enthusiasm and provokes men to action’.126 – Le Corbusier.

Each statement from the influential designers point to a similar motive: to create a place, the retreat, of beauty and freedom, for each individual to thrive, for only then can they contribute their best back into the greater society. But the ideal retreats were designed for the societies which the Utopias based on personal idealist principles as opposed to concrete evidence. Faludi writes that the ‘utopians have provided planners with their own home-made sociology,’128 as they had no validity and became warped by developers when realised. The contemporary architects however, worked in vice versa to derive 125 Howard, The Garden City, 114. 126 Le Corbusier, The City of To-morrow, 241. 127 Wright, The Disappearing City, 47. 128 Sarakinsky, “Utopia as Politcal Theory,” 56.

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The Best of Both Worlds / EPILOGUE

the fiction from the real, evident in their mutual pride over their existing structures. Bjarke Ingels comments on the Mountain’s existence as being proof of new possibilities, and similarly Stefano Boeri directly compares himself to Le Corbusier in his own pragmatism of actually constructing a prototype for curing cities as opposed to simply drawing it. It was working with something real and lived in which resulted in the architects considering the utopian implications, as opposed to creating a retreat as a mechanic of an all encompassing Utopia. The intimate relationship these structures have with the impossibility of their own Utopias blurs the definition between fantasy and real, to create a new way of perceiving the city retreat. The architects share the motive of adapting the Howardian home as it has already broken through the “futile” boundaries between the urban and the natural, presenting itself as precedent for deriving a new reality from known places. A new reality was necessary as both architects aimed to make a retreat which solved a typology: Boeri the artificial skin of

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highrises and Ingels the non-specific sprawl of the suburb. To match the success of hytter they required an intimate relationship with nature which would disconnect the user from urbanity, and achieved this through exaggeration of the third-magnet-appeal. Both of these structures associate themselves with a natural occurrence – the forest and the mountain – and the best qualities of each are made available to the user by being artificialized. There is now no distinction between the two worlds, but rather a new reality of mutual coexistence. This is appropriate as retreatism itself is artificial, a simulacrum of the physical retreat showcased by hytter. According to Baudrillard’s theory, if the place of retreatism can present the same advantages as a defined retreat it will be equally as successful, capable of replacing it. As a retreat escapes the problems of the urban, retreatism exists within the urban which is naturally artificial. This could suggest why these new realities appear successful in dislodging the resident from the reality of their context: the artificial retreat is best housed in the “artificial landscape”, a retreat from both worlds.

End of discourse

The Best of Both Worlds / EPILOGUE

A C O N S I D E R AT I O N O N F U T U R E R E T R E AT I S M

he retreat has been considered as the outcome of utopian planning, as functions of critiquing the nature of the present and suggesting improvement based upon it,129 and so retreatism is valid specifically to the era it was defined in. On this subject of these eras changing Bjarke Ingels references Charles Darwin: ‘It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.’130 Although the primitive need to retreat is unchanging, the urban ills which cause this need are forever changing, such as contemporary architects who have become more sustainably minded than the architects of the 20th century due to environmental change. Environmentalist David Attenborough discusses that artificiality is the key to this, highlighting Singapore’s artificial “supertrees” as contributing to the environmental sustainability better than 129 Sarakinsky, “Utopia as Political Theory,” 112. 130 Charles Darwin in Yes is More, by Bjarke Ingels, 15.

nature or technology can do independently (fig. 23).131 He states that to have a future in the urban, these two worlds must work as one. This resonates the approach of Boeri and Ingels, but whilst these iconic structures of today’s architectures are thriving on surreality, we may remember the sense of wonder in Glasgow, as the slum population moved into what was minimal accommodation but also a complete upgrade from their previous residence. This wonder is associated with Utopia: it was perfect compared to what was known previously, and when this became the norm, it was no longer perfection and, over time, deteriorated. Boeri and Ingels are amidst many architects redefining the “normal” way of living, but should these become models of contemporary retreatism, we cannot assume against these becoming the “new” normal. I believe there will come to be another reason to retreat from what is to become the new-urban of the future.

131 David Attenborough, “Cities,” Planet Earth 2, 6, directed by Fredi Devas, written by David Attenborough, BBC One, first broadcasted December 11th 2016.

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APPENDIX i - Glossary ii - Bibliography iii - Index of Images

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GLOSSARY

utopia - Derived from Greek. ‘Ou’ - no, ‘eu’ well, ‘topos’ - place. Utopia - both ‘no place’ and ‘good place’. Coined in 1516 by Thomas More, it formulates a fictional world which is inhabited by a perfect society according to the existing socio-political condition. Retrospectively a Utopia acts a critique of the current issues. retreatism - Author’s definition for academic reference. An urban concept of creating an artificial sense of retreating from the city, but without the physical separation of habitats. It will present a place of “psychological dislodgement from its context through nature and privacy ensues by its spacial uses. Contains an element of collectivity since it is used within urban planning and design. This is based upon the Norwegian phenomenon of hytte culture.

hytte - Plural: hytter. Literal translation is ‘cabin’. Contains Norwegian cultural significance a second home of recreational purposes within a rural setting. frliluftsliv - Literal translation is ‘open space’. “To be able to get away from the crowd, away from the perpetual race, the confusing clamours in which we conduct our lives to far too great an extent – to get out into nature, into the open.” - Fridtjof Nansen. “Sojourn or physical activity outdoors in leisure-time with a view to change of environs and experience of nature.” -Government Policy hjemmekos - Literal translation is ‘homeliness’. “It includes time spent together as a family enjoying each other’s company, and in particular creating moments that can be enjoyed together, doing purely pleasurable things, with an overtone of “cosiness” and warmth of feeling. It also extends to a physical environment that will encourage such moments.”

All definitions are derived from research within the bibliography. Acknowledgement to Alex Andresen for validating all Norwegian terms and concepts.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Abram, Simone. “The Normal Cabins Revenge.” Home Cultures: The Journal of Architecture, Design and Domestic Space 9, no. 3 (2012): 233-253. http://www.tandfonline.com.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/doi/abs/10.2 752/175174212X13414983522071. Adams, Jonathan. Frank Lloyd Wright: The Man Who Built America. Directed by Ian Michael Jones. BBC Four, First Broadcasted August 30 2017. ArchDaily. “Bosco Verticale / Boeri Studio.” ArchDaily 23 November 2015. Accessed November 2017. https://www.archdaily.com/777498/bosco-verticale-stefano-boeri-architetti. Ashton, Izzy. “Le Corbusier’s Cabanon seaside cabin is his smallest building on the World Heritage List.” Dezeen ( July 20 2016). Accessed October 2017. https://www.dezeen.com/2016/07/20/lecorbusier-french-holiday-home-cabanon-17-buildings-unesco-world-heritage-list. Attenborough, David. “Cities.” Planet Earth 2, 6. Directed by Fredi Devas. Written by David Attenborough. BBC One, First Broadcasted December 11 2016. Balik, D., & Allmer, A. “This is not a mountain!: Simulation, imitation, and representation in the mountain dwellings project, Copenhagen.” Arq : Architectural Research Quarterly 19, no. 1 (2015), 3040. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/10.1017/S1359135515000196. Beuka, Robert. “Cue the Sun: Soundings from a Millennial Suburbia.” Iowa Journal of Cultural Studies 3 (Autumn 2003), 155-171. Boeri, Stefano. A Vertical Forest: Instructions Booklet for the Prototype of a Forest City. Edited by Guido Musante and Azzurra Muzzonigro. Mantua: Corraini, 2015. Boeri, Stefano ( June 4 2014). “Trees in the sky - a vertical forest in Milan.” Ted Talks. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jH4Q6ddchPc. Bruce, Robert. First Planning Report to the Highways and Planning Committee of the Corporation of the City of Glasgow. Glasgow: Corporation of the City of Glasgow, 1945. Don, Katherine. “Frank Lloyd Wright’s Utopian Dystopia.” Next City. April 8 2010. Accessed September 2017. https://nextcity.org/daily/entry/frank-lloyd-wrights-utopian-dystopia. Faludi, Andreas. A Reader in Planning Theory. Oxford, New York: Pergamon Press, 1973. Fishman, Robert. Urban Utopias in the Twentieth Century. New York: Basic Books, Inc., Publishers,1977.

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Gang, Jeanne (August 31 2017). “Buildings that blend nature and city.” Ted Talks, retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFjD3NMv6Kw. Graham, Wade. Dream Cities: Seven Urban Ideas That Shaped the World. New York: Harper Perennial, 2016. Green, Jared. Designed for the Future: 80 Practical Ideas for a Sustainable World. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2015. Hatherly, Owen. “London on Film.” Icon 121 ( July 2013): 81-85. Helliwell, J., Layard, R., & Sachs, J. World Happiness Report 2017. New York: Sustainable Development Solutions Network. Howard, Ebenezer. The Garden City of To-Morro. Edited by Frederic James Osborn. Michigan: MIT Press, 1965. Ingles, Bjarke. Abstract: The Art of Design. Online Documentary. Directed by Mark Mothersbaugh. 2017, United Kingdom, Netflix Studios. Ingels, Bjarke. “Bjarke Ingels Discusses Designing a New Vernacular in the Face of Climate Change.” Interview via Architizer. January 4th 2017. Accessed November 2017. https://architizer.com/blog/ bjarke-ingels-hedonistic-sustainability. Ingels, Bjarke (May 9th 2011). “Hedonistic Sustainability.” Ted Talks. Retrieved from https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=ogXT_CI7KRU. Ingels, Bjarke. Yes is More: An Archicomic on Architectural Evolution. Copenhagen: BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group, 2009. Le Corbusier. The City of To-morrow. 8th Edition. Translated by Frederick Etchells. New York: Dover Publications, 1987. Leslie, Chris & Rodger, Johnnie. Disappearing Glasgow: A Photographic Journey. Glasgow: Freight Books, 2017. Leslie, Chris & Rodger, Johnnie (November 16th 2017). “Glasgow High Rises: Have they served their time?” Event attended at the Lighthouse, Glasgow. Lund, Brian. Housing Politics in the United Kingdom: Power, Planning and Protest. Bristol: Policy Press, 2016. Majoor, Stan. “Urban Megaprojects in Crisis? Ørestad Copenhagen Revisited.” European Planning Studies 23, no. 12 (2015): 2497-2515. Accessed November 2017. DOI: 10.1080/09654313.2015.1014780. Manaugh, Geoff & BIG Bjarke Ingels Group. BIG. Seoul: ArchiLife, 2010. More, Saint Thomas, & Sampson, George. Sir Thomas More’s Utopia. London: G. Bell, 1910. Müller, Dieter. “Second Homes in the Nordic Countries: Between Common Heritage and Exclusive Commodity.” Scandinavian Journal of Hospitality and Tourism 7, no.3 (2007): 193-201. Nicolaides, Becky M. “Suburbia and the Sunbelt.” OAH Magazine of History (October 2003), 21-26.

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Nozick, Robert. Anarchy, State and Utopia. New York City: Basic Books, 1974. Pepper, Simon. “The Garden City Idea: Introduction: The Garden City Legacy.” The Architectural Review 163, no.976 ( June 1978): 321-324. O’ Rourke, P.J. “I hate the suburbs… Sort of ... but what I Really hate is myself.” Rolling Stone, Issue 822. September 30 1999, p35. Orwell, George. 1984. Reprinted. London: Penguin UK, 2004. Richards, Eric. Debating the Highland Clearances. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007. Riddoch, Lesley ( July 15th 2017). “Bothy Culture.” Event attended at Abriachan Village Hall, Inverness. Sarakinsky, Ivor. “Utopia as Political Theory.” Politikon: South African Journey of Political Studies 20, no. 2 (1993): 111-123. The New York Times. “Housing Plan Seen as a Walled City.” The New York Times. May 20, 1943. Tiano, Massimo. “Porta Nuova: Milan rises.” Guiding Architects. January 5 2017. Accessed November 2017 http://www.guiding-architects.net/porta-nuova-milan-rises. Wright, Frank Lloyd. The Disappearing City. Digitised by The University of Michigan. Michigan: W. F. Payson, 1932. Accessed October 2017.

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INDEX OF IMAGES

Cover Image: Photograhphs edited within Adobe Photoshop CC. 1 - User of “Each City a Fantasy”, The rainforest commands respect!, 2016 Photograph. Available from https://eachcityarhapsody.com/2016/08/27/into-the-jungle-of-langkawi-gallery. 2 - Quintin Gellar, High Angle View of Cityscape Against Cloudy Sky, Photograph, 5103 x 3320 pixels. Available from https://www.pexels.com/photo/high-angle-view-of-cityscape-against-cloudysky-313782. index no.

1 User of “Living Mountain”, The partially serviced Stolsmardalen hut in Jotunheimen NP, 2009. Photograph. Available from http://livingmountain.net/2009/11/fantasy-bothying-in-norway.html. 2 Diagram by Author using Adobe Illustrator CC, information retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/ news/election-2015-32393222, http://eyeonhousing.org/2011/08/where-are-the-nations-secondhomes. 3 Poster advertising the merits of Letchworth Garden City, 1925. Available from http://www.cltroots.org/ the-guide/foreign-born-pioneers-precedents/garden-cities. 4 Luca Maresca, Illustration from comic book: Martin Mystère, “Dalla Terra alla Luna”, p91. Available from https://www.stefanoboeriarchitetti.net/en/vertical-forest-en/vertical-forest-symbol-of-milan/ 5 Ebenezer Howard, Group of Slumless, Smokless Cities, 1902. Drawing. Available from http://library. famu.edu/c.php?g=276202&p=1841225. 6 Le Corbusier, Plan for a City of 3 Million Inhabitants, 1922. Drawing. Available from https://relationalthought.wordpress.com/2012/07/29/1189. 7 Le Corbusier, Blocks of dwellings on the cellular system, 1929. Drawing. Scanned from The City of To-Morrow and its Planning. p224. 8 Chris Leslie, The Red Road Flats, 2016. Photograph. Scanned from Disappearing Glasgow: A Photographic Journey, p13.

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THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

9 Porta Nuova Municipality, Masterplan for the Development, after 1999. Disgital Illustration, edited in Adobe Photoshop CC. Available from https://casestudies.uli.org/porta-nuova. 10 Paulo Rosselli & Laura Cionci, The Vertical Forest, Milan, 2015. Photograph. Scanned from A Vertical Forest: Booklet for the Prototype of a Forest City, p42. 11 Diagram by Author using Rhino and Adobe Photoshop CC, information retrieved from A Vertical Forest: Booklet for the Prototype of a Forest City, p114. 12 Diagram by Author using Adobe Illustrator CC, information retrieved from https://www.archdaily. com/777498/bosco-verticale-stefano-boeri-architetti. 13 Stefano Boer, Visions of a Forest City, 2015. Digital Illustration. Scanned from A Vertical Forest: Booklet for the Prototype of a Forest City, p148-149. 14 Photograph by Author, Mountain Dwellings of the VM Bjerget, Copenhagen, 2017. 15 The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives, Model of Broadacre City by Frank Lloyd Wright. Photograph. Available from http://www.metropolismag.com/architecture/frank-lloyd-wright-urban-theorist. 16 William Garnett, Set of Aerial Photographs of the Lakewood Development Under Construction. 1949, Aerial Photographs. Available from http://spaceframed.blogspot.co.uk/2010/02/new-topographics-photographs-of-man.html. 17 Diagram by Author using Adobe Photoshop CC, imagery retrieved from https://www.google.co.uk/ maps. 18 Diagram by Author using Adobe Photoshop CC, imagery retrieved from https://www.google.co.uk/ maps and http://big.dk/#projects. 19 BIG Bjarke Ingels Group, edited by Author using Adobe Photoshop CC, Design Development of the Mountain, 2007. Digital Illustration. Available at http://big.dk/#projects-mtn. 20 BIG Bjarke Ingels Group, Perforated Aluminium Cladding, 2007. Photograph. Available at http:// big.dk/#projects-mtn. 21 BIG Bjarke Ingels Group, View of the Mountain from the South, 2007. Photograph. Available at http://big.dk/#projects-mtn. 22 Photograph by Author, The View from the Mountain, Copenhagen, 2017. 23 Matthew Boner, Gardens by the Bay, 2017. Photograph. Available from https://matthewboner. myportfolio.com/singapore.

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