how we shape cities, and cities shape us
by alexi gunner · updated 19d ago
how we shape cities, and cities shape us
- There is a gentrification that is happening to cities, and there is a gentrification that is happening to the emotions too, with a similarly homogenising, whitening, deadening effect. Amidst the glossiness of late capitalism, we are fed the notion that all difficult feeling - depression, anxiety, loneliness, rage - are simply a consequence of unset... See more
alexi gunner added 5mo ago
It's not only UK dance music of the Nineties that is associated with cities; the whole history of popular music is about urban scenes. It's no accident that Motown started in Detroit, house in Chicago, hip-hop in New York… Cities are pressure cookers which can synthesise influences
quickly and in a way that is both collective and idiosyncratic. Scen
... See morefrom þÿK-punk by þÿMark Fisher,Darren Ambrose
alexi gunner added 4mo ago
“A neighbourhood is not only an association of buildings but also a network of social relationships, an environment where the feelings and the sympathy can flourish.” -
Jane Jacobsfrom idle gaze 002: Community thrives through bustling neighbourhoods and casual chatter. by Alexi Gunner
alexi gunner added 1mo ago
- Entrepreneur Phil Levin on the importance of neighborhoods:
"You are going to spend 1000x more time in your surrounding 5 blocks than you will in any other neighborhood in your city. Thinking about all the things that New York City has—or the next city has—is a lot less important than thinking about the things within the five blocks where you live.
M... See morealexi gunner added 3mo ago
- You are always internalizing the culture around you. Even when you wish you didn’t. So you better surround yourself with something you want inside—curate a culture.
from First We Shape Our Social Graph; Then It Shapes Us by Henrik Karlsson
alexi gunner added 6mo ago
- “Every city has a sex and an age which have nothing to do with demography. Rome is feminine. So is Odessa. London is a teenager, an urchin, and in this hasn’t changed since the time of Dickens. Paris, I believe, is a man in his twenties in love with an older woman.”
―
John Bergerfrom A quote by John Berger
alexi gunner added 1mo ago
- The story of humanity is an urban one, a slow 20,000 year drift towards a largely urban condition. A city does the same thing to individualism that a natural ecosystem does to a tree — thriving there is about living well with people who are not like you. Just as a tree revels in those multifarious interdependencies, so we do with cities.
from 11: Post-traumatic urbanism and radical indigenism by Medium
alexi gunner added 6mo ago
- Stark reminder of the parlous state of afterdark subculture in so many cities around the world. In the UK, for instance, 75% of nightclubs have shut since 2005 (75%!) - and, truth be told, so much of what survives is very corporate and highly contrived.
They say nothing good happens after 2am (or is it midnight?), but in the case of creativity, that... See morefrom feed updates
alexi gunner added 5mo ago
- In their effort to picture modernity, Impressionists painted all the new daytime activities of Paris: from walking the freshly laid promenades to peering through the industrialised glass panes of shops. But they also began to paint the nightlife: the absinthe drinker; the lady of the night; the theatre; the bar girl; the singer. The Impressionists ... See more
from Matter
alexi gunner added 6mo ago