Geoffrey James (2)

We talk a lot about "placemaking," which usually involves some color-coded sketches and photo "montages" illustrating what could be. I almost prefer we spent more time on what is, and what it tells us about what was.

Toronto is a catalog or typology of places, unoccupied but not empty, in two-point perspective like Renaissance backdrops. Something about the way space bends--or is bent--makes scenes and histories of the streets themselves, with no need for an explicit human presence.… (mehr)