I first learned about the work of Jonathan Segal back when I was in architecture school. And he was somebody I immediately admired. 

At the time, I was struggling to figure out where I wanted to position myself between architecture and real estate development, and he was somebody who had seemingly figured it all out: he simply merged the two.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Jonathan Segal, he has made a name for himself by being a pioneer of the “Architect as Developer” business model. That is, he acts as both the architect and the developer/client.

This business model isn’t going to suit everyone, but I suspect that we’ll see more of it in the future.

Of course, it doesn’t just have to be an architect acting as a developer. It could also be an architect and a developer joining forces or some other permutation. Whatever the case may be, design and innovation are central to business today and that’s why I think this model will only become more relevant.

Below is a short 3 ½ minute video about Segal’s latest project, called Mr. Robinson. It is located in San Diego. If you can’t see the video below, click here.

[vimeo 155403927 w=500 h=211]

If you’d like to see the typical floor plans or rent one of the apartments (they start at $2,400/month), click here.

Now I’d be curious to hear your thoughts. Do you like the project?

Architect Bjarke Ingels will be in Toronto next week to talk about how architecture can create communities and about a new project that he is working on with developers Westbank and Allied REIT here in the city.

The last time I heard Bjarke speak was when I was in undergrad and he had recently started a firm called PLOT with Julien De Smedt. That was over 10 years ago. So I am looking forward to this talk. If you’re also going to be attending, tweet me and let’s try and connect at the event.

In anticipation of that, I thought I would share a book that his firm published about a year ago called, BIG, HOT TO COLD: An Odyssey of Architectural Adaptation. 

What’s interesting about the book is that all of the projects are organized according to climatic location – literally hot to cold. That’s why the pages themselves start as red and end up in dark blue.

It’s a direct response to the fact that modern architecture and modern building systems largely did away with regional and climatic variations. Buildings were designed, no matter their location, to look exactly the same. 

To a certain extent, globalization makes this somewhat inevitable. But climate is climate. And I believe that architecture is stronger when it responds to local context.

If you were in Toronto this past weekend – perhaps for the NBA All Star Game – you’re probably well aware that Toronto sometimes gets cold. So it will be interesting to see what kind of strategies they employ for their upcoming project.

If you want to hear Bjarke talk about this book and some of their projects, check out this video from the Architectural Association in London.

This week I have been thinking and reading about monocentric and polycentric cities. In urban real estate economics, the monocentric city model has historically been an important economic model. Developed in the 1960s, it attempts to explain land use in cities with one core, or central business district (CBD).

In its most simplest terms, the model states that as you move further away from that core, land prices will fall. But since retail and employment need to be at the center of large catchment areas, they will remain in the middle, while the residential will naturally spread out.

When you begin to factor in transportation costs, there is an argument to be made for why inner cities neighborhoods were often poorer in North American cities (no car; higher transportation costs) and why the suburbs were often wealthier. In this latter case, the rich wanted to consume more home/real estate and their transportation costs weren’t as significant. They had cars and subsidized highways in which to drive them on.

Of course, there are many ways in which you could argue against the above. Today, urban neighborhoods are some of the most desirable areas in many cities. 

But perhaps the most obvious thing to question is the idea that cities only have one central business district. I mean, just look at all the employment nodes in Toronto. Yes, downtown Toronto is still the dominant zone, but could we really be considered monocentric?

From what I remember, the model had mechanisms for dealing with polycentricity. But at the same time, so much has changed since the 1960s. The central business district with its big department store was only just getting introduced to the likes of fully enclosed, climate-controlled suburban malls. And of course today, we are now living in a world of Amazon Prime and independent workers.

So what does this mean for cities?

Well, as I was reading up on this topic I stumbled upon this diagram by architect Cedric Price (1934-2003):

I wish I knew exactly when this diagram was created, but I wasn’t able to find that online. In any event, the diagram uses different kinds of eggs – boiled, fried, and then scrambled – to explain the urban morphology of cities over time.

In the ancient world, cities had a clearly defined core and a clearly defined perimeter – often a wall for defence (boiled egg). In the 17-19th centuries, cities started to expand outwards through the advent of technologies like rail. This gave them a more irregular shape (fried egg). And then finally, Cedric argues that the modern city had, or would, become all mixed together like scrambled eggs.

I wouldn’t say that our cities have become completely scrambled. But I would agree that we are moving away from the simple fried egg of a city (or monocentric city model). So I guess the big question is really: How scrambled do you think we’ll get?