Cities

Cities at London Met is a bold venture

The shaping of cities is a vast collaboration in which we can all participate, but not without some skill and determination, and some focus on what kind of good we are wanting. When people with nimble design minds push their way forward and find a strong role it is usually productive, and our places come out the richer for it. Cities at London Met is a bold venture, led by Professor Mark Brearley, to help make that happen.

The School is amidst a golden opportunity. Our city is fast changing, and that change needs careful consideration, subtle steering. We are lucky that so many good people here at our school have an incisive contribution to make to the discussion about London, and about other cities, and to the process of change. Those people are able to initiate, to challenge, to observe. Those people have a flair for making good things happen. And there is also here a remarkable and ever-evolving collection of students. At Aldgate we host a big bundle of enthusiasm, intelligence, creativity and skill. We are well embedded in this wonderful and bewildering city, and are laden with talented urbanists. They are observers, drawers, mappers, photographers, designers and proposers, plan makers, teachers, no-nonsense researchers, urban make-it-happen people and activists, architects who are able at once to be sensitive to, and rough with, the city.

So how could we not make all this more visible and start rolling a snowball, to somewhere high impact, and offer it all up to our city and the world? That is what we are doing now, with Cities, and we are making it grow, excitedly rolling that snowball.

Expect to hear strong things about London and about cities from us here. Expect to see us making it up as we go along, seizing opportunities, linking up, fanning flames, being entrepreneurial, nurturing and helping. Affecting as well as understanding, being part of it not just watching. Following our convictions and using our flair to help make the city better.

Here you can find a taster of what we are doing, and some of the people involved, working from our room overlooking Whitechapel, across the University, and beyond.

To find out more please contact Mark Brearley.

Cities Unit

People

 
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