Towards an Urban Re…mix!
An anti-innovation manifesto advocating for cities to keep regrowing layers of opportunities in everyday places.
Cities around the world exist in a constant state of growth, an inevitable consequence of urbanization. While this growth risks exacerbating existing social challenges – such as climate change, congestion, obesity, and poverty and so on—it also presents a unique opportunity.
We invite you to reimagine the city—not just as a place to live, but as a thriving ecosystem. It is essential to cultivate a deep sense of belonging by assembling diverse minds, cultures, and needs. This vision embodies the philosophy of urban remixing. With the right urban remixing toolkit, we can transform urban growth into a powerful catalyst for positive change. The first step in this remixing journey is to reject monofunctional fabrics and standardized developments. Let us begin by remixing our homes, town centres, and industrial lands into vibrant living spaces.
A toolkit for remixing: Remixing our homes
A home transcends mere than just the number of residential units addressing housing shortages; it is a comfortable environment for livelihood, connecting streets and nature to provide safe spaces for intergenerational communities. By remixing the homes, streets, and gardens of our suburbs, we can blend familiar historic vernacular with modern comforts. It is essential to provide a diverse mix of residential typologies that are thoughtfully knitted into the urban fabric. When designing homes, we should reimagine streets as pedestrian-friendly spaces, reclaiming them from car dominance and return the streets to people. By remixing sustainable drainage systems with play, we can unlock opportunities to create safe spaces for children within compact urban living. Additionally, we should prioritise remixing active travel with wellbeing by finding ways to incorporate sustainable drainage with pavements and bike lanes.
Remixing our town centres
A town centre is the place where living, shopping, marking, breaking, meeting, learning, and protesting can co-exist and complement each other. By remixing our town centres with homes, co-working or creative spaces, and their public realm, we can intertwine makers with wanderers, young with old, extroverts with introverts. Each town centre should be uniquely reimagined, reflecting its own characteristics and the dynamics of urban growth. By advocating for a mix of uses within neighbourhoods, we weave together the diverse layers of community and people, fostering a thriving environment that invites more residents to embrace town centre living. This approach ignites spontaneous activities and sparks creative interactions, ultimately enriching the community experience and forging an inclusive city.
Remixing our industrial areas
Many cities across Europe carry the legacy of trading and productivity, which has resulted in remnants of industrial land. Most industrial sheds and factories are still in use today, yet often operate inefficiently and ineffectively. This monofunctional land use becomes a stumbling block for urban growth, posing potential health and safety issues due to its proximity to residential neighbourhoods in compact urban settings. By remixing our industrial areas with studios, cargo hubs, farms, social hubs, and clubs, we can blend work with play, production with consumption, and tranquillity with safety. Industrial areas must no longer be seen as isolated and inaccessible- instead, they have the potential to transform into vibrant spaces for the public. Workers will thrive in an enjoyable and engaging work environment, while the communities are invited to experience this newly remixed space day and night. This could also mitigate the absolute boundaries between industrial and residential areas, embracing the principle ‘agent of change’ to create a safer city.
Mixing isn’t ‘new’. It’s what cities do best.
Cities are growing and they can’t grow out or up anymore, or anymore unequal. Therefore, places need to grow thicker, adding layers and remixing functions spatially to increase equitable access to natural resources, ideas, cultures, a sense of belonging, progressive employment, and fun, while fostering wellbeing and enjoyment for all urban dwellers.
