Can architecture and design respond to cities under stress? Capital flight, debt, and social crisis have left visible scars in urban environments worldwide. Buffeted by powerful forces, the endemic vacancy and deteriorating buildings that confront a visitor to Athens today are only the most immediate symptoms of longer-term decline. With its roots in a research and design initiative led by Urban-Think Tank, this book presents a collection of 101 spatial ideas that map a post-crisis vision for the city. Focusing on small and large-scale interventions alike, the authors identify and mobilize the latent potential found in the Greek capital by demonstrating how what already exists can be used in creative and unexpected ways. Targeting a range of challenges, from the economy and public space, to immigration, health, mobility, and poverty, Reactivate Athens: 101 Ideas can be read simultaneously as a both an in-depth toolkit and call to action. Alongside material produced by Urban-Think Tank, the book, which is written in Greek and English, includes contributions from Maria Kaltsa, Thomas Maloutas, and Panayotis Tournikiotis.

Reactivate Athens: 101 Ideas

Publications

Torre David, a 45-story skyscraper in Caracas, has remained uncompleted since the Venezuelan economy collapsed in 1994. Today, it is the improvised home to more than 750 families living in an extra-legal and tenuous squat, that some have called a ‘vertical slum’. Urban-Think Tank spent a year studying the physical and social organization of this ruin-become home. Richly illustrated with photographs by Iwan Baan, Torre David: Informal Vertical Communities documents the residents’ occupation of the tower and how, in the absence of formal infrastructure, they organize themselves to provide for daily needs, with a hair salon, a gym, grocery shops, and more. Including contributions from Andres Lepik, André Kitagawa, Arno Schlueter, and Christian Schmid, this thought-provoking work not only investigates informal vertical communities and the architecture that supports them, but also issues a call for action: to see in informal settlements a potential for innovation and experimentation, with the goal of putting design in service to a more equitable and sustainable future.

Torre David: Informal Vertical Communities

The São Paulo Architecture Experiment documents a collaboration between the São Paulo State Housing Secretariat (SEHAB), Urban-Think Tank, and various international partners focused on a reconsideration of minimal habitation in dense urban space. The project proposes that architects eschew their conventional role in traditional hierarchies and instead act as an enabling connection between the opposing forces of top-down planning and bottom-up initiatives. The book focuses on issues related to São Paulo’s urban development, covering topics such as water management, waste recycling, slum morphology, and economic development.

São Paulo Architecture Experiment

A special publication produced by Urban-Think Tank and the TdLab at ETH Zürich,Markets in the Tropicspresents the research, debates, and encounters that emerged from two summer schools with Universidad del Norte focused on thecentro histórico of Barranquilla, Colombia. Published as a limited edition newspaper, it gathers local and international expert opinions on the current trade-offs facing the city, and examines the potential of furthering participatory and trans-disciplinary methodologies in urban design. Encompassing historical recollections, future scenarios, interviews, and workshop findings, the publication also includes contributions from Armando Silva, Roland Krebs, Christian Sieber, Peter Mörtenböck, and Helge Mooshammer.

Title	Markets in the Tropics
Release	July 2015
Managing Editor	Marie Grob
Guest Editor	Alice Herzog
Design	Mayra Monobe
Sponsor	ETH Zürich (Innovedum)
Pages	40