Zohran Mamdani Is Making History. When Will Top Democrats Catch On?
Mamdani won a record-setting primary victory, and unions, grassroots Democratic groups, and savvy elected officials are rushing to back him. Now it’s the establishment’s turn.
https://thenation.com/article/polit…
Susan Weil: About Time
The title of the Susan Weil retrospective at the Shirley Fiterman Art Center at Borough of Manhattan Community College not only suggests the belated recognition of the ninety-five-year-old’s work, but also speaks to the question of “aboutness.”
https://brooklynrail.org/2025/07/ar…
The Work of Caring for My Daughter Will Never Be ‘Efficient’
Moving words from a pal in New York.
https://theatlantic.com/family/arch…
Radburn, New Jersey and the Utopian Origins of the American Suburbs
An introduction to Radburn.
https://architizer.com/blog/inspira…
Finding a Family of Boys
Leaving Brooklyn for a new life as a college student in Manhattan was in itself an act of becoming.
https://newyorker.com/magazine/2025…
“Giving Up Is a Great Source of Happiness”: 30 minutes with author Geoff Dyer
If you ever wondered how Dyer got this way, the 67-year-old writer’s new memoir, Homework, is a good start.
https://interviewmagazine.com/liter…
Don Bachardy reflects on his artfully queer life
In his retrospective at The Huntington, Don Bachardy, at 91, gets his flowers and reflects on a lifetime of queer art.
https://out.com/out-exclusives/gay-…
Your Hip Surgery, My Headache
Getting Hugh home after his hip replacement involved a thick cushion and a car with legroom. “Ow!” he said whenever I tried to help. “You’re making everything worse!”
https://newyorker.com/magazine/2025…
The American Paradox: Bigger Doesn’t Necessarily Mean Better
The community characteristics found in villages are scaled up for the cities. Size of space affects behavior. And behavior of course produces culture.
https://commonedge.org/the-american…
Ben Shahn, the Lefty Artist Who Was Left Behind
Shahn was an American phenomenon, but a new retrospective suggests that we’ve come to prize his politics over his accomplishments.
https://newyorker.com/culture/the-a…
Knitting and Crafting as Subversion of Neoliberalism
Knitting down the system.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=JZsGjQu…
The Potential Beauty and Wonder of Storefront Displays
Pal James Rojas takes it to the street, well the street window.
https://commonedge.org/the-potentia…
William Kentridge Reflects on What It Means to Be a South African Artist
“I think my experience of South Africa has been that one has to keep an optimism and a pessimism together, and neither by itself is accurate.”
https://nytimes.com/interactive/202…
Richard Saul Wurman: “There’s a Louis Kahn Cult, and I’m a Member!”
“In a sense, I’m an amateur, a dilettante, I don’t do anything particularly well, but I see patterns between things,”
https://commonedge.org/richard-saul…
‘The Cole Porter of Literature’: Writers and Artists Remember Edmund White
In these reflections, colleagues, friends and admirers recall his risk-taking, his generosity and his insatiable taste for gossip.
https://nytimes.com/2025/06/05/book…
The Very Gay Life of Edmund White
Remembering Edmund White.
https://nytimes.com/2025/06/05/opin…
Artificial Intelligence and City-Making: The Potential for New Synthesis
Pals Rocky Hanish and John Parman extend the discussion about AI to include urban morphology.
https://builtformjournal.org/index.…
No Straight Road Takes You There by Rebecca Solnit review – an activist’s antidote to despair
Hope is no casual platitude in this inspiring collection of essays; it’s the realistic mindset with which to approach existential challenges
https://theguardian.com/books/2025/…
Design Hospitality at Placewares
I just heard that Kevin Leigh Lane passed away. He was well known in design circles. I interviewed him and his then partner, Shev Rush, when they took over Placewares from the Lyndons.
https://kennethcaldwell.com/design-…
These People Used to Live Here?
Before the Chelsea Hotel got swanky, a long-term resident captured the louche building—and its iconic guests—with a black-and-white-film camera.
https://newyorker.com/culture/photo…
My Parents Expected to Be Retired. Instead, They Are Raising My Sister’s Kids.
When grandparents are parents.
https://nytimes.com/2025/05/18/maga…
Notes From the Venice Biennale, Past and Present
Unlike professions such as medicine, accounting, or law, architecture has a high culture. By this I mean an indulgence in exhibition making, publishing, and archiving—in possessing its own rarified curators.
https://commonedge.org/notes-from-t…
Cancer Stole Her Voice. Curse Words, Children’s Books and AI Saved It
Our good friend Sonya Sotinsky was profiled on KQED. She took the tough lessons of her career as an architect to share what she learned from her cancer experience. Finding your voice has all kinds of meaning.
https://kqed.org/science/1996818/sh…
Pepe Mujica: My Generation Made a Naive Error
The late Uruguayan statesman José “Pepe” Mujica argues that capitalism is not just property relations but a set of cultural values that the Left must confront with a culture of solidarity.
https://jacobin.com/2025/05/pepe-mu…
Tate Modern Is the Museum of the Century (Like It or Not)
The London institution, which turns 25 this week, encouraged its peers to look beyond the West. But its greatest impact was to remake the art museum into a kind of theme park.
https://nytimes.com/2025/05/08/arts…
Learning How to Talk About Architecture on Social Media
For my communication compadres...
https://commonedge.org/learning-how…
