THE GRUDGING URBANIST
Shamsul Wares: A teacher who inspired generations of architects
Aristotle once said, “Those who know, do. Those who understand, teach.” Shamsul Wares understood, and hence taught.
Faujdarhat Cadet College / A post-Partition heritage campus worth preserving
FCC should not be viewed simply as one of the cadet colleges; it is a heritage campus that can be showcased to the world.
Planning for Dhaka's new night
Dhaka should be readied for a nighttime culture that offers a potpourri of entertainment options to people.
Has Dhaka become a status city?
The status city often serves the privileged, while the huddling masses eke out a minimal existence
Is human civilisation at an inflection point?
Our brains are being reprogrammed to look for the easiest solutions to our most vexing social and political questions.
Is there an architecture for marginal communities?
Our experience of designing Brac regional offices across rural Bangladesh.
Muzharul Islam’s Birth Centenary / Forging a Bengali identity through modernist architecture
After completing his Bachelor of Architecture degree at the University of Oregon, Eugene, in June 1952, the 29-year-old Muzharul Islam (1923-2012) returned home to find a postcolonial Pakistan embroiled in acrimonious politics of national identity.
The Louis Kahn mystique: 20 years after ‘My Architect’
The legend of Louis Kahn remains strong.
How the demolition of a train station changed America
At the heart of the ongoing debate on the potential demolition of TSC and Kamalapur Railway Station in Dhaka is an old philosophical dilemma—how to progress while retaining some loyalty to history, a key concern of many 20th century philosophers, such as Paul Ricoeur.
SDGs, the tyranny of sameness, and a lesson for World Cities Day
Yesterday was World Cities Day (WCD). In 2013, the United Nations General Assembly designated October 31 as WCD to build global awareness of the challenges that cities around the world face.
SDGs, the tyranny of sameness, and a lesson for World Cities Day
The world’s urban future is full of challenges. But one of the greatest among them is a simple but profound one: the universalisation of urban problems and their generic solutions.
A looming tragedy in the University of Dhaka’s centennial celebration
Is this the right way to celebrate the centennial of the University of Dhaka in 2021? Like many of my colleagues in Bangladesh and around the world, I was horrified to learn that the university administration has made plans to demolish a 20th century architectural icon inside the university campus to expand and upgrade its insufficient facilities.
What if a 7.9 Richter-scale earthquake hit Dhaka?
The runway of Dhaka’s international airport was torn asunder along the axis. The damage forced all international flights—carrying emergency medical supplies, food, temporary shelters, and heavy-duty rescue machines—to divert to Chittagong and Sylhet.
Discrimination by design
I was reading a harrowing report in the New York Times that revealed startling data about how federal officials in the United States during the 1930s demarcated or “redlined” certain areas of different cities as “hazardous” or “risky for business,” based on the concentration of poor Black people or immigrants in them.
To remove or not to remove?
Lincoln Park is our community hub on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Just a block away from where we have lived for nearly two decades, it is a magnificent swath of urban green, within walking distance from the US Capitol.
How can Dhaka become more resilient to future pandemics?
Cities have generally been the epicentres of the devastation caused by Covid-19, fuelling debates around the world on how to make cities more resilient against future pandemics.
Not rewarding honesty is promoting dishonesty
It is hard not to notice the frozen posture of BUET engineer MD Delwoar Hossain’s murdered body on the bank of the Turag river.
Density is not the problem – lack of public health and social justice is
In America, one of the politically charged reactions to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic has been the denigration of urban population density.