UCPA Sports Station, Bordeaux

Operating from Paris and Nice since 2009, NP2F has worked on the most varied themes, among which a special interest in sports spaces stands out. As architects of Cartesian method, the firm’s members tackle their projects from a deduction process grounded on the drawing, which helps them take on the complexities of the context and turn them into gestures of great clarity, restrained but intense.

The dossier of the issue explores how the design of urban spaces can contribute to mitigating floods like Valencia’s recent ones. Using his own work in this environmental focus, the Zaragoza architect Iñaki Alday presents four water parks: the Somes River Banks in Cluj-Napoca (Romania), by PRÁCTICA; the Papaloapan Linear Park in Tuxtepec (Mexico), by Entorno y Contexto; the Benjakitti Forest Park in Bangkok (Thailand), by Turenscape y Arsomsilp; and the Johannisberg Wetland Park in Västerås (Sweden), by Topia landskapsarkitekter.

In line with the reopening of Notre-Dame, Juan Villoro in the Art and Culture section analyzes Victor Hugo’s famous reflection on the role of the great medieval cathedrals. For her part, Marina Otero examines the digital revolution knowing that it would not be possible without a colossal physical infrastructure of vast ecological impact. And complementing the usual News and Books sections is the prologue that Dolores Hayden has written for the recently published Spanish edition of Redesigning the American Dream, the influential work on urban planning that she published forty years ago.

Order Arquitectura Viva 270