The vicissitudes of urban form over the last fifty years are the story of a passion. Since the Renaissance, architecture has considered, with Leon Battista Alberti, that a city was nothing more than a large house, and that a house was nothing more than a small city. Guided by this analogy, modern architects have tried time and again to make cities in the image and likeness of their buildings, while feeling satisfied when, in designing their buildings, they did so guided by the logic of city construction. But this one-to-one relationship is both necessary and impossible. It is at the heart of the desire that drives architects, but ultimately constitutes an unattainable goal...[+]