Landscape Futures: Instruments, Devices and Architectural Inventions

By Geoff Manaugh

Landscape Futures explores how landscapes, and our perceptions of them, can be utterly transformed by technology and design. It travels the shifting terrains of architectural invention, where new spatial devices on a variety of scales--from the handheld to the inhabitable--reveal previously overlooked dimensions of the built and natural environments. From philosophical toys and ironic provocations to a room-sized kinetic mechanism that models future climates, these devices are not merely diagnostic but creative, deploying fiction as a means of exploring alternative futures: landscape futures, terrestrial scenarios for which we have no other guide.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Actar
• Release date: Aug 1, 2013
• ISBN: 9781945150548

Geoff Manaugh

Geoff Manaugh is a Los Angeles-based freelance writer and the author of A Burglar’s Guide to the City, which was a New York Times bestseller and one of Amazon.com’s ‘Best Books of 2016.’ Manaugh regularly covers issues related to cities, design, crime, infrastructure, and technology for The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic, New Scientist, The Daily Beast, Wired UK, and many other publications. He has also contributed essays to multiple books, exhibition catalogues and artist monographs.

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Reviews for Landscape Futures

[modioperandi · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is one of those books that is so interesting to read that it becomes difficult to put it down and write a review of it. I almost want to keep it a secret how cool it is, but since everyone already knows that whatever Geoff touches turns to gold, it's not like I'm letting any particular cat out of the bag.In my eyes this book is largely a sequel to The BLDG BLOG Book, which is by far the most interesting book on the build world ever written. Even if you disagree, you have to admit that Geoff's ability to pull together so much, and to give more leads to artists and sites and other books than anyone could ever follow, is as impressive as it gets.There is a large section of graphics in the book which I just can't get as into as the rest of it, but the book is intended to supplement/document an exhibit, so I know I shouldn't be too picky. This aside, I have to say I love this book, and it stands as yet another testament to Geoff's curiosity and ability to observe the threads connecting virtually everything he sees and reads about, and then writing about it in ways that makes the most mundane subject absolutely compelling. Also this is an achingly beautifully made book. If you dont even care about Landscape Futures if you love well made artfully produced books then just buy this one. It is a work of art. Most definitely recommended.