May 4, 2021
Urbanist Charles Wolfe publishes new book, ‘Sustaining a City’s Culture and Character’
In his latest book, “Sustaining a City’s Culture and Character: Principles and Best Practices,” Charles Wolfe asks: How can we create urban environments that are truly livable?
The answer, he writes, isn’t as simple as building “bland or pastiche developments, nor throwing out the old entirely and imposing an ultra-modern monolith.” The book, published in February by Rowman and Littlefield, addresses “how to enact blended and contextualized urban change, using the past and the status quo as catalysts rather than castaways.”
Charles Wolfe
It offers examples that emphasize the importance of context and offer solutions “to blend the past with the future.” These include moving a small Swedish city, and the revitalization of Irish market towns and property alongside London’s Waterloo Station.
Wolfe is an attorney with experience in environmental, land use and real estate law and an affiliate associate professor of urban design and planning in the UW College of Built Environments. The book’s co-author is Tigran Haas, associate professor of urban and regional studies at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden, where Wolfe is also a guest affiliate scholar.
Wolfe will discuss “Sustaining a City’s Culture” with journalist Steve Scher at Town Hall Seattle online on June 11.
“Sustaining a City’s Culture and Character” is third book in a trilogy by Wolfe on urbanism. The others are Urbanism Without Effort: Reconnecting with First Principles of the City” (2013, rev. ed. 2019), and “Seeing the Better City: How to Explore, Observe, and Improve Urban Space” (2017).
Wolfe blogs at sustainingplace.com. To learn more, contact him at chuck@seeingbettercities.com.
Tag(s): Charles Wolfe • College of Built Environments • Department of Urban Design and Planning
