Customer Reviews

Design of Cities, Revised Edition (A Studio Book)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is my favorite book on urban design....how cities work, history of city design, and the key elements that make a city exciting, livable, and functional. A key insight of Mr. Bacon is the potential for the integration of various movement systems (train, car, pedestrian, etc.), and the vitality possible at the intersections and nodes of those systems.

A very informative and well designed book. I am currently a grad. student in architecture and the ideas presented in this book are very intriguing. It takes a very practical approach to urban design. If this book were coupled with Jane Jacob's The Death and Life of Great American Cities, one could get two different but relevant viewpoints regarding this very important debate, especially in the wake of Modernism.

This book is an excellent introduction to the nature of urban design.

It illustrates, in a concise and simple way, most of the major interventions in urban design beginning with early settlements, and finishing with modern cities. E.G the route to the Acropolis, the extension of the garden of Versailles, the reorientation of Georgian London.

Every point is explained clearly using great plans, sections and photographs.

The book features many references to the conceptual sketches of artist Paul Klee, which Bacon uses as comparisons for urban concepts.

This book had a very positive effect on my understanding of architecture and urban design, and i would recommend it to anyone interested in the field.

Bear in mind that it is not a standard history book. It is more light-hearted but that is why i enjoyed it so much.

In this classic text on city design Edmund Bacon explains the elements of the new urbanism. I teach architecture and use this text as reference to explain a brief history of urban form and as a model for urban design concepts and drawings because many of its chapters are beautifully illustrated with refined and thoughtful conceptual diagrams that are rich examples for anyone who wants to understand how to design the urban dimension.

Design of Cities is a classic of Bacon in the study of the urban form. The new tendences in urbanism forget many times same of the principal conditions of the place. Bacon in a very simple and sensitive way offers us the keys of a original and elemental way. Writing in the sixties is current also today.

A comprehensive review of historic and contemporary urban design strategies complete with wonderful hand drawn, pre CAD, diagrams and sketches with a compelling text written by former Philiadelphia city planner Ed Bacon and several younger urban designers.

What is a space?
How is made of?
What is architecture?

"Design of Cities" is an excellent book about perception, space and architecture.

This book changed the way I looked into the conception of cities. The command of urban spaces, with beatiful examples through history, put me to new design of cities or to renew existing city centers including new perspectives for the citizen or people that just pass by.

The book is detailed in description and does have nice sketches of examples, however, to understand the design of each city, one must study the simple sketch for a bit and relate back to the text back and forth. Although this may sound natural and may also make me come off as a person who just doesn't like to read, I feel the book could've provided better examples or diagrams. Sometimes a sketch of an urban plan and one colored arrow just doesn't cut it for everyone.