Hundred Mile City [Paperback]

Deyan Sudjic (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 24, 1993

The new architectural shape of five world cities-London, Paris, New York, Tokyo, and Los Angeles. Sudjic tells how cities grow and change through their buildings and how people live and work in them. "Written with all the pace and drive of a high-speed freeway... Powerful and convincing" (J. G. Ballard). Index; photographs by Phil Sayer.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This well-written book, a British import, is full of perceptive, wide-ranging observations on the evolution of the "multilayered new city"--concentrating mainly on London, Paris, New York, Tokyo and Los Angeles. Sudjic, a London editor and critic who was trained as an architect, is neither nostalgic nor pollyannish, finding both vitality and ugliness in the modern city. Pointing to London's Canary Wharf and New York's World Financial Center, he argues that the property developer--not the architect or city planner--is most responsible for shaping the city. Yet planners still have power: Sudjic limns the Grands Projets , Francois Mitterrand's attempt to remodel Paris, and discusses the need for good planning in the dystopia of Houston. Most interesting are Sudjic's expositions of how the museum has become the "replacement for the missing agora," and how the airport has become the new city square. A city's transport plan helps create its public life, and the author contrasts Tokyo's dependence on public transport with the worldwide ascendance of the automobile. We must, he concludes, learn new ways to analyze and assess life in the modern city.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

Face it, the urban center cannot hold: This, in essence, is the message of British architecture-writer Sudjic's sweeping discussion of modern cities, especially those he deems the world's greatest: New York, Los Angeles, London, Paris, and Tokyo. Hammering away with the now familiar observation that cities are spreading beyond their old boundaries, decaying in the center and reshaping themselves on the edges, Sudjic is especially impatient with those who idealize the urban past and what he calls the ``myth'' of community, and who are obsessed with saving ``elderly buildings'' even at the cost of displacing the poor. It's not that Sudjic glorifies current trends; he has as much distaste as those he criticizes for beltway office clusters ``where it is impossible to walk out at lunch time to the pub or cafe''; the centerless city that's Houston today (``you feel an emptiness everywhere''); the museum's new commercialism; huge warehouse stores like Ikea (shopping there ``makes life just a little more brutal''); and 80's overdevelopment in general. And, like everyone else, he deplores the massive public-housing projects that have only made low-income housing problems worse. Sudjic tries hard to defend ugly L.A., for example, from lovers of the ``picturesque''; to recognize airports as what he sees as authentic urban places; even to see Houston's vast void as ``exhilarating possibility.'' Yet the tone here is far from exhilarated. Even an early rundown of urban theorists and architects consists mostly of capsule characterizations followed by dismissive negative pronouncements. And though he takes on all the obligatory topics--theme parks and festival markets; grandiose postmodern kitsch; transit and tourism; and racial tensions--often Sudjic just touches these bases while relentlessly charging on. Not notably arresting in its insights, nor as strong and coherently argued as Joel Garreau's Edge City (1991). Sudjic is up on the issues, though, and his text could be useful for its sheer coverage, especially the international. (Photos throughout) -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books; First U.S. Edition edition (October 24, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 015642357X
• ISBN-13: 978-0156423571
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,599,082 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Deyan Sudjic is director of the Design Museum, London. He is the author of The Language of Things," "100-Mile City," and "The Edifice Complex." and the co-author of "The Architecture Pack."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting Analysis into Our Modern World, December 8, 2002

By 

Matthew J. Fery (Dayton, OH USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hundred Mile City (Paperback)

Overstretched, Resource-Scarce, Unregulated. Los Angeles and other world cities are increasingly walking a tightrope that becomes harder to balance on. This book carefully outlines how cities got to this untenable situation and looks at examples of how different communities are combating these problems with mixed results. A read for anyone interested in urban politics, involved in the real estate business, or studying urban and regional planning