The Caring City: Health, Economy, and Environment

Izaskun Chinchilla is a Ph.D. architect and professor of Architectural Practice at Bartlett School of Architecture. Her work has been recognised by the RIBA as an International Honorary Fellow. She has been at the helm of my own firm, Izaskun Chinchilla Architects, since 2001. More than 300 international architecture publications, over 30 international awards and hundreds of invitations to lecture enhance the interest of her work. Garcimuñoz Castle Media Library, Organic Growth Pavilion in NY, ARCOMadrid 2016 VIP Room, several co working spaces in Madrid and Barcelona, FITUR STAND FAIR for COMUNIDAD AND AYUNTAMIENTO DE MADRID, or Cosmowomen, researching on the work of female architects at La Galleria Nationale di Roma are some of her recognized works. She applies in her profession a strong commitment to critical innovation, linking architecture with ecology, sociology, and science.

This book invites us to rethink architectural and urban models, prioritizing not so much the technical, formal and abstract knowledge sought by urban planners, as the public and civic dimension of citizens' experience when they try to care for themselves, for each other or for the environment. After decades of industrialization, our cities, in their physical and governmental dimensions, are productivity-oriented places. Cities are, nonetheless, a more hostile environment for non-productive activities: being able to choose where to sit and rest, use a public toilet, drink clean water without paying or breathe unpolluted air. The privilege that productive activities have enjoyed and those who exercise them has led to the denial of the various biological and subjective characteristics of its inhabitants and the multidimensional character of the city, becoming a cultural principle and a political practice. The Caring City opens up an extensive field of alternatives that can present a uniting vision of the economy, the environment and the health of a diverse community.