Looking Across Time [Editorial]

Looking Across Time Looking across time—not just at it—is a necessary part of forming, re-forming, and caring for culture. While this is true in general, it is particularly true for places…whose forms and consequences unfold over time. Their significance lies in that unfolding and in the interactions with many lives that ensue, not simply in the moments of their conception. In this issue we look across time in several ways. In an extended Speaking of Places, John McKean examines the thinking of the Italian architect Giancarlo De Carlo as embedded in a great university building. De Carlo’s Magistero, now nearly a quarter of a century old, modulates its position in a setting that has evolved over centuries, caring for the inherited structure of the place as well as investing it with new uses, meaning and vigor. In our Research and Debate section, Randall Mason examines the conceptual bases of preservation, and partic- ularly the concept of significance, as it confronts contemporary challenges. Also in that section, Ron Fleming examines various new strategies by which designers may embed interpretive markers in the landscape to reveal history and focus people’s attention on processes of change. Finally, our portfolio of photographs, by Brian Rose, compares views from 1980 and now of the streets of New York’s Lower East Side—an area that, more than most, reveals many patterns of living and layers of initiative, assembled by time in a place of grit and intrigue. The issue opens with a presentation of winning projects from the EDRA/Places Awards Program for 2003. As in the past, each project is discussed at length and accompanied by representative graphics and a sampling of comments from the jury, which this year was composed of James Corner, Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, Setha Low, and Walter Moleski. This is the sixth round of these awards, sponsored jointly by Places and the Environmental Design Research Association. So we have also asked three people to examine the awards program across time…to consider the range of prizes awarded, the issues raised, the distribution of efforts they represent… and to comment on the value of the program and its special commitment to bringing together the research and design communities. William L. Porter was co-editor of Places when it was founded, and now leads the Design Inquiry program in MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning. Mark Francis, a landscape architect on the faculty of UC Davis, was Chair of the EDRA board in 1996 and was instrumental in initiating this program. David Brain is a sociologist at New College in Sarasota, Florida, where he has been especially concerned with how research can inform development, and vice-versa. The three bring differing perspectives and modes of analysis to their task, and together they construct a comprehensive picture of the program. The issue concludes with our feature To Rally Discussion, which brings your comments into a continuing discussion over time. Here, Andres Duany partici- pates in an evolving debate on the value of public, private and semipublic space that began with an article by Emily Talen in Places 15.1, and continued with a response from Clare Cooper Marcus in Places 15.2. The discussion will certainly continue. Join in!…or start a new line of thought, commenting on articles that have captured your attention, roused your ire, or inspired new observations. Help form, re-form, and care for our evolving cultures. — Donlyn Lyndon