Design
A Guidebook for the Urban Age
P.D. Smith's engaging and illuminating new book on the history, evolution and intricacies of cities.
The city is both ambiguous and defined, with endless quirks but also finite borders. It's housing and politics and slang and disease and a zillion other things, a fractal-like creature that becomes more complex the closer you look. Delving in is exciting but also a little intimidating. None of that dissuaded P.D. Smith, author of the new book City: A Guidebook for the Urban Age, an impressively comprehensive look at this very broad topic.
"You can explore the whole of human society in one subject," Smith says.