Who Are We?

DESIGNER/builder: A Journal of The Human Environment is an independent and nontraditional magazine that brings social justice and issues of equity to the debate over the built and human environments. Every other month we focus on a wide variety of issues, including architecture, building, planning, urban design, quality of life, affordable housing, homelessness, race and equity, housing options, ecology, and sustainability from a point of view not being addressed in other places.

DESIGNER/builder is about an architecture that serves humankind. It offers an optimistic and hopeful view of attitudes, ideas, efforts, and programs that collectively begin to shape a society where everyone matters. It serves to inspire designers to create a built environment that reflects the principles and values of racial, economic, and social justice.

We cover a broad array of subjects, from housing policy and design in Cuba to the architecture of Pyongyang, North Korea; from the normal looking buildings that hid detention centers and places of torture during Argentina’s Dirty War to a photo essay on the human consequences of the wall separating Israelis from Palestinians; from the amazing adobe high-rises of Yemen to New York’s radical workers’ housing cooperatives of the 1920s.

We explore the underlying meaning of sustainable development and take the concept of green building beyond its current use as a buzzword for marketing purposes, and we probe creative green building strategies for low-income housing. We critique the design of public institutions, such as libraries, schools, parks, and public places. We look at the financial manipulations, true costs, and failed promises of public facilities, such as convention centers and sports stadiums. And we seek out and celebrate creative measures to confront the impacts of gentrification and displacement.

DESIGNER/builder offers a forum for a broad, inclusive, and intelligent discussion of the many issues facing our communities today and of the challenges to creating a more sustainable, humane, and peaceful world.