Lunch Hour Lecture with UCL East

Urban rooms carry lessons for imagining how universities, governments, and community groups may come together to critically and creatively forge future propositions for the urban condition.

Genuine engagement about how best to achieve liveable urban futures should be part of planning’s raison-d’etre but it has a chequered history of delivery. Exhibitions harnessing the communicative power of mixed media and linked to a progressive and responsive programme of focused discussion and debate remain relevant to community consultation and civic engagement.

Terry Farrell’s concept of the ‘urban room’ to involve citizens in engaging with the past, present, and future of towns and cities offers a contemporary refreshment of the approach propounded by Patrick Geddes from the early 1900s. 

Through this guise, Professor Mark Tewdwr-Jones, Professor of Cities and Regions at Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis, UCL, will explore the possibilities of creating novel and compelling opportunities for civic discourse through the Newcastle City Futures pop-up exhibition and events held in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK in 2014.

UCL Urban Laboratory and Culture Lab are working to bring an Urban Room and Memory Workshop to the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park as part of the first phase of the UCL East development. Find out more about the facility on our website.’