Friedrich von Borries, how can we rethink architecture? | Poetry & Truth #43

Rethinking Architecture: From Human Progress to Planetary Responsibility. Imagine a discipline whose original mission was to shelter us, to make the planet habitable, but which has now become one of the greatest engines of environmental destruction. That's the unsettling truth at the heart of the conversation on reimagining architecture in the era of the Anthropocene—a time when humans have become the dominant geological force on Earth. At first glance, architecture seems straightforward: the art of designing and building structures, homes, cities. Yet, it is much more—it is the way we organize our lives in space, the shapes we give to our relationships, the scripts we write for how we live together. For centuries, architecture has reflected and reinforced certain models: the nuclear family, the separation of man and nature, the triumph of human ingenuity over the wild and unpredictable. But what if, at its very roots, architecture has always carried within it a streak of violence, a drive to dominate, to separate, to control? The numbers are sobering. The built environment now outweighs all living biomass on Earth. Building and maintaining our structures accounts for roughly a quarter of global CO2 emissions and more than half of all waste in some countries. And yet, the construction industry remains stubbornly traditional, clinging to materials and methods that are both familiar and catastrophically unsustainable. This is not just a technical issue—it's psychological, cultural, and deeply bound to our collective sense of safety and progress. But what if the very notion of progress, with its relentless push for more, needs to be questioned? The conversation turns to the idea of "active omission"—learning not only what to build, but what to leave undone. Can architects, and by extension all of us, embrace a discipline of restraint? Can we open spaces, literally and figuratively, for different ways of living, for less rather than more? The challenge is not just about materials or energy efficiency, but about reimagining the very role of the human within the planetary system. The idea of the "planetary" asks us to see ourselves not as rulers at the top of the food chain, but as one actor among many—temporary guests within a vast, interconnected web of life and matter that far predates and will outlast us. There are no easy solutions. Adapting, innovating, even escaping into space—these are all strategies that echo the mythic figure of Daedalus, forever inventing clever new answers, each with unintended consequences. But perhaps what's needed is a more radical shift: a willingness to question the centrality of the human, to adopt a perspective that is less about mastery and more about humility, adaptation, and care for the broader web of existence. This is a call not for despair, but for courage—courage to imagine and inhabit new futures, to experiment with new forms of togetherness, and to accept the contradictions and complexities of our time. Architecture, and indeed all of us, must learn not just to build, but to repair, to leave be, and to dream beyond the walls we have inherited.