BY JONATHON GEELS

Design processes, especially in the built environment, tend to progress on very similar trajectories: a client with an idea engages a designer to turn that abstract idea into a concrete product (sometimes literally concrete). Many problems with this approach come to mind, but the one I would like to focus on is the notion of genius and where good ideas come from.

BY JONATHON GEELS

In recent decades, as churches have fallen into disrepair, their previously significant impact on community development has waned. While they certainly still serve as both social and spiritual centers, they do not dominate the landscape as they once did. The grid of city streets has reduced their hierarchical impact, and often, the Central Business District supports many buildings of much greater scale. Even the megachurches, with their thousands of members and sprawling complexes and campuses, are often sited away from urban centers, isolated on large swaths of land in suburbia.