(Fred Kent and) The Project for Public Spaces

Fred Kent, president of PPS, is featured in the New York Times, "Impresario of the Village Green." This Saturday, during Open House New York, PPS will be doing a placemaking exercise in Washington Square Park, and will have an open house. Steve Pinkus will be venturing up to NYC to participate...

From "Battery Park City" in the New York Times:

“Design,” Mr. Kent said, “is a disease. It is almost always at odds with good places.” And design, in his opinion, is what has ruined a potentially extraordinary place, the waterfront parks of Battery Park City...

Good public spaces,” Mr. Kent said, “should reach out like an octopus.”

(Fred and I part on this a bit. I think you need to know the principles of what works, and they are design principles. But... if you focus on design of places the way starchitects focus on building design by ignoring context and functionality, then you get awful spaces.)