Architecture and urban design are rarely considered as technology, but more frequently as a result of artistic creativity performed by gifted individuals. Postphenomenology and Architecture: Human Technology Relations in the Built Environment considers buildings and cities as technologies, from a postphenomenological perspective. This book argues that buildings and the furniture of cities-like bike lanes, benches, and bus stops-are inscribed in a conceptual framework of multistability, which is to say that they fulfill different purposes over time. Yet, there are qualities in the built environment that are long lasting and immutable, and transcend temporal functionality and ephemeral efficiency. The contributors show how different perceptions, practices, and interpretations are tangible and visible as we engage with these technologies. In addition, several of the chapters critically assess the influence of Martin Heidegger in modern philosophy of architecture., this book reads Heidegger in the perspective of architecture and urban design as technology, shedding light on what it means to build and dwell.

Contemporary society is marked and defined by the ways in which mobile goods, bodies, vehicles, objects, and data are organized, moved and staged. Against the background of the 'mobilities turn' this book articulates a new and emerging research field, namely that of 'mobilities design'. The book revolves around the following research question: How are design decisions and interventions staging mobilities? It builds upon the 'Staging Mobilities' model (Jensen 2013) in an exploratory inquiry into the problems and potentials of the design of mobilities. The exchange value between mobilities and design research is twofold. To mobilities research this means getting closer to the 'material', and to engage in the creative, exploratory and experimental approaches of the design world which offer new potential for innovative research. Design research, on the other hand, might enter into a fruitful relationship with mobilities research, offering a relational and mobile design thinking and a valuable basis for design reflections around the ubiquitous structures, spaces and systems of mobilities.

Contemporary society is marked and defined by the ways in which mobile goods, bodies, vehicles, objects, and data are organized, moved and staged. Against the background of the 'mobilities turn' this book articulates a new and emerging research field, namely that of 'mobilities design'. The book revolves around the following research question: How are design decisions and interventions staging mobilities? It builds upon the 'Staging Mobilities' model (Jensen 2013) in an exploratory inquiry into the problems and potentials of the design of mobilities. The exchange value between mobilities and design research is twofold. To mobilities research this means getting closer to the 'material', and to engage in the creative, exploratory and experimental approaches of the design world which offer new potential for innovative research. Design research, on the other hand, might enter into a fruitful relationship with mobilities research, offering a relational and mobile design thinking and a valuable basis for design reflections around the ubiquitous structures, spaces and systems of mobilities.

Our century is the urban century -- a century in which the balance between urban and rural has been tipped with more than half of the world's population now living in cities. It is also a century characterised by an unprecedented urbanisation that has affected both urban form and urban life, and a century where the role of Urban Design has never been so intensified - and so urgent. It is our endeavour with this book to explore emergent theories and practices relating to urban design in order to better understand current processes of urbanisation and to intervene in our built environments with a focus on the quality of life in them. Through a series of articles and projects, Musings -- an urban design anthology brings together researchers, practitioners and students from the Urban Design Programme at the Department of Architecture, Design and Media Technology, Aalborg University with the aim of providing a multilayered and nuanced perspective on the discipline of urban design -- one that explores a number of optics through which urban design can be reflected upon, and ways in which the contemporary built environment can be intervened with. In this way the book navigates new frontiers in search of a better understanding of emerging urban culture. This journey presents a varied account of the urban design field through four chapters that reveal core themes framing both the theoretical and practical challenges of contemporary urbanity: Performativity, Mobility, Transformation, and Design & Method. Illustrating the direct relationship between research and teaching in the Urban Design Programme, the book investigates the themes through research and through project work of students at the Bachelor and Masters level. It is also the aim of this book to encourage continued discussion in the field of urban design through this - a contribution of our musings - manifested here in the theory, practice and production generated in the Urban Design Programme at Aalborg University.