New Urban Luxuries

By The Why Factory for Droog Lab
The Why Factory (Winy Maas with Pirjo Haikola, Mick van Gemert and Ania Molenda). Artificial Suns by Louisa Au, Alice Guarisco, Ley Lee, Tomas de Loo, Chrstian Lunde, Garyfalia Pitsaki, Alexandra Vlasova, Stefanie Winter and Bo Zhou (TU Delft, Faculty of Architecture).

In 2010, Droog Lab ventured to the far Canadian North in search of qualities that can inspire new urban luxuries. Mental and natural qualities of the Arctic inspired five future city concepts by Winy Maas and The Why Factory. From the idea that people can have their own artificial suns to the thought that people can adjust the amount of thrill and danger that they’d like to encounter in their city, each concept exploits the urban manifestation of a quality found in the remote Arctic. Finally, cities with true brightness, silence, thrill, openness and uncompromised nature seem possible.