AA Visiting Students Lecture

Resilience

According to my friend S. the implementation of city plans would inevitably bring cities to destruction.
—Arata Isozaki

The destructive character sees nothing permanent. But for this reason, he sees ways everywhere.
—Walter Benjamin

Arguably the most often destroyed metropolis in the world, Tokyo has seized the opportunity to reinvent itself time and again, developing a resilience to destruction of any kind. In fact, the constantly recurring destruction caused by often tragic disasters has altered the city’s DNA to a degree that today, deliberate and constantly ongoing destruction and rebuilding is perhaps the city’s most powerful urban generator.