Cities that produce only underwear, blue jeans and extras in domestic films are among the fascinating objects of study in Typological Drift: Emerging Cities in China by Shiqiao Li and Esther Lorenz. Journey with Unfrozen and Shiqiao Li to reveal the surprising urban realities of China that escape normative urban theories, with several stops along the way in philosophy and linguistics.


Typological Drift: Emerging Cities in China by Shiqiao Li and Esther Lorenz


Interviewee: Shiqiao Li is Weedon Professor in Asian Architecture, School of Architecture, University of Virginia, where he teaches history, theory, and design of architecture, and directs PhD in the Constructed Environment Program. He is author of Understanding the Chinese City (2014), Architecture and Modernization (2009, in Chinese) and Power and Virtue, Architecture and Intellectual Change in England 1650-1730 (2006). He recently contributed an essay to the Routledge Handbook of Chinese Architecture (2022).


Inro/Outro: β€œDrifted” by Groove Armada


Discussed:


Drift Triggers


Ten Thousand Things


Yiwu International Trade City


Borges: β€œThe map of the empire is the size of the empire itself.”


Figuration


Wilhelm von Humboldt


Francois Jullien: The Silent Transformations


Nanhui New City


Hengdian World Studios


Minmetals Hallstatt


Thames Town


Lujiazui


The Bund


Tongji Architectural Design Group Co. Ltd.