The February issue of The Architectural Review delves into the world of repair and restoration, topics that have recently animated the architecture community. Like the built-in obsolescence of electronics and household appliances, buildings too are designed with a use-by date. Reuse and restoration can break this cycle, as some of the buildings featured illustrate – but the issue also examines the powerful economic imperatives working against repair, which can scupper the best efforts to rehabilitate existing buildings. Architectural repair has repercussions far beyond the built envelope, as seen in projects from Chicago’s South Side to the West Bank, while the most urgent repair work facing us – that of damaged ecologies – is invoked by landscaping projects in Australia and Colombia.
