Places for Strangers

Places for Strangers aims to illustrate a set of continually negotiated principles and attitudes which London based mae Architects have established in their architectural and urban design. Juxtaposing polemic texts published through the duration of the practice with a fresh revisitation of mae’s project portfolio, Places for Strangers is a contemporary examination of the architects’ predicament rather than an exhaustive monograph. It is a candid insight into the possibility of aligning ideological principles with the prosaic realities of design practice where a building and place’s occupant is unknown.
The new book takes a form between manifesto and manual. It acts as a manifesto in so far as it advocates a position on urban design and architecture, and a manual in so far as it elucidates an approach to producing critically engaged design, which questions and challenges the rules that we work with. It comprises a number of texts by Alex Ely with contributions by former mae partner Michael Howe, written between the practice inception in 2001, and the present day. These texts, written for newspapers such as The Guardian or professional perioducals like The Architects’ Journal, are polemic in their nature, illustrating the sociopolitical, ethical and formal concerns navigated in architectural production today.

mae Architects was established in 2001 in London and has developed projects throughout the United Kingdom and Europe.