Summer of Architecture at the Paul Mellon Centre

This talk presents a series of ideas from Gissen's book, The Architecture of Disability (University of Minnesota Press, 2023). The Architecture of Disability proposes a politics of buildings, landscapes, cities and human impairment that extends beyond a sole focus on the problems of access and accessible design. In developing this approach, the book re-examines architectural history, theory, pedagogy and practice through the lens of human weakness, incapacities and frailty. Ultimately, Gissen argues that these latter qualities lie at the heart of architectural thought and construction. 

David Gissen is an author and designer based in New York City. He is Professor of Architecture and Urban History at Parsons School of Design/The New School and a visiting professor at Columbia GSAPP. In addition to The Architecture of Disability, he is the author of the books Subnature (2009) and Manhattan Atmospheres (2013).

Respondent: Jos Boys

A Research Seminar Series co-organised with Rixt Woudstra (Assistant Professor in Architectural History, University of Amsterdam).

  • David Gissen is an author and designer based in New York City. He is Professor of Architecture and Urban History at Parsons School of Design/The New School and a visiting professor at Columbia GSAPP. In addition to The Architecture of Disability, he is the author of the books Subnature (2009) and Manhattan Atmospheres (2013). 

  • Jos Boys is an architect, activist, educator and writer. She was a founder member of Matrix Feminist Design Co-operative and co-author of their 1984 book Making Space: Women and the Man Made Environment (Pluto Press, 1984). Since 2008 she has been co-director of The DisOrdinary Architecture Project with the artist Zoe Partington, a disability-led platform that brings together disabled artists and built environment students, educators and practitioners for creative and positive actions and dialogue that can demonstrate how disability is a valuable and generative force in design, rather than a technical and legalistic “problem”. Jos is author of Doing Disability Differently: An Alternative Handbook on Architecture, Dis/ability, and Designing for Everyday Life (Routledge, 2014) and editor of Disability, Space, Architecture: A Reader (Routledge, 2017).