Maintenance Architecture

The timing of this marvelous book couldn\’t be better. After decades of projects designed and discussed as the newest thing, we now have a study that faces the temporal reality of buildings without compromise: newness ends when inhabitation begins. Sample shows that the labor of construction is succeeded by the labor of remaking, of revitalization; indeed, of maintenance. Insofar as maintenance is a public concern—ranging from social justice to visible beauty—street cleaners and squeegees get their due, also works of art, and the topics that underpin current discussions of experimentation, performance, and sustainability.