I was a student when doubt had already made itself felt. In the mid-1970s I walked into the Social Academy at Westblaak, Rotterdam – an 18-year old, embarking on my studies. You might say the social academy was one, if not the ideological center of the welfare state. Not only intended to shape the critical contours of everything that ‘social’ could achieve. It also provided the support staff of social workers, community workers and socio-cultural workers for an intricate infrastructure of temporary refuges/shelters, crisis-, community- and youth centers, and the like.

Shortly after I took over the editorship of Building Design in 1983, I met Cedric Price at an industry event, probably at the Building Centre on Store Street, opposite his office in Alfred Place. He suggested we might have breakfast at his office. It was the beginning of a long run of breakfasts, conversations, initiatives, magazine columns, and occasional excursions at home and abroad. It provided me with the architectural education that, as a history graduate, I had never had. Cedric actually thought that this was a good thing.

In today’s rapidly changing world, the role of real estate has been affected deeply. To such a degree that the Center for Urban Real Estate at Columbia University sees an opportunity to transform the profession from within, stressing its creative potential and introducing an ethical code. This issue of Volume is dedicated to CURE’s ambition to create a continuum between architecture and real estate, as part of the design disciplines.

Who rules the city? The traditional set of players who determine planning and management of cities has gone through a major shift. The financial crises since 2008 were a major trigger, but also more social and cultural incentives can be indicated as forces in play. Private partners, city urbanists, city governors, housing corporations, developers, and citizens try to redefine their roles in new constellations. Who sets the new rules and what effective regulation helps to facilitate citizens to co-create their environment?

Following Word War Two, London embarked on a highly prolific rebuilding campaign. But it wasn’t simply putting the pieces back together. The ambition of the welfare state combined with new ideas in architecture to produce radical new designs, altering the British landscape. The organization behind this was the London County Council, and in particular the Architects’ Department. Ruth Lang discusses the machinery of the bureaucratic system that enabled one of England’s most innovative periods in design.

Hong Kong and Macau aren’t independent nations, yet they appear at the Biennale regardless. As recent appendages to China, they are undergoing an often-uncomfortable transition to a new political reality. Thomas Daniell explains how both pavilions give different responses to the unification question. Hong Kong emphasizes its inclusion in a larger regional network, the Pearl River Delta, while Macau places focus on its cultural distinctiveness.