Excerpt from front cover of 'Building and Dwelling by Richard Sennett, published by Penguin in April 2019.

Reader’s corner book of the month: February 2025

Featuring publications of relevance to our industry, including those cited in SDS e-newsletter lead articles and suggested additional reading, we’ve recently relaunched the SDS Reader’s Corner book of the month page. Each month we will showcase a suggested read that relates to our professional areas of interest, be it a seminal publication or something more tangential. We hope the books we select will offer you insights and inspiration.

If you any suggestions of books, particularly newly published ones, that you think would be of interest to our community, please email us: enquiries@signdesignsociety.co.uk.

For February ’25 we feature ‘Building and Dwelling‘ by Richard Sennett (published 4 April 2019 by Penguin Books).

Front cover of 'Building and Dwelling by Richard Sennett, published by Penguin in April 2019.

Synopsis

“In this book, Richard Sennett distils a lifetime’s thinking and practical experience to explore the relationship between the good built environment and the good life. He argues for, and describes in rich detail, the idea of an open city, one in which people learn to manage complexity. He shows how the design of cities can enrich or diminish the everyday experience of those who dwell in them. The book ranges widely – from London, Paris and Barcelona to Shanghai, Mumbai and Medellin in Colombia – and draws on classic thinkers such as Tocqueville, Heidegger, Max Weber, and Walter Benjamin. It also draws on Sennett’s many decades as a practical planner himself, testing what works, what doesn’t, and why. He shows what works ethically is often the most practical solution for cities’ problems. This is a humane and thrilling book, which allows us to think freshly about how we live in cities.”

Review

“Sennett is my kind of urbanist. He sees the modern city. He reads its secrets as he walks down the street, kicking over the detritus of the past … There is no alternative to the planner, but please a planner who has read Sennett’s book.”

[Simon Jenkins, Sunday Times]

Buy a copy now!

As of 03.02.2025, this paperback publication retails at £14.24 (RRP £14.99), from Bookshop.org.

Previous books of the month