ABSTRACT
Architecture is a medium of tolerance. It is a space of negotiation which straddles and accommodates different material and social entities and tensions within urban development. The ongoing techno-material-social paradigm shift that started with the rise of neoliberalism in the 1980s and a growing “experience economy” is changing tolerance in architecture. Under neoliberalism, new technological developments are shaped by/shaping spatial imaginations and their material manifestations. This article examines the dynamic co-production of technology and society in the nexus between urban mega-developments, variable/hyper-precise tools for design and fabrication, and neoliberalism through the study of the Barclays Center at Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park in Brooklyn, New York. From the Barclays Center study we argue that to effectively respond to the changing real estate conditions, architecture must propose different/variable/multiple value propositions through how it engages with environmentality, governance, and the performance metrics of digital technologies in order to provide a medium of tolerance today.
