ABSTRACT
Despite the best efforts of high modernist architects and urban designers to privilege openness and continuous space, to do away with enclosure altogether, the contemporary global city is as much an interior condition as an exterior one. Early manifestations of the 'urban interior' appeared in late-nineteenth-century America, when skyscraper architects designed elaborate lobbies mimicking and competing with the streets outside. Air-conditioning, fluorescent lighting, the escalator and long-span structural systems made possible the vast interior spaces characteristic of our contemporary urban landscape: the shopping mall, the office complex and the airport terminal. The work of sociologist William H. Whyte proved hugely influential in popularizing the urban living room idea. His primary critique of his subjects was that many were designed primarily for visual appeal, or as elements within a larger urban composition, with little thought as to how people would inhabit them. The creation of the late-modern version of the urban surface is aided by new technologies.
