This event celebrates the publication of Living in the Endless City (2011, Phaidon). The event will feature a presentation by editor Ricky Burdett followed by a conversation with contributors Suketu Mehta and Richard Sennett and a book signing.

Combining smart writing, remarkable photographs and incisive research conducted by the Urban Age Project, Living in the Endless City is an investigation into the physical and social aspects of the modern urban condition, written by esteemed thinkers from all around the globe, under the leadership of Ricky Burdett of the London School of Economics and Deyan Sudjic of the Design Museum, London.

With reports and data on vital themes including security, climate change, density and globalization, Living in the Endless City focuses on three of the most vibrant and fastest growing mega-cities in the world; Mumbai, India’s economic powerhouse known as the ‘Maximum City’; São Paulo, Brazil’s most populous and dynamic city; and Istanbul, Europe’s largest city and one of the most resilient urban economies in the world.

Living in the Endless City incorporates a wealth of research and analysis which has emerged from a sequence of conferences held by the Urban Age Project for influential figures in the field of urban development – such as mayors, planners, architects, scientists and community groups – to study the growing, and in some cases shrinking, cities of the twenty-first century. Clearly organized into separate sections for each city, the book makes detailed scholarly reporting accessible. Striking images of each city accompany the discussions presented in the text providing a visual, as well as an intellectual journey into the heart of the cities. The Data section later in the book compares and contrasts the three cities with the six from The Endless City (Phaidon, 2008): Berlin, Johannesburg, London, Mexico City, New York and Shanghai.

Ricky Burdett is Professor of Urban Studies at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), director of LSE Cities and the Urban Age programme, and NYU Global Distinguished Professor. He has worked as Chief Adviser on Architecture and Urbanism for the London 2012 Olympics, as architectural adviser to the Mayor of London and currently advises the Olympic Park Legacy Company. He was Director of the 2006 Architecture Biennale in Venice and currently advises the cities of Genova and Parma, and is a member of the Milan Expo 2015 masterplan team.

Suketu Mehta, a professor of journalism at New York University, is the author of “Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found. He is currently working on a nonfiction book about immigrants in contemporary New York. He has also written an original screenplay for The Goddess, a Merchant-Ivory film starring Tina Turner, and Mission Kashmir, a Bollywood movie. Mehta was born in Calcutta and raised in Bombay and New York.

Richard Sennett is IPK Senior Fellow, NYU University Professor of the Humanities, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, London School of Economics, and Distinguished Visiting Scholar at Cambridge. Richard Sennett writes about cities, labor, and culture. He teaches sociology at New York University and at the London School of Economics. His most recent book is The Craftsman (2008) which examines the meaning of hand work, of "doing a job well for its own sake" from the Enlightenment on. The Craftsman is the first in a three part series on material culture.

This event is co-sponsored by Phaidon.