TED Talks
David Byrne: How architecture helped music evolve
As his career grew, David Byrne went from playing CBGB to Carnegie Hall. He asks: Does the venue make the music? From outdoor drumming to Wagnerian operas to arena rock, he explores how context has pushed musical innovation.
SciShow
The 3 Coolest Things Built By Birds
There are a number of bird species that construct pretty cool things - today on SciShow, we'll visit with three of them...
TED Talks
James Howard Kunstler: The ghastly tragedy of the suburbs
In James Howard Kunstler's view, public spaces should be inspired centers of civic life and the physical manifestation of the common good. Instead, he argues, what we have in America is a nation of places not worth caring about.
TED Talks
Kate Orff: Reviving New York's rivers -- with oysters!
Architect Kate Orff sees the oyster as an agent of urban change. Bundled into beds and sunk into city rivers, oysters slurp up pollution and make legendarily dirty waters clean -- thus driving even more innovation in "oyster-tecture."...
TED Talks
Kevin Surace: Eco-friendly drywall
Kevin Surace suggests we rethink basic construction materials -- such as the familiar wallboard -- to reduce the huge carbon footprint generated by the manufacturing and construction of our buildings. He introduces EcoRock, a clean,...
TED Talks
Stewart Brand: The Long Now
Stewart Brand works on the Clock of the Long Now, a timepiece that counts down the next 10,000 years. It's a beautiful project that asks us to think about the far, far future. Here, he discusses a tricky side problem with the Clock:...
TED Talks
Joshua Prince-Ramus: Behind the design of Seattle's library
Architect Joshua Prince-Ramus takes the audience on dazzling, dizzying virtual tours of three recent projects: the Central Library in Seattle, the Museum Plaza in Louisville and the Charles Wyly Theater in Dallas.
TED Talks
Dan Phillips: Creative houses from reclaimed stuff
In this funny and inspiring talk, Dan Phillips tours us through a dozen homes he's built in Texas using recycled and reclaimed materials in wildly creative ways. Brilliant, low-tech design details will refresh your own drive to make more...
TED Talks
Andrew Blum: Discover the physical side of the internet
When a squirrel chewed through a cable and knocked him offline, journalist Andrew Blum started wondering what the Internet was really made of. So he set out to go see it -- the underwater cables, secret switches and other physical bits...
TED Talks
Amanda Burden: How public spaces make cities work
More than 8 million people are crowded together to live in New York City. What makes it possible? In part, it’s the city’s great public spaces — from tiny pocket parks to long waterfront promenades — where people can stroll and play....
TED Talks
Michael Green: Why we should build wooden skyscrapers
Building a skyscraper? Forget about steel and concrete, says architect Michael Green, and build it out of … wood. As he details in this intriguing talk, it's not only possible to build safe wooden structures up to 30 stories tall (and,...
TED Talks
Reed Kroloff: A tour of modern architecture
Reed Kroloff gives us a new lens for judging new architecture: is it modern, or is it romantic? Look for glorious images from two leading practices -- and a blistering critique of the 9/11 planning process.
TED Talks
Frank Gehry: A master architect asks, Now what?
In a wildly entertaining discussion with Richard Saul Wurman, architect Frank Gehry gives TEDsters his take on the power of failure, his recent buildings, and the all-important "Then what?" factor.
TED Talks
Diébédo Francis Kéré: How to build with clay ... and community
Diébédo Francis Kéré knew exactly what he wanted to do when he got his degree in architecture... He wanted to go home to Gando in Burkina Faso, to help his neighbors reap the benefit of his education. In this charming talk, Kéré shows...
TED Talks
Lucy McRae: How can technology transform the human body?
TED Fellow Lucy McRae is a body architect -- she imagines ways to merge biology and technology in our own bodies. In this visually stunning talk, she shows her work, from clothes that recreate the body's insides for a music video with...
TED Talks
Elora Hardy: Magical houses, made of bamboo
You've never seen buildings like this. The stunning bamboo homes built by Elora Hardy and her team in Bali twist, curve and surprise at every turn. They defy convention because the bamboo itself is so enigmatic. No two poles of bamboo...
TED Talks
Cameron Sinclair: My wish: A call for open-source architecture
Accepting his 2006 TED Prize, Cameron Sinclair demonstrates how passionate designers and architects can respond to world housing crises. He unveils his TED Prize wish for a network to improve global living standards through collaborative...
TED Talks
Robert Hammond: Building a park in the sky
New York was planning to tear down the High Line, an abandoned elevated railroad in Manhattan, when Robert Hammond and a few friends suggested: Why not make it a park? He shares how it happened in this tale of local cultural activism.
TED Talks
TED: What can we learn from shortcuts? | Tom Hulme
How do you build a product people really want? Allow consumers to be a part of the process. "empathy for what your customers want is probably the biggest leading indicator of business success," says designer Tom Hulme. In this short...
TED Talks
David Rockwell: A memorial at Ground Zero
In this emotionally charged conversation with journalist Kurt Andersen, designer David Rockwell discusses the process of building a viewing platform at Ground Zero shortly after 9/11.
TED Talks
Nathaniel Kahn: Scenes from "My Architect"
Nathaniel Kahn shares clips from his documentary "My Architect," about his quest to understand his father, the legendary architect Louis Kahn. It's a film with meaning to anyone who seeks to understand the relationship between art and love.
TED Talks
Nicholas Negroponte: One Laptop per Child, two years on
Nicholas Negroponte talks about how One Laptop per Child is doing, two years in. Speaking at the EG conference while the first XO laptops roll off the production line, he recaps the controversies and recommits to the goals of this...
TED Talks
Joshua Prince-Ramus: Building a theater that remakes itself
Can architects re-engineer their design process? Joshua Prince-Ramus shows how the results can be spectacular. He walks us through his fantastic re-creation of the Wyly Theater as a giant "theatrical machine" that reconfigures itself at...
TED Talks
TED: Adventures of an interplanetary architect | Xavier De Kestelier
How will we live elsewhere in the galaxy? On earth, natural resources for creating structures are abundant, but sending these materials up with us to the Moon or Mars is clunky and cost-prohibitive. enter architect Xavier De Kestelier,...