IN the past century, principal architects like Le Corbusier, Gropius and Mies were articulate in the language and practice of social architecture. Be it through innovating with healthier and more affordable housing, writing books like Toward a New Architecture, or organizing model exhibitions like the Weissenhofsiedlung, generous and empathetic design was once a top priority in architecture for the masses.

Unfortunately, this fluency petered out by the end of the 20th century. A great deal of aspirations was since then neglected and dismissed — what was once admirable became hubristic and eventually, naive. The narrative of social responsibility in architecture was marginalized and propelled out of the norm. Coupled with the advent of the pandemic outbreak, we begin to see the current built environment as one crowded with a suffocating state of affliction.