“PR-chitecture” is the word we were looking for
Reader comment: "Dezeen, please stop promoting this stupidity" https://t.co/qT3zlQqYlk
— Dezeen (@dezeen) May 23, 2020
Perhaps you’ve seen a bombardment of not-very-affordable design “solutions” to questionable coronavirus-related lifestyle hindrances. How do I wear a face shield while expressing my fanaticism for Devo, they ask. Can we make PPE look more like a Jean Nouvel tower, they wonder. I will challenge norms during a pandemic, they say.
If something is bugging you about this, here is an essay for you.
Architecture critic Kate Wagner has coined the trend “PR-chitecture.” Wagner writes:
“In short, PR-chitecture is architecture and design content that has been dreamed up from scratch to look good on Instagram feeds or, more simply, for clicks. It is only within this substance-less, critically lapsed media landscape that Coronagrifting can prosper.”
See, for example, these conceptual face sneakers and lettuces. Wagner argues that “these tone-deaf art world creeps are using such a crisis for shameless self-promotion and the generation of clicks and income, while providing little to no material benefit to those at risk and on the frontlines.”
Wagner targets Dezeen and designboom as the main offenders, with pieces featuring a 3D-printed door-opener, a #StayTheFuckHome desk (a desk), and glistening prefab ICUs. To Dezeen’s credit, they blogged the piece.
