Living With Buildings

£10.99

Buildings shape our lives and our health. They affect how we sleep, work, socialise and even breathe. They can isolate us, make us sick or put us in danger, but they can also heal. We, in turn, make our buildings an extension of ourselves: our hopes, fears and vanities. The structures we choose to inhabit absorb our histories and leave traces for future generations to read. In ‘Living With Buildings’ Iain Sinclair embarks on a series of journeys – through London, Marseilles, the Outer Hebrides and Sweden – to explore the conflicted relationship between sickness and structure.

In stock

Description

‘A remarkable book; surprisingly gripping and often very moving … at once disorientating and illuminating.’ – Robert MacfarlaneWe shape ourselves, and are shaped in return, by the walls that contain us. Buildings affect how we sleep, work, socialise and even breathe. They can isolate and endanger us but they can also heal us. We project our hopes and fears onto buildings, while they absorb our histories.In Living With Buildings, Iain Sinclair embarks on a series of expeditions – through London, Marseille, Mexico and the Outer Hebrides. A father and his daughter, who has a rare syndrome, visit the estate where they once lived. Developers clink champagne glasses as residents are ‘decanted’ from their homes. A box sculpted from whalebone, thought to contain healing properties, is returned to its origins with unexpected consequences. Part investigation, part travelogue, Living With Buildings brings the spaces we inhabit to life as never before.