On the dawn of our fourth season, your hosts recap their favorite ‘casts of 2023, a live dramatic reading of Unfrozen’s 2023 Spotify Wrapped stats, and get on and off the soapbox as we stare down the barrel of 2024.

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Intro/Outro: “Trying Not to Think About Time,” by The Futureheads

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Discussed:

-      Unfrozen’s 2023 Spotify Wrapped Stats:

o  Most Popular Episode: “Show Me the Bodies” with Peter Apps

o  Most Shared Episode: “Untimely Meditations, Virtual Repatriations,” with Era Merkuri and Martin Gjoleka +Chidi Nwaubani

-      After School Newsletter by Casey Lewis

-      Unfrozen’s Favorites of 2023:

o  Attending the Venice Biennale during previews,including Sir Peter Cook’s assertion that, while at their event and on their payroll, NEOM would be less than half-built and eventually devolve into shantytowns

o  “Moving the Monolith, Speed-Running the Follies,” with Andreea Ion Cojocaru and Nick Kauffman

o  “The Atlas of Space Rocket Launch Sites,” with Brian Harvey and Gurbir Singh. Greg was channeling Geoff Manaugh’s BLDGBLOG

o  “Smaller Cities in a Shrinking World,” with Alan Mallach

o  “Renewing the Dream” with James Sanders

---    2024 Doomscroll:

o  NEOM meets the Metaverse at Aquellum + Zaha Hadid’s Minas Morgul tower, Discovery at Trojena

o  You won’t have Charlie Munger to kick around anymore

o  CES is underway, and so is the metaverse rebranding

o  Apple Vision Pro

o  Meta Wayfarer Ray-Bans

o  Want work? You need to kneel before the PIF

o  Are architects and engineers really building thefuture for Saudi’s young? Or are they just taking the money and running?

---      Half the world’s population will vote in 2024

-      No election scheduled in Canada, but in 2025, things are looking topsy-turvy:

o  Canada is “three NIMBYs in a trenchcoat” rightnow

o  Households now owe more in mortgage debt than Canada’s entire GDP

o  Pierre Poilievre and the Canadian Conservatives seem to be the only ones taking the housing crisis seriously, and the kids are listening

o  CHMC can’t just straight-up build affordable housing – why?

---     But it’s good real estate vibes in the US oncerates get cut...

Freedom Cities

    California Forever

-      You can build it – but who will insure it?

-      Will San Francisco exit its doom loop in 2024?What cities will pull ahead?

o  Gensler doubles down in its hometown + Shvo to the rescue at the Transamerica Pyramid

-      Greg draws a picture of the work-from-home,AI-driven, obesity-drug-taking hellscape called America

-      People are competing for walkable urbanismeverywhere because we can’t seem to build any new housing

-      Could consumer branding of residential real estate boost housing construction?

o  Welcome to the Neighborhood! Wall Street Designed It

o  Culdesac– build-to-rent walkable urbanism in Tempe, AZ

o  WeWork’s Adam Neumann starts Flow

-      Dead mall resurrections

-      Easton Town Center, Columbus

-      Retrofitting Suburbia, Ellen Dunham Jones and June Williamson

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Engagements Preview 2024:

  “Don’t Believe the Hype: Cities are Alive and Well,” University of Maryland Baltimore, 22 February

   “Using Augmented Reality to Drive Inclusive City Development,” SXSW, Austin, 10 March

   Smart City Expo USA, New York, 22-23 May

     CTBUH International Conference, London and Paris, 23-27 September