Research, thoughts, theories, and findings that we’ve explored and shared with the world.
Sustainable Urbanism is both an urgent call to action and a comprehensive introduction to “sustainable urbanism,” the design reform movement that combines the creation and enhancement of walkable and diverse places with high-performance infrastructure and buildings.
Sustainable Urbanism: Urban Design With Nature
Sustainable Nation: Urban Design Patterns for the Future
Doug Farr’s second book poses one big question: how can we make the world we want in the least possible time?
The answer touches on a good many things: our brain’s wiring, civilization’s long arc of progress, the unique and urgent challenges we face today, how long change normally takes, and ways to speed it up.
TEDxChicago: Climate action is 90% mindset and starts with a conversation
Doug Farr is fascinated with humanity’s struggle to talk about the Climate Emergency—our unsettled emotions, how we think the world works, and the negotiation we all go through before committing to take climate action.
In this funny and provocative talk Doug shares how his own personal climate action journey led him to redo his house, stay home more, and co-found the Climate Action Museum.
Resilience Hubs strengthen a community's ability to avoid, prepare for, and resist climate impacts while easing the strain on local emergency services. They are also an innovative investment in equity, sustainability, and long-term resilience.
To help leaders embrace innovative models like resilience hubs, based on resilience hub collaborations in 2024, we developed a compendium in collaboration with Climate Resilience Consulting and One Architecture & Urbanism (ONE) to equip local governments and community groups with the resources they need to design and fund resilience projects.
Resilience Hub Planning & Design Compendium
Energy Revolution: Chicago Architecture through a Climate Lens
Energy Revolution was an exhibition organized for the Chicago Architecture Center in 2023. Curated by Eve Fineman and Doug Farr, it demonstrated how we can actively respond to the climate crisis by transforming our use of energy in the built environment.
The exhibition highlighted the ways individuals, corporations, and city leaders can work toward a carbon-free future.
Doug Farr recaps Energy Revolution with this video showcase featuring content from the exhibit.
Learn more about the TLC approach — Tactical, Lean, Climax — developed by Farr Associates for the Downtown Rockford Strategic Plan.
This process focused on implementation strategies for the previously made recommendations, rather than just creating another shelf document that is years from realization.
A Little TLC for Your Neighborhood
LIVING CITIES: Transforming APEC Cities into Models of Sustainability by 2030
Since its founding 22 years ago, APEC has pursued policies that support free and open trade and investment as the surest way to accomplish greater common prosperity and stability in the Asia-Pacific Rim region.
This report, co-authored by Farr Associates and Northwestern University, makes the case that APEC should step up to a position of global “green” leadership by advocating its member countries to develop and redevelop their cities in the highly sustainable manner of “Living Cities” in the near term.