Interviews & podcasts

We're looking to blend the digital and the physical; blend the artificial and natural, and blend the human and non-human, particularly working in the built environment where I think it's really crucial.

One of the most useful things I've always found was to try to build things, not just to remain at the design stage but actually to try and build and prototype something.

I wanted to transform what people think of as architecture, do stuff that was explicitly interactive, explicitly about the way we live our lives and organise them, and wanted to do something within the city.

Engagement for me is almost the fundamental thing, because there is a technical aspect to it, there is a sociocultural aspect to it, there is a kind of governance aspect to it, and making all these things work together is key.

London-based architect Usman Haque is famed for his interactive architectural systems, and for his exploration of newer, more effective ways of creating human engagement and interaction through his designs.

Usman Haque's practice is not what you would immediately think of as architecture. But, as founding partner of London-based urban technology designers Umbrellium, Haque is having an impact in areas associated with the discipline.

Participation is the principal topic of this interview, and it is a fundamental theme in the work of Usman Haque, a London-based architect and artist whose activities defy traditional categories.

We were always looking for ways you could actually build the thing that you were imagining.

The real opportunity afforded by building these participatory projects is to involve citizens in building a shared memory of a possible future.

It is vital for people to be able to participate in the process of evidence-gathering: partly so that they can question the 'standards of evidence,' partly so that they can become part of a solution.

We have got to stop trying to sell people the idea that there are simple and obvious ways to deal with the kinds of complex systems that govern both our social and environmental lives.

We can consider, equally as 'environments' a mountainside, the interior of a building, the context of a webpage, the internal status and external context of a mobile device.

I suddenly discovered that a lot of the things I had been thinking about in an unstructured way actually had historical precedent and had been carefully thought out and formalized even before I was born.