Borderwall as Architecture: A Manifesto for the U.S.-Mexico Boundary (Ahmanson-Murphy Fine Arts Books (Hardcover))

Part historical account, part theoretical appraisal, and part design manifesto, Borderwall as Architecture is reminiscent of Rem Koolhaas’ Delirious New York in its sweeping assessment of both the sociocultural peculiarities and outlandish possibilities represented by a prominent structural element.

"Unbuild the Divide" according to Koala Nose. In hopes of ending the coupe of division, this book provided depths of the US-Mexico border from its history, strategies, and people's stories. There are proposed designs on the divider to diminish its physical solitude and to regenerate communities and natural habitats. As a student in architecture, this is a great reference for theory of how architecture can revitalize communal spaces and natural environments when there's conflict.

Rael proposes that despite the intended use of the wall, which is to keep people out and away, the wall is instead an attractor, engaging both sides in a common dialogue. It is both a protest against the wall and a projection about its future. On the way the transformative effects of the wall on people, animals, and the natural and built landscape are exposed and interrogated through the story of people who, on both sides of the border, transform the wall, challenging its existence in remarkably creative ways. Borderwall as Architecture is an artistic and intellectual hand grenade of a book, and a timely re-examination of what the physical barrier that divides the United States of America from the United Mexican States is and could be. Coupled with these real-life accounts are counterproposals for the wall, created by Rael’s studio, that reimagine, hyperbolize, or question the wall and its construction, cost, perform