This exhibition of recent projects from CCA's Urban Works Agency explores how architects can reshape social justice, ecological vitality, and economic resilience in cities today. Work shown here spans across four of the lab’s current areas of focus. Domestic Affairs studies co-living arrangements by documenting their spatial conditions, tracking their governance protocols and envisioning design research proposals that can decommodify housing and promote a more equitable sharing of resources. Resilient Equity asks how climate adaptation strategies can support social and racial equity. This project imagines alternative property arrangements in flood-prone regions that can enable adaptation without displacement, and uses board games as a public decision-making tool for diverse stakeholders. Catalyzing the Commons defines design proposals to expand the public realm of cities, starting with the ground floor left vacant by e-commerce and COVID-19, to support social infrastructure for civic agency and community initiatives. Leveraging Infrastructure examines the impact of high-speed rail in California and proposes new forms of urbanism that can leverage this infrastructure to more equitably redistribute resources across the Central Valley. 

The Urban Works Agency (UWA) is a research lab at the California College of the Arts Architecture Division in San Francisco. UWA works with interdisciplinary partners to produce original research and design projects disseminated through books, exhibitions, and interactive media. We also run symposia, design studios, seminars, and a post-professional degree program, which engage students as active agents in dialog with the entrepreneurial and counter-cultural legacies of the Bay Area. 

The Urban Works Agency is led by CCA faculty Antje Steinmuller, Chris Roach, Neeraj Bhatia and Janette Kim.