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Usual Suspects: Hadid, Libeskend, Koolhaas, and Chipperfield's proposals for new cities across the globe.

Via Archinect we come across this article from the Wall Street Journal Called "Designer Cities: The Development of the SuperStar Urban Plan"

From the article:

Name-brand master plans are "an entrepreneurial tool" that are key to getting these large projects built, says Reinier de Graaf, an OMA partner working with Mr. Koolhaas on the Riga and Waterfront City projects. Urban planning is now "a very weird mixture of marketing and urbanism," he says.

Mr. Chipperfield agrees. "It's easier to know about architects than architecture," he says. "A banker won't know about architecture but will know that 'Zaha Hadid' or 'Rem Koolhaas' is a brand."

...

"We are seeing an emergence of a new industry," says Dennis Frenchman, director of the city design and development program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's urban-studies department. "It's not real-estate development; it's not architecture; it's not city planning. All I can do is name it 'the city-building industry.' "

And a name-brand architect can make the product sellable. "It's just like teapots," he says. (emphasis mine)

"Just like teapots?" I shriek in my tiny little brain. "What is this world coming to?"