Bjarke Ingels Group’s ‘Formgiving’ from Taschen Completes a Trilogy

It’s a spin on formgivning, the Danish word for design—quite literally, to give shape to that which doesn’t yet exist. That’s where Bjarke Ingels Group found the title for their latest monograph from Taschen. It’s the firm’s third book with the publisher, following the graphic novel “Yes is More. An Archicomic on Architectural Evolution” and the round-up of adaptive architecture “Hot to Cold. An Odyssey of Architectural Adaptation.” The book’s full title, “Formgiving. An Architectural Future History,” is a hint to what’s contained in its 700+ pages. 

The work presents a timeline across three sections: Past, Present, and Future. In the Past section, “Making,” “Sensing,” “Sustaining,” “Thinking,” “Healing,” and “Moving” serve as evolutionary trajectories through which to examine the history of architecture. The middle section, Present, presents 65 of BIG’s projects from the drawing board to completion. The final section imagines habitats that could support life on other planets, along with a look at BIG’s “Masterplanet” framework for a fully sustainable human presence on Earth. The book ends with a note from firm founder and creative director Bjarke Ingels addressing the impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic on design. “Since we know from our past that our future is bound to be different from our present,” he says, “rather than waiting for it to take shape on its own, we have the power to give it form.”

The book is a companion to an exhibition of the same name at the Danish Architecture Centre in Copenhagen, which welcomed over 150,000 visitors last year. If you missed it, fear not… you can still tour the exhibition in VR. Here’s to the future.