Over the last six years, the AIA New York Architecture Dialogue Committee’s Cocktails and Conversation series has hosted some of the most interesting and provocative practitioners we know to discuss what informs their designs. These have been collected into Cocktails and Conversations: Dialogues in Architectural Design.

Architects were paired with journalists, curators, historians, critics, educators, and their clients—people who create narratives about the built environment for both the profession and the general public. Their conversations touched on many of the most compelling and consequential issues facing designers today.  Featured practitioners shared insights about how to create form, how to relate new and old, and what they took away from the projects that were built and the ones that never left the drawing board. They talked about designing at all scales from the macro to the micro, the role of drawing, and the role of the client, politics, and the economy. They discussed aesthetics, color, and form. To lubricate the discussion, a bartender created a cocktail in the spirit of the architect’s work.

This book intends to inspire and delight while distilling ideas presented. You may pre-order your copy here.