The Masterplan

Alex Mademo

The Masterplan is a podcast that focuses on the analysis, planning, and design of cities. It is created and hosted by Alex Mademo, an urbanist and researcher.

  1. 11/10/2025

    #23 - Ocean Jangda and Firas Saffiedine: Real Estate Development for the 21st Century

    A conversation with Ocean Jangda and Firas Saffiedine. Ocean Jangda is a real-estate manager and urban technologist. His recent thesis at the MIT Center for Real Estate, titled Urban Technology: Rethinking Real Estate Development for the 21st Century, challenges how we build cities and argues for a development model that is deeply connected to biology, technology, and the biosphere. Firas Saffiedine is an author and founder of the architecture practice Spatial Forces. We explore questions about the future of development: What responsibilities do developers have? Can cities behave like living systems? How does information, matter, and energy shape urban futures, and what does it mean to design for the planetary scale? This episode dives into the mental models, ethics, and cosmic perspective required to rethink how and why we build. Find out more about Ocean and Firas here: https://oceanjangda.org https://www.spatial-forces.com

    3h 7m

  2. 01/27/2025

    #22 - Ocean Jangda: Technology as a lens for Urban Science

    Ocean Jangda is a real estate expert, currently studying at the MIT, with a passion for technology and urban development. Find more about Ocean here: https://oceanjangda.org

    2h 54m

  3. 08/28/2024

    #21 - Mario Gonzalez Nevarez: Climate Injustice in Puerto Rico

    Mario Gonzalez Nevarez is an urbanist based in Puerto Rico with a background in political science, architecture and climate adaptation. Find more about Mario here: www.linkedin.com/in/mjgn/

    2h 43m

  4. 08/14/2024

    #20 - Jordi Vivaldi: Architectural Philosophy and the Materiality of Reason

    Jordi Vivaldi is an architect and philosopher based in Vienna.  PhD Architect (IOUD, Austria) and PhD Philosopher cand. (EGS, Switzerland), his areas of research include various forms of Speculative Realism and New Materialism, as well as 21st century’s theory of experimental architecture, art and technology. His current field of philosophical investigation puts in relation the notion of ‘reason’ with the concepts of ‘mimesis’, ‘finitude’ and ‘fortune’ in pursuit of plastic modes of rationality. From an architectural perspective, Jordi’s research focuses on mobilising the notion of limit as a spatial device of limitude, liminality and limitrophy in order to recreate the concept of hospitality in the context of the Anthropocene.  Jordi works or has worked as theory faculty/researcher in several international universities such as the University of Innsbruck (IOUD) and the Vienna University of Technology (TuWien – ATTP) in Austria, the UCL Bartlett in Great Britain, the IAAC-UPC in Spain and the Shenzhen University in China. In addition to several articles, essays and lectures, Jordi is the co-author of the book The Threefold Logic of Advanced Architecture (Barcelona: Actar Publishers, 2021). More information on Jordi's work: www.jordivivaldi.com

    2h 42m

  5. 07/18/2024

    #19 - From the Top #3 with Leyla Saadi from Urban Collabs

    The following is a conversion with my friend and colleague Leyla Saadi from Urban Collabs. It's Leyla's 3rd time on the show in our recurrent series we like to call "From the Top". Join us while we catch up, figure out who actually invented the airplane, how one can be in Mali and the Senegal at the same time, talk about Leyla's latest projects and try to unpack Advanced Urbanism, Ancient cities and Social Transition.  To find out more about Leyla's work and Urban Collabs visit: https://www.urbancollabs.com

    1h 21m

  6. 03/31/2024

    #18 - Firas Saffiedine: Spatial Internet, Metaverse, Architecture, NEOM & Ground Zero Urbanism

    Firas Saffiedine is a spatial design practitioner whose work spans urbanism, design, architecture, neurotechnology, and art. He is the founder of his own practice called Spatial Forces, the director of the platform Urbanitarian the Chief Metaverse Architect at Gamiumcorp and the Director of the NeurotechX Hackathon. His upcoming book called Spatialization Takes command: Notes on the Future of Urbanism, the Internet and life as we live it, is a commentary on the evolution of the internet and on the emergence of a new Spatial Internet.

    3h 2m

  7. 01/06/2024

    #17 - From the Top #2 with Leyla Saadi from Urban Collabs

    This is a special edition to the podcast. I recorded these episodes in the summer of 2023 with my good friend and colleague Leyla Saadi from Urban Collabs. Urban Collabs is a consultancy, Leyla is an urbanist and urban designer. They do really cool work, so definitely check them out. Back in the summer of 2023 we thought of doing something different, we thought of sitting down in the living room, opening google maps and exploring cities from the top view (hence the name), cities that we know and lived in. From this idea, this experiment, a very fun experience came out and I think you will also hear this through the episode. We also decided to record the computer screen as we go through google maps and explore the cities to actually give a spatial dimension to the discussion and something interesting came out. It's not the standard approach to the episodes I’ve been putting out for the last couple of years, this is a much more laid back discussion between two friends and urbanists.  To find out more about Leyla's work and Urban Collabs visit: https://www.urbancollabs.com

    1h 30m

  8. 01/06/2024

    #16 - From the Top #1 with Leyla Saadi from Urban Collabs

    This is a special edition to the podcast. I recorded these episodes in the summer of 2023 with my good friend and colleague Leyla Saadi from Urban Collabs. Urban Collabs is a consultancy, Leyla is an urbanist and urban designer. They do really cool work, so definitely check them out. Back in the summer of 2023 we thought of doing something different, we thought of sitting down in the living room, opening google maps and exploring cities from the top view (hence the name), cities that we know and lived in. From this idea, this experiment, a very fun experience came out and I think you will also hear this through the episode. We also decided to record the computer screen as we go through google maps and explore the cities to actually give a spatial dimension to the discussion and something interesting came out. It's not the standard approach to the episodes I’ve been putting out for the last couple of years, this is a much more laid back discussion between two friends and urbanists. To find out more about Leyla's work and Urban Collabs visit: https://www.urbancollabs.com/

    59 min
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About

The Masterplan is a podcast that focuses on the analysis, planning, and design of cities. It is created and hosted by Alex Mademo, an urbanist and researcher.

Information

  • Creator
    Alex Mademo
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2025
  • Episodes
    23
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Alex Mademo
  • Show Website
    The Masterplan