The Urbanist
Monocle
With an influential audience of city mayors, urban planners and architects, this is Monocle’s guide to making better cities, be it new technology, state-of-the-art subways or compact apartments. Nominee in the Smartest Podcast category of the 2019 British Podcast awards.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Apr 2, 2026 • 30min
Finding out what our urban futures hold in Ljubljana
Guy de Launey reports from Urban Future, a Better Cities event taking place this year in the Slovenian capital of Ljubljana.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mar 30, 2026 • 7min
Tall Stories 502: The Columbus Lighthouse’s bizarre origin story
Gregory Scruggs tells the odd tale of the energy-sapping totem that is Santo Domingo’s Columbus Lighthouse.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mar 26, 2026 • 30min
How Apple delivers a sense of place to the built environment
We speak with Apple’s VP of places, Kristina Raspe, about how the tech giant’s real-estate portfolio adds to cities. Then: the changing face of Medellin and we farewell our long-time producer.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mar 23, 2026 • 7min
Tall Stories 501: How does Taipei 101 stay standing? It’s what’s inside that counts
Clarissa Wei climbs Taiwan’s best-known tower to investigate the clever engineering that keeps it in the sky.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mar 19, 2026 • 30min
More from the world’s leading real estate event – Mipim
Rod Miller, CEO of the Miami‑Dade Beacon Council, drives regional investment. Cass Facy, ING cities director, studies digital visibility of second cities. Joyce Sinderbrand, NYCHA capital lead, manages massive modernization. Anna‑Claudia Rosbach, UN‑Habitat executive director, shapes global housing policy. They discuss housing scale, resilient upgrades, second‑city visibility, and Miami’s economic repositioning.
Mar 16, 2026 • 6min
Tall Stories 500: Shadows of Errol Flynn in Mallorca
Andrew Tuck goes searching for the remains of the home of a 1930s Hollywood star in Mallorca’s Bay of Palma.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mar 12, 2026 • 45min
Meet the mayors at Mipim, the world’s leading real-estate event
We report from the world’s leading real estate event, Mipim. Here we meet mayors from Turku to Genoa and Lisbon to Rome who are putting their city’s best foot forward to drive investment. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mar 9, 2026 • 7min
Tall Stories 499: Masterful mixed-use at Singapore’s Tiong Bahru Estate
Tomas Pinheiro takes us to Tiong Bahru Estate to see how Singapore is able to succeed at the 15 minute city model within just one urban development.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mar 5, 2026 • 31min
Balancing security and aesthetic appeal in Oslo’s New Government Quarter
We visit Oslo to see the New Government Quarter, which has transformed the site of the city’s 2011 terrorist attacks into an open, civic space. Then: we explore the new Louise Tower on Brussels’s iconic Avenue Louise.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mar 2, 2026 • 6min
Tall Stories 498: The many faces of the Maritime Hotel in New York
Paul Logothetis takes us to a hotel in Manhattan that has been transforming since its construction in the 1960s.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
