Storied Cities
11th July 2020
When people in place don’t understand or believe that they do have a rich history and an identity worthy of embracing, that tragically leads them to try to imitate other places they think are worthy. This accounts for the curious fact that while every company tries its hardest to convince you of how much different and better it is than every other company in its industry, too many cities try their hardest to convince you that they are exactly the same as every other city that’s conventionally cool. In that, they embrace and tout the trappings of unbearable sameness: bike lanes, microbreweries, coffee shops, and so on. These are all great parts of what today’s thriving cities have, but they fail to capture the magical uniqueness that makes each city a place of its own.
The American Midwest is perhaps the most tragic victim of this loss. The cities of this region were dealt a massive blow by deindustrialization and struggled to reinvent themselves for the knowledge economy in the way that coastal cities did. Their default response was one of shame, of shedding their agro-industrial heritage in a vain attempt to imitate the Portlands and Brooklyns of America.