Transition from the industrial to the information society calls for a new kind of learning. Outstanding potentials for this exist in urban communities, where there is a concentration of both formal and informal educational facilities for children, youths, and adults; these must be developed. Urban space and the architecture of educational institutions can create inviting, encouraging, and inspiring settings in which to learn. The International Building Exhibition Hamburg adopts such contexts as a working emphasis within the framework of its key theme COSMOPOLIS. Volume 3 in the METROPOLIS: series enquires after the new city of the information society and its need for innovative “pedagogic architecture,” and also presents examples of reformative intervention for discussion.

There is more to globalisation than international financial and trade networks. Globalisation also creates an international urban society: the Cosmopolis. The aim of the Internationale Bauausstellung (International Building Exhibition) IBA Hamburg is to adapt the city to the needs of citizens of this cosmopolis and to give them the opportunity to develop. Volume 5 of the IBA’s series of publications deals with the structure of the communities inhabited by citizens of this cosmopolis—the places where they live, move and operate. In the light of demographic change, the book focuses on questions such as whether—and, above all, how—the armoury of urban planning and of architecture can be used to overcome the social and cultural barriers within urban societies, how ethnic and cultural diversity can become positive strengths, and how this can happen under the conditions of a worldwide trend of urbanisation that is coming up against its ecological limits.

Designing the future of cities in the twenty-first century: this is the task taken on by the Internationale Bauausstellung (International Building Exhibition) IBA Hamburg. Its projects make an innovative and sustainable contribution to current metropolitan development issues. In the heart of the Hanseatic city of Hamburg, the IBA Hamburg is presenting, until 2013, more than sixty building, social, and cultural projects and programmes to demonstrate how major cities can undergo ecologically and socially balanced growth in the present day. Covering 35 square kilometres, the IBA’s project site on Hamburg’s Elbe Islands of Wilhelmsburg and Veddel, as well as the Harburg upriver port, is intended to provide a role model for sustainable, future-oriented inner city development. These islands are home to around 55,000 people from more than 100 countries.
With this, the seventh volume in the METROPOLIS: series, the IBA Hamburg, in its presentation year, 2013. provides an annotated overview of the projects and the three themes: Cosmopolis, Metrozones, and Cities and Climate Change.
In keeping with the tradition and commitment to quality of the “IBA brand,” this volume presents an innovative review of planning and construction as well as venturing an initial reflection, both internal and external, on the seven-year development and implementation process. Not least, METROPOLIS: BUILDING THE CITY ANEW recognises the involvement and commitment of all those whose participation has played such a key role in the success of the IBA Hamburg. And, looking ahead, the first responses to the question “Where do we go from here?” are already right there.