Archtober's Festival Itineraries offer a curated selection of festival events, hand picked by a thought leader, editor, or creative mind that we admire in New York City. Our next itinerary is from Avinash Rajagopal, the Editor in Chief of METROPOLIS. He is an advocate for life-centered architecture and design, contributing his expertise to industry initiatives on sustainability and circularity. He spearheaded the creation ofMETROPOLIS’s Climate Toolkit for Interior Design, the first resource to address the embodied carbon emissions of interior renovations. Rajagopal is a board member at the International Living Future Institute, and a member of the Governance Council at the International Well Building Institute. He has served on the juries of many awards and competitions, most recently the Architizer A+Awards, the Gensler Research and Innovation Awards, and the HDR Opacity Awards, Rajagopal has lectured at Parsons, where he was the 2024 graduation speaker for the School of Constructed Environments, as well as at the New York School ofInterior Design and the University of Texas at Austin.  

 Check out what Rajagopal is looking forward to during the 2025 festival, and plan your own itinerary!

1. October 15: Building of the Day: 505 State Street‍

METROPOLIS was proud to feature the visionaries at Alloy Development earlier this year for creating what might be the most sustainable city block inBrooklyn. As part of AIANY’s Building of the Day series, you’ll get to tour Alloy’s 505 State Street building, which is the first all-electric skyscraper in the city. Sustainability geeks will get plenty of inspiration here, but even if you don’t spend your time thinking about decarbonization you should visit this building for the community spaces on the upper floors and their spectacular views across Brooklyn. While you’re there, don’t forget to ask the Alloy team about how they also built the city’s first Passive House-certified public schools on the same block.

2. October 18, 25, 30: Grace Farms Foundation Tours‍

Where can you visit an iconic piece of architecture, revel in an idyllic landscape, learn about fair trade and labor policies, and come away with a lesson or two about the continued plague of modern-day slavery in the building industry? Grace Farms. In a stunning building designed by the Pritzker Prize–winning Japanese firm SANAA, the GraceFarms Foundation pursues peace through five initiatives—nature, arts, justice, community, and faith. One of their initiatives, Design for Freedom, is teaching architects to think more deeply about the labor practices in the supply chains of building materials and on the construction site. There’s plenty to absorb your attention at Grace Farms, but if you want to make a day of it, the Yale University campus, with buildings by Eero Saarinen, Louis Kahn, and Paul Rudolph, is about a 45-minute drive away.

3. October 28: Mikyoung Kim: Designing for Higher Ground‍

A visit to the New York Botanical Garden is worthy of a spot on any Archtober itinerary in its own right, but I’m especially thrilled to have the opportunity to hear from the landscape architect Mikyoung Kim. As part of NYBG’s annual Landscape Design PortfolioLecture Series, Kim will speak to the extraordinary spaces she has helped create around the world (including the Regenstein Learning Campus at the ChicagoBotanic Garden, featured in METROPOLIS). A recipient of the Cooper HewittNational Design Award, Kim layers insights into the natural world, the human brain, and our social selves to craft truly affecting and transformational landscapes.

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4. October 25: East Harlem Walking Tour

The New York Restoration Project stewards over 50 parks and community gardens in some of the most underserved neighborhoods in all five boroughs, giving NewYorkers access to nature and a treasured sense of community. This walking tour, organized in partnership with Poster House, promises to reveal and celebrate the network of resilience and care fostered by East Harlem’s Community Gardens. Be prepared to be charmed and stunned—not many outside the neighborhood realize how much Harlemites love their flowers.

‍5. October 29: Building of the Day: Davis Center

My neighbors in Harlem have spent all summer feverishly exchanging notes about how best to beat the long lines for the pool at the Davis Center, at the Northern end of Central Park. With beautiful facilities and a stunning swimming pool, the Center is equally beloved of students at Columbia University, kids in Spanish Harlem, and the 40-somethings who have been flocking to the area over the last couple of years. I’m excited to hear from the minds behind this gem of community-centered design: theCentral Park Conservancy, Susan T. Rodriguez Architecture and Design, and Mitchell Giurgola Architects. If you’re planning to join this event, save a little time to visit the underrated Conservatory Garden, just a short stroll away inside Central Park.