Is Beirut's glitzy downtown redevelopment all that it seems?
Two decades after civil war blew the Lebanese capital to rubble, the city centre boasts immaculately rebuilt streets lined with Gucci and Prada stores – but the whole place is strangely deserted, says Oliver Wainwright
Inside Beijing's airpocalypse – a city made 'almost uninhabitable' by pollution
The 21 million inhabitants of China’s capital appear to be engaged in a city-wide rehearsal for life on an inhospitable planet. Oliver Wainwright reports from Beijing
The truth about property developers: how they are exploiting planning authorities and ruining our cities
Oliver Wainwright
Affordable housing quotas get waived and the interests of residents trampled as toothless authorities bow to the dazzling wealth of investors from Russia, China and the Middle East
Apartheid ended 20 years ago, so why is Cape Town still 'a paradise for the few'?
The South African city is World Design Capital, yet residents of its Khayelitsha township live in appallingly cramped, unhygienic conditions. The need for long-promised urban reform is urgent
The woman kicking up a stink about urban life: 'Cities are losing their smell'
From chocolate shops to noodle bars, from Japanese 'sites of good fragrance' to a hint of purest Glasgow, one woman is on a mission to reopen our nostrils to the smells of the city
