Architects should embrace ideas of cruising and sex in public places in their designs, say the curators of an exhibition at ArkDes in Stockholm.
Cruising ? the practice of looking for casual and anonymous sex in semi-public places ? can be relevant to architecture if architects can be less squeamish about it, said Pierre-Alexandre Mateos, Rasmus Myrup, Octave Perrault and Charles Teyssou, the curators of Cruising Pavilion: Architecture, Gay sex and Cruising Culture.
"It's very enriching for architecture. Cruising is one aspect of a much larger sexual architectural revolution that needs to happen," Perrault told Dezeen.
"Sex, sexuality, desire and gender remains very untapped in the architectural discourse."
The exhibition at ArkDes in Stockholm explores the intersections between cruising and architecture The curators told Dezeen that an injection of sex is a much needed dimension in architecture as societal attitudes to sexuality and gender evolves.
"Architecture must be sensitive to these societal evolutions and must respond to it with architectural proposals," added Perrault.
Exploring urban typologies that have been adopted for cruising could also inform designing cities and spaces that are more democratic, and accessible for queer women and non-binary people.
"We really wanted to expand on the idea of what lesbian cruising looks like, or what is it to be a non-binary person wanting to cruise," Myrup said.
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