Hyperborder:
The Contemporary U.S.-Mexico Border and Its Future Fernando Romero, LAR
Fernando Romero , LAR

Roving vigilantes, fear-mongering politicians, hysterical pundits, and the looming shadow of a 700-mile-long fence: the U.S.–Mexico border is one of the most complex and dynamic areas on the planet today. With more than one million daily crossings, the border has increasingly has become a hotbed for debate. But too often its complexities are viewed through the myopic lens of illegal immigration, ignoring a multitude of other critical issues that include health, the environment, drug trafficking, free trade, and post-9/11 security.

Hyperborder provides the most nuanced portrait yet of this dynamic region. Author Fernando Romero presents a multidisciplinary perspective informed by interviews with numerous academics, researchers, and organizations. He begins by examining issues faced by other border regions including those dividing North and South Korea and Israel and Palestine. A brief summary of the U.S.–Mexico border's recent history provides a much-needed context for a detailed portrait of the many unique issues the two countries face today. Romero uses current economic, political, social, and environmental trends to project potential scenarios—both positive and negative—for the border at the midway mark of the twenty-first century. Provocatively designed in the style of other kinetic large-scale studies like Rem Koolhaas's Content and Bruce Mau's Massive Change, Hyperborder is an exhaustively researched report from the front lines of the border debate. Nonpartisan in its politics and tackling issues from both U.S. and Mexican perspectives, this book is essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand—and find solutions for—the many intertwined issues that define this complex region of the world, and others like it.


Fernando Romero worked as an architect in the office of Rem Koolhaas from 1996–1999 and has designed buildings around the world, both for Koolhaas and for his own firm, Laboratory of Architecture (LAR), which he founded in 1999 (and was featured in PAP's Young Architects: If… Then). Romero was born in Mexico City, where he currently resides. He has lived in Rotterdam and in the US, and LAR is in the process of opening a Los Angeles office in addition to it's Mexico City base. For Hyperborder, Romero interviewed numerous academics, researchers, and organizations throughtou North America, in order to assemble a book that tackled the border from multiple disciplinary perspectives.
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Editorial Reviews

Next American City:
"Hyperborder is an altogether different type of intervention by an architect...a series of possible future scenarios demonstrates the urgency of addressing these issues through comprehensive and bi-national planning and cooperation, rather than piecemeal responses, or very long fences." (Winter 2007)

Dwell:
"Required reading even before its ink had dried, Hyperborder is Fernando Romero's long-anticipated, perfectly timed look at the culture, space, and economic future of the U.S.-Mexico border." (March 2008)

Metropolis:
"Occupying the lonely speculative middle ground, LAR has embraced the role of communicating what might be." (December 2007)

Hispanic:
"Brilliantly organized, thoroughly researched and presented in a visually striking format, this book by architect Fernando Romero is essential for anyone seriously interested in the U.S.-Mexico border." (January 2008)

Choice:
"Romero's work transcends the usual debate on immigration issues...augmented by some of the most impressive charts and photographs this reviewer has ever seen in a text. The book is well written and fully footnoted. It should appeal to a wide variety of academics interested in the US-Mexico border area and the issues confronting this area. Summing up: Recommended." (02/2008)

Nylon Guys:
"Packed with easy-to-read charts, compelling photographs, and clear prose, the author demonstrates how vital the border is in the present and to the future." (January 2008)

Los Angeles Times Book Review:
"Romeros scenarios are born of current realities, and for him despite massive inequities the key reality is interdependence, so much so that one nations future depends on the other, he argues. More Coca-Cola is consumed per capita in Mexico than in any other country; money sent home from the U.S. exceeds local incomes in five Mexican states, and Wal-Mart is the largest private employer in both countries." (January, 2008)

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