What is the Anti-City Guide?
Skip the tourist trap: the Anti-City Guide takes you to post-growth Europe you never knew you needed to visit.
Each ‘edition’ of the Anti-City Guide spotlights two post-growth cities — one from Eastern, one from Western Europe. Together they reveal a European narrative about (re-)growth and decline.
The Anti-City Guide is a research project on post-growth Europe curated by Maurice J. Hermans. The first ‘edition’ of Heerlen and Zenica has been published on this site. A printed edition will be published in the summer 2027.
What is an Anti-City?
“Perhaps it seems as if an Anti-City resists urbanity and urban development — the way antibiotics kill bacteria, or anti-squatting resists unwanted occupation. But that is not what is meant by the term. If the city were an elementary particle, the Anticity would be its antiparticle. She may very well be the polar opposite of the old European city.”
An excerpt from De Antistad (nai010, 2016)
Let's find out.
Currently the printed #1 edition Heerlen
This exhibition just opened.
Do you have a story?
Contributions from photographers, writers, researchers, and anyone who knows a place that doesn't make the headlines are welcome.
Send us your field notes, photographs, research, or your story. If it fits an edition we're working on, we'll be in touch.
A number of exchanges, events, lectures and field visits.
Do we cooperate with partners?
We didn’t do this alone and teamed up with universities, city councils, publishers and non-profits. Without them it’s impossible to do what we do.
Get in touch
Maurice J. Hermans
Design
Koehorst in ‘t Veld
Publishers
Vrijeme IK
Site
Bureau Sporken
Correspondents
Sanja Stevic, Hanna Zwart
Editors
Thijmen Hermans
Photography
B. Perry
GJ van Stiphout (’about’)Ge
The research, design and content-creation for the anticityguide.eu has been generously supported by the Creative Industries fund NL.