This talk was given at a local TEDx event, produced independently of the TED Conferences. Danny Forster makes connections between how architecture looks, as art, and how it fulfills its function. He illustrates how local culture and wisdom influence architecture and make it effective and aesthetic, and how he communicates that filmmaking.

Danny Forster is an Emmy-award-winning producer, an influential speaker and educator, and an internationally recognized architectural designer. His wide-ranging career is unified in his singular ability to teach people to find meaning in buildings, and in his passion for opening their eyes to the built world around them.

Forster's skill as an interpreter of architectural concepts first emerged on television, as the on-screen host and later the producer of the Discovery Channel's award-winning series Build It Bigger. The show brought a camera crew and Forster's curiosity, discernment, and enthusiasm to pioneering construction projects in more than fifty countries. At each site he would go to extreme lengths—two miles under a seismic zone in a Peruvian tunnel, landing in a chopper on the back of a top-secret Naval vessel, 1,600 feet in the air on top of a twisting skyscraper—to make complex architectural content accessible to a wide audience.

About TEDx, x = independently organized event In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)