In ancient Babylon, King Hammurabi had a famously clear approach to architectural accountability: if a builder constructed a home that collapsed and killed the owner, the builder was put to death.
Brutal? Absolutely. But effective. Because it ensured one thing: that those who built had a very real stake in the outcome.
Fast forward a few millennia. Developers all over the world still build homes. Just with... fewer consequences.
Profits on Paper, Risk on Us
Here’s the pattern: In the good years, developers make a killing. “Luxury” apartments go up, prices go through the beautifully insulated roof, and the brochures sing about sustainability, harmony, and living well.
But the moment interest rates wobble or materials spike, the chorus changes. Suddenly, it’s the commune’s problem. Or the state’s. Or the buyer’s.
Anyone’s, really, except the person who commissioned the thing in the first place.
It’s a curious business model: socializing risk, privatizing reward.
The result? A landscape dotted with overambitious projects, awkward demolitions, and buildings no one truly stands behind.
Literally. They build them. But they wouldn’t be caught living in them.
The “Luxury” Nobody Wants
Take a walk around your neighbourhood. Count the cranes, the “For Sale” signs, the glint of glass promising prestige.
Now ask: Who are these homes for?
Because they’re certainly not for the people who built them.
Developers, more often than not, live elsewhere. In the charm of an older Jugendstil villa, for instance as one told me with a dreamy smile. And while they may speak in press releases about “creating vibrant communities,” what they’re really creating is exits.
We’ve developed an entire industry of non-participation.
A culture of construction without consequence.
A skyline shaped by those who never intend to inhabit it.
And the consequences are architectural, not just ethical. Poor detailing. Cheap finishes. The same tired white box, scaled up or down depending on zoning.
Buildings that speak in spreadsheets and fall silent when it comes to soul.
So What Would Real Accountability Look Like?
Let’s not bring back Babylonian justice. But what if we revived the spirit behind it?
What if developers actually had skin in the game, not just capital exposure, but lived exposure?
Imagine if: Developers were required to live in one of their buildings for a minimum of five years.
Their compensation was tied not just to sales, but to long-term performance metrics: energy efficiency, resident satisfaction, repair history. A demolition tax discouraged speculative tear-downs unless renovation was demonstrably impossible.
Communes could withhold permits if a developer had unresolved failures elsewhere.
Too radical?
Not really. It’s only radical if you assume that architecture should have no memory.
And that’s exactly the problem.
From Facade to Exit Strategy
This is the unspoken link to our tear-down culture. When developers have no relationship to what they build, no intention to linger, no desire to belong, then demolition becomes strategy.
Cheaper than care. Faster than renovation. Far less personal.
It’s why we see century-old houses bulldozed for half-baked plans. Why façades with texture and rhythm are flattened for beige render and perpetually annoyed balconies. Why so much of what gets built feels hollow, unanchored, and oddly evasive, like it doesn’t want to be here either.
When there’s no skin in the game, there’s no pride in the product.
Just marketing copy. And margin.
It’s Time to Build Differently
We say we care about quality, culture and rootedness.
But when the people shaping our towns treat buildings like flipping stock portfolios, what we end up with isn’t architecture, it’s turnover.
And what we lose isn’t just aesthetics. We lose trust and cohesion. The slow, layered richness that makes a place feel real.
This is a call for responsibility. For developers who don’t just walk away when the concrete sets. Because a city isn’t a brochure. It’s a lived experience.
And if you’re going to build something others are meant to live in, maybe, just maybe, you should be willing to sit in it for a while.
written by Helen M. Krauss