Acknowledgments

During my junior sabbatical year, reality caught up with me. I was writing my first book on an organization gargantuan in scale and with very little time on my hands. I needed all the help I could get and it arrived in all different forms and shapes. So, this is the space and time to tip my hat with enormous gratitude to all the people who supported me along the way, making the completion of this project possible.

First and foremost, I thank Antoine Picon, who gave me the opportunity of a lifetime when he offered me a place at the doctoral program at Harvard. He encouraged me to develop my own research agenda and historical approach, while offering crucial and sustained feedback throughout the initial phase of my research and writing. He cautioned against causal historical claims, challenging me to pay attention to the multitude of shifting vectors that shaped imaginaries of globality during the twentieth century. And when the time arrived, he gently pushed me out the door. Discussions with K. Michael Hays reconnected me with language and poetics at a moment when the bureaucratic language of the institution started taking over my own voice. A big thank-you also goes to Peter Galison, who not only decidedly changed the direction of my research when he pointed me toward World War II military research on sound and communications but also generously shared his words, thoughts, and criticisms on my work. His suggestion to stay with the United Nations in my historical examination of global spaces proved catalytic for the formation of this book. Mara Mills carefully read and commented on the entirety of my dissertation manuscript. An interdisciplinary scholar, she immediately grasped the crux of my argument, encouraging me to take on the question of global governance as a communications enterprise. Mara, I am eternally thankful.

Courses and lectures by Eve Blau, Margaret Crawford, Arindam Dutta, Mark Jarzombek, and Caroline Jones shaped my thinking on politics, governance, and space. For the opportunity to test my ideas in numerous conferences, panels, and classrooms, I am thankful to Jay Cephas, Aliki Economides, Neta Feniger, Anna Flach, Dale Gyure, Jack Hartnell, Ayala Levin, Wanda Liebermann, Kevin Lotery, Jacqueline Maurer, Tyler Morgensten, John W. Ott, Sun-Young Park, Vassiliki Petridou, Melissa Renn, Timothy Rohan, Carsten Ruhl, Anooradha Iyer Siddiqi, and Ilkay Tanrisever. At the Buell Dissertation Colloquium at Columbia University, I articulated for the first time the idea of the book before a formidable crew of fellow historians of architecture—Gretta Tritch-Roman, Ginger Nolan, Ana María León, Shiben Banerji, Rafico Ruiz, Michael McCulloch, Moritz Gleich, Sam Dodd, and Catherine Boland Erkkila. The Architecture and Bureaucracy conference that Rika Devos, Fredie Floré, and Ricardo Costa Agarez co-organized motivated me to consider bureaucracy in tandem with the architecture of international organizations. Time at the Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte and Viktoria Tkaczyk’s research group Epistemes of Modern Acoustics helped me pin down the role that acoustics and communications played on these global platforms. Panayiota Pyla’s invitation to the vibrant academic community at the University of Cyprus gave me time to complete my manuscript next to the UN Buffer Zone in Nicosia. Parts of the argument of this book have been fleshed out in two chapter-length essays in the edited volume Architecture in Development: Systems and the Emergence of the Global South (2022) edited by Arindam Dutta, Ateya Khorakiwala, Ayala Levin, Fabiola López-Durán, and Ijlal Muzaffar; and in Sven Sterken’s and Dennis Pohl’s fantastic special issue The Architecture of Global Governance for Architectural Theory Review (2023). The feedback I received during the editorial process was invaluable.

Jonathan Sterne, whose own groundbreaking work is an inspiration and a model of how scholars, in my opinion, should exist in the world, generously engaged me in conversations on the history of acoustic spaces. The late Leo L. Beranek answered questions and shared information on his work at the Psycho-Acoustic and Electro-Acoustic laboratories at Harvard, as well as his research on the acoustic design for the UN Headquarters. The work of Fred Turner, Barry Katz, and Mark Mazower has been in my mind throughout the process. Dr. Theodoros Radisoglou talked to me extensively about the archives of the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg and sent me valuable secondary sources and brochures.

Quick, but significant for me, exchanges with Ed Eigen, Jacob Gaboury, John Harwood, Timothy Hyde, Daniel Immerwahr, Ben Kafka, Brian Kane, Paula Lupkin, Shannon Mattern, Linda Mulcahy, Dominique Rouillard, and Emily Thompson opened new questions and shifted my thinking on the role of media, art, and law in international bureaucracies. Bernard Dionysius Geoghegan gave crucial positive feedback on my last chapter at a moment of ambivalence about its place. John Durham Peters, who owed me nothing and whose mind operates on a different level altogether, read and commented on chapters 3 and 4. To all of you, I am grateful for your time and insights, but errors remain my own.

Archivists and librarians provided guidance and access to invaluable resources and documents. At the United Nations Archives and Records Management, Jill Annitto, Paola Casini, Wei-wen Chiang, Marvin Cordova, Seymour Edwards, Aleksandr Gelfand, Neshantha Karunanayake, Romain Ledauphin, Kathryn Lee, Amanda Leinberger, Corinne O’Connor, and Cheikh Ndiaye expertly guided me through mountains of documents, going above and beyond to unearth minutes, photographs, and drawings from the UN’s collection. At Harvard, Mark Gerstel offered access to the closed library of the Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory; Cristina Prochilo, E. P. Jackson, and Maureen Jennings shared the drawings of the anechoic chamber in the UPO PIRC collection; and Mary Daniels and Inés Zalduendo at the Frances Loeb Library’s Special Collections pointed to resources and connections I did not anticipate. Janet Parks and Jason Escalante provided valuable guidance to Max Abramovitz’s and Wallace K. Harrison’s architectural records and papers at the Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library. For facilitating in-person visits I also thank Arnaud Dercelles at the Fondation Le Corbusier; the staff at the Rockefeller Archive Center; Lauren Alderton at the RIBA Drawings and Archives Collection; Christine Rosenlund at the Designmuseum Danmark; Frida Melin at ArkDes; Bente Solbakken at the Nasjonalmuseet for kunst, arkitektur og design; John Calhoun at the Billy Rose Theatre Division of the New York Public Library; Jacobine Wieringa at the Carnegie Foundation at The Hague; Cyril Emery at the Documentation Division and Library of the International Court of Justice; and Mary Caldera at the Yale University Manuscripts and Archives.

Gratitude also goes to the archivists who assisted me remotely: staff at the National Archives and Records Administration at College Park and at the New York City Municipal Library and Archives; Marc Brodsky at the Special Collections at Virginia Tech; Rodney Obien at Keene State College; Elisabeth Thomas at the MoMA Archives; librarians at the Special Collections Research Center at the University of Michigan; Randy Sowell at the Harry S. Truman Library; Jacques Oberson and Amanda Howland at the Library Research Center of the United Nations Office at Geneva; Nicole Westerdahl at the Special Collections Research Center at the Syracuse University Libraries; the inimitable Giota Pavlidou at the Constantinos A. Doxiadis Archives; Filine Wagner and Irina Davidovici at gta Archives; Stephen Van Dyk, Elizabeth Broman, and Emily M. Orr at the Cooper Hewitt Museum; Daniel Huws for permission to access and use Jaqueline Tyrwhitt’s papers at RIBA; Dawn Stanford at the IBM Corporate Archives; Kristen McDonald at the Yale University Archives; and Brandon E. Barton at the UCLA Library Special Collections. Librarians at Bard saved the day more than once. Betsy Cawley, Billey Albina, and Melanie Mambo, I am in constant awe of your ability to scavenge rare articles and archival resources. The administrative support of Jeanette McDonald, who scanned endless pages of book chapters and articles throughout the years, made everything easy and possible.

A number of small private collections gave me an intimate view of the design work that went into the UN’s initial platforms. Laurie Pasler, who is directing the Descendants Media Group, offered snippets into her father’s collection; Jill Lundquist opened her home and gave me access to the papers of Oliver Lincoln Lundquist; and Donna Firer, Brian McLaughlin, and Katie Garber, generous hosts, allowed me in their attic during a raging pandemic to consult Donal McLaughlin’s invaluable collection of interviews, minutes, and other memorabilia from the San Francisco Conference on International Organization.

In some cases, the building is the archive. Henrike Claussen took me on a backstage tour of Courtroom 600 while I was visiting Nuremberg. I had fascinating and productive conversations while touring the UN Headquarters with Michael Adlerstein, former Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations and executive director of the United Nations Capital Master Plan; Ginni Wiik of the Royal Norwegian Consulate General; and Jonathan Mishal, whose knowledge of the UN Headquarters and all its nooks and crannies is endless and who took me on an intimate and thorough tour that I will remember for years and that makes for a lot of bulletproof insider jokes.

The book was researched, written, and completed with the generous support of the Konstantinos Katseas Foundation; the Alexander S. Onassis Foundation; the Propondis Foundation; a Frederick Sheldon Fellowship; and a CCA Research Grant. The Bard Research Fund supported archival research in Scandinavia and the National Endowment for the Humanities gave me time and space to write the first chapter.

The number of conversations that informed this book are too many to mention, but some stand out. A passing comment by Kostis Kornetis on the history of third worldism sent me to dig deeper into the political history of multilateralism; Andreas Kalpacki introduced me to Paul Otlet’s network sensibilities; Niko Vicario probed me to think about tables and the shape of diplomacy; Kahlila Chaar-Pérez pushed me to consider how my work speaks to fields outside architecture; Iris Moon suggested that I look at adaption of theaters for the National Assembly in postrevolutionary France; Isobel Roele, a true inspiration in her own right, pointed me to the structural (and structuring) nature of the distinction between the headquarters and the field; and David Theodore, dear friend and expert provocateur, challenged me to articulate the broadcast studio elements of the UN’s designs. Research on acoustics and sound in architecture is growing, but when I started the community was tiny. Carlotta Daró, Shundana Yusaf, and Joseph Clarke made important conversations possible. I owe even more to Sabine von Fischer whose “acoustic argument” has been an inspiration and who brought me to the Max Planck. Sabine, thank you for all the fun our conspiring brought about in panels and special issues.

At the University of Minnesota Press, Pieter Martin expertly shepherded my book to production. His advice, kindness, and perspective have been invaluable. I am in his debt for obtaining two excellent readers for my manuscript, whose comments greatly molded the form and language of the book. A big thank-you goes to Reinhold Martin, who welcomed this book to his series and offered critical comments on book chapters. At Minnesota, Anne Carter, Shelby Connelly, Rachel Moeller, and Laura Westlund approached my book with attention, care, and utmost professionalism. Jenn Kane masterfully dealt with copyright permissions, a task I dreaded. I would be in the wrong not to mention Jenny Gavacs, who guided me through the development of the manuscript, and Catherine Osborne, for her precise copyediting. Everything I know about prose and writing in English, I owe to the excellent staff at the MIT Writing Center. Marilyn Levine, Elizabeth Fox, and Bob Irwin, thank you!

I am particularly grateful for two writing groups. Katherine Boivin, the gem of a human I call my friend and peer, read every single page of this manuscript more than once. She is a master of structure and flow and one of the most careful readers I could have ever asked for. Maria Sonevytsky, a crucial interlocutor and dear friend, always offered plenty of food for thought, keeping big-picture arguments at the center of her razor-sharp feedback. I am so lucky to keep conversing with you. In a second writing group, Ateya Khorakiwala and Jay Cephas both read final drafts and offered critical feedback on how buildings get to enact politics. Hiba Bou Akar saved the day with sage advice when the book entered production, and Marcia Mihotich lent her design expertise for the book cover.

Teaching at Bard College has also shaped my writing. Special mention should go to my colleagues at the Sound Cluster that Laura Kunreuther organized and ran for years. Alex Benson, Matthew Deady, Danielle Riou, Whitney Slaten, Maria Sonevytsky, and Drew Thompson, I assure you that your comments and work found their way to my book. In the Art History and Visual Culture Program, I thank Susan Aberth, Anne Chen, Laurie Dahlberg, Patricia Karetzky, Alex Kitnick, Susan Merriam, Julia Rosenbaum, Heeryoon Shin, and Tom Wolf. I could not have asked for better colleagues. Nana Adusei-Poku, Myra Armstead, Karen Barkey, Laura Battle, Roger Berkowitz, Maria Sachiko Cecire, Christian Ayne Crouch, Ellen Driscoll, Elias Dueker, Kevin Duong, Jeannette Estruth, Tabetha Ewing, Miriam Felton-Dansky, Jackie Goss, Nora Jacobsen Ben Hammed, Sandi Hillal and Alessandro Petti, Kwame Holmes, Mie Inouye, Tom Keenan, Pinar Kemerli, Peter Klein, Cecile E. Kuznitz, Nicholas Lewis, Pete L’Official, Allison McKim, Leslie Melvin, Alys Moody, Greg Moynahan, Michelle Murray, Dina Ramadan, Jana Schmidt, Nate Shockey, Sophia Stamatopoulou-Robbins, Pelin Tan, Dominique Townsend, Eric Trudel, and Marina van Zuylen, you made Bard a better place. Ross Exo Adams and Ivonne Santoyo-Orozco, who arrived to launch the Architecture Program, created a community around the politics of space that was much needed.

A brilliant cohort of peers made research and writing a more rewarding adventure: Fallon Samuels Aidoo, Alejandra Azuero-Quijano, John R. Blankinger, Alex Bueno, Daniel Cardoso Llach, Peter Christensen, Christina Crawford, John Davis, Aliki Economides, Jacob Emery, Nacho Galan, Rania Ghosn, Matt Gin, Lisa Haber-Thomson, Jeanne Haffner, Max Hirsh, El Hadi Jazairy, Jordan Kaufman, Duks Koschitz, Michael Kubo, Matt Lasner, John Lopez, Jennifer Mack, Diana Martinez, Anna-Maria Meister, Elli Mosayebi, Brian Norwood, Yetunde Olaiya, Sun-Young Park, Petros Phokaides, Andrei Pop, Diana Ramirez, Enrique Ramirez, Rebecca Ross, Ivan Rupnik, Sebastian Schmidt, Peter Sealy, Dubravka Sekulić, Molly Wright Steenson, Irene Sunwoo, Zenovia Toloudi, Rebecca Uchill, Olivier Vallerand, Alla Vronskaya, Tijana Vujosevic, Eldra-Dominique Walker, Delia Duong Ba Wendel, and Mechtild Widrich, thank you for being part of this book’s journey. In Cyprus, Popi Iacovou and Giorgos Artopoulos showed me around; in Paris, Sharon Kanach, Dimitris Mavridis, and Nikola Jankovic made my stay less lonely; and in Zurich, Elli Mosayebi, Marcel Bleuler, and Eleana Akrita offered much needed respite from work.

Friendship and camaraderie moved me forward, even when the task ahead seemed mission impossible. The Feminist Art and Architecture Collaborative taught me about friendship and intersectionality—thank you Ana María León, Tessa Paneth-Pollak, and Martina Tanga; and a second collective sustained me during the pandemic: Christina Crawford, Brian Goldstein, Jennifer Hock, Min Kyung Lee, Catalina Mejía Moreno, and Robin Schuldenfrei offered valuable support in the form of meaningful Zoom get-togethers.

Some people are just special. Jilly Traganou, getting to know you helped me make home out of New York; Emilie Lemakis, your lucky charm kept me safe and sound; Jason Nguyen, the “archives” might have moved, but a day has not passed; Stephanie Tuerk, we made stories happen and that was fun and real; Zeynep Oguz, seeing the world with you has been a lifetime adventure; and Theodora Vardouli, your big soft heart, wisdom, and openness, unmatched and unparalleled, helped me see that in this academic world of ours every voice matters, including ours. From the bottom of my heart, I would like to thank Mariana Mogilevich, the voice of logic and good sense, who guided my ignoramus younger self throughout uncharted territories of academic life. And Ateya Khorakiwala, you are my friend, the smartest person I know and a truly beautiful human, with whom I could talk forever.

My friends, my family—Anestis Touloumis, Stavroula Parnassou, and Ellie Touloumis, Evangelia Chatzikonstantinou, Emi Kitsali, Chrisa Kofti, Stella Pantelia, Domna Pardali, Paschalis Samarinis, Eleni Sgouridou, Efi Terzidou and Olga Terzidou—you turned every single trip into a small celebration, reminding me that there is life before and after the book (maybe even during). Eleftheria Zografou, Ourania Tsoukala, and Vana Tentokali, you are special to me.

I finished the writing of the book in the midst of the Covid-19 global pandemic. During that period of isolation, away from my family and friends, Alistair Bevington (1926–2021) and Christine Benglia Bevington (1937–2020) opened their home and accepted me as part of their family. Feeding the pigeons with Alistair and listening to Christine’s stories grounded me emotionally and carried me through an otherwise horrendous period of loss.

Last, but not least, I thank Alexander Bevington, my best friend and, in all honesty, the best human I know. Your endless humor (delivered exactly how I like it, extra-dry), your delicious cooking, and your care nurtured me and kept me going. I could not have done this without you. Lucas Wilson-Bevington, you brought a lot of fun, and love, and adventures, although please let your dad beat you at chess from time to time. Our small family grew with Margot, the black half-rottweiler that passes as labrador and whose mischief made for a lot of laughter despite the occasional whining.

I dedicate this book to my parents, Effrosini Touloumi and Konstantinos Touloumis, who accepted and embraced my path regardless of how foreign to them it was. This project would not have been possible without the consistency of their presence, their acceptance, and their love. I hope that in publishing this book I am also returning something to you both.