Meanings
- uncountableA type of architecture and design strategy for buildings, roads, park benches, etc, which aims to discourage homeless people, skateboarders, or others from sitting, sleeping, skateboarding or otherwise using a space, for example by covering it with spikes.
On a human level, the new facility [Moynihan Train Hall] is a disaster. Like so many other places defined by the principles of hostile architecture, there's almost nowhere to sit, lest a homeless person might find a place to take a nap.
2025 April 19, Jacob Silverman, “Welcome to Slop World”, in FT Weekend (Life & Arts section), London: The Financial Times Ltd., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 161 more example
The Camden Bench is not an anomaly: more and more, our cities are being designed to keep those deemed as ‘undesirables’ out. By its very nature this is ‘hostile architecture’—urban design with a focus on exclusion, design that inhibits community and tells us who is welcome and who is not.
2020, Noreena Hertz, The Lonely Century, →ISBN
Translations
German feindliche Architektur, Anti-Obdachlosen-Architektur
- feindliche ArchitekturTranslations
- Anti-Obdachlosen-ArchitekturTranslations
Portuguese arquitetura hostil
- arquitetura hostilTranslations
Spanish arquitectura hostil
- arquitectura hostilTranslations
Cite this entry
hostile architecture. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hostile%20architecture
“hostile architecture.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hostile%20architecture. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “hostile architecture,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hostile%20architecture.
Source: hostile architecture on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.