São Paulo’s Outdoor Advertising Ban (2016)
I had always dreamed about a city without advertising, and couldn't wait to visit São Paulo. And when I did, I was completely shocked to discover... I hated it.<p>Until you experience a lack of advertising, it's hard to imagine quite how gray and boring and non-vibrant a city looks without it. Turns out billboards and panels full of dramatic movies and TV shows, beautiful smiling faces selling makeup and phones... actually add a lot of character to a city and make it feel like things are happening and going on.<p>Imagine if books no longer had graphic covers anymore, just all solid gray and beige and black covers, and you walked into a bookstore. It feels kind of like that.<p>If you're going to get rid of advertising, at a minimum you've got to replace it with something -- like a <i>lot</i> of murals, like murals <i>everywhere</i>. (The Bushwick neighborhood of NYC has some areas full of street art, which works pretty well.)