When looking at suburbs, people and planners often see something very different. Whereas the former dream of a better lifestyle, the latter often talk about urban sprawl and point to a long list of negative aspects of this kind of urban from. Particularly in view of rising energy consumption, Peak Oil and possible climate change continuing trends towards global suburbanization have caused concerns. However, more recently the ”reading” of suburbs has changed. The prevailing critical discourse has been challenged by the assumption that suburbs – if designed and managed well – can be aligned with the overall goal of sustainability. This includes a reappraisal of ”suburbanism as a way of life” that might offer a lot. The seminar will examine the current debate by taking American, Australian, Chinese and German cities as an example. To this end concepts of sustainable urban development will be explored, followed by a practice review. It will be argued that the debate on suburbia is embedded in a much larger, underlying debate on the good life.The Coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) and similar future risks give rise to questions such as: Is urban densification still a good approach in urban planning? Is the global trend towards more and ever larger metropolises healthy and sustainable? Would more decentralized settlement structures and lower urban densities better protect human health, and, in doing so, increase the overall resilience of cities and countries? Or would these strategies, on the contrary, create an abundance of adverse effects?