True Cities captures, in words and images, moments in the lives of five global cities: Dubai, Guangzhou, Houston, Lagos, and London, all in their own way critical to the way in which the global market works, now and in the future.

Informed by her sociological insight and artistic approach, Koolhaas's personal view on these unique urban agglomerations across five continents, reveals a permanent process of adaptation and mutual adjustment, the constant formation and undoing of communities, aesthetics, ideologies, and lifestyles.

The book is a documentary collage—a mixture of street photography, energized observation, fragments of conversations, voices, stories, and images that tell five parallel but intersecting stories, which contain many moments that are individually unique, interesting or beautiful, but when brought together create a multi-layered picture of intricately connected lives.

Dutch sociologist and artist Charlie Koolhaas (born in London, 1977) graduated with a BA in sociology from New York University (1999), and an MA in interactive media from Goldsmith University (2004). She has contributed extensively to magazines, books, and exhibitions with her writing, art, and photography and is founder and editor of UNIT magazine, based in Guangzhou, China. In 2007, she was cocurator and visual director for the Shenzhen Biennale, China. She participated in Dubai Next at the Vitra Design Museum, Germany (June, 2008). True Cities, her solo photography exhibition at the AedesLand Gallery in Berlin, featured images of four of the largest urban agglomerations: Guangzhou, Dubai, Lagos, and London (June, 2009). She exhibited in Room for Thought at the Lucy Mackintosh Gallery, Switzerland (October, 2010), Her recent exhibition at the Architectural Association, London, was a photographic and text installation, summarizing ten years of research on global cities.