This introduction foregrounds islands in terms of constructed space and sets the ground for a mutually beneficial cross-disciplinary exchange between island studies and architecture. As shown by this collection of essays, islands and insularity are a keen and indeed urgent topic of concern for many architectural thinkers and practitioners today, both as actual objects of inquiry and as metaphors. In focusing on the former, this volume offers a global range of studies that productively illustrate the scope and diversity characterising current architectural research. The opening premise of the volume, which gave it its title, is philosopher Gilles Deleuze’s notion of ‘instituting worlds’ as discussed in his early essay “Desert Islands”. The 17 chapters in the book, summarised in this introduction, each shed a light on this premise, and expand it to stress the importance of architectural thinking when approaching contemporary challenges facing islands across the world.