IN-PERSON Barcelona. Section A
Abstract
Due to the changing needs and desires, buildings become obsolete over time leaving them vacant over a longer period before they are either demolished, renovated or reconverted. In many cities, this is becoming a real problem which leads to deprived neighbourhoods, vandalism and the diminishing of the living quality. To tackle the challenge of vacancy and give time and space for the design, temporary projects are organised in unused buildings in the anticipation of future projects. As such, they preserve buildings, and utilise again their materials and embodied energy which would be otherwise lost. However, in many cases they do not reach their ambition of providing a long-term impact on the future project. In fact, more often developers choose to demolish these buildings and construct new and performant buildings. Recently, a trend can be noticed where buildings, among which offices and industrial buildings, that have become obsolete in their location are being reconverted to housing. However, these projects are primarily intended for higher- or middle-class families and not for affordable housing even though there is a high demand. To grasp the opportunities of both temporary projects and reconversion projects in dealing with vacancy, this study reflects on the relationship between bottom-up initiatives and long-term planning. By looking into existing projects, and conducting an in-depth case study analysis, this study will put forward some examples of best practices and an approach on how the bottom-up and top-down initiatives could be combined for responsible urban planning strategies.
Paulien Beeckman is a PhD researcher at VUB Architectural Engineering. She obtained her master’s degree in Architecural Engineering in 2022 within the Bruface program (VUB-ULB). Her research, under the supervision of prof. dr. ir. arch. Waldo Galle and prof. dr. ir. arch. Niels De Temmerman, focuses on the reconversion of offices to housing and how the use of circular strategies could make these projects more affordable.
Gabrielle Kawa is a PhD researcher at the department of Architectural Engineering at Vrije Universiteit Brussels (VUB). In her research ‘Reimagining vacancy’, she explores the opportunities of temporary projects in vacant industrial buildings for the circular construction industry. She aims to design and propose sustainable ways of organising temporary projects in vacant buildings that can support the transition towards circular construction.
Waldo Galle is part-time assistant professor and the academic policy coordinator on sustainability transitions at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) and associate researcher for the Flemish Institute for Technological Research (VITO). As a member of the research groups VUB Architectural Engineering, and Business Technology and Operations, he studies the financial and socio-technical feasibility of a circular construction economy. He questions which opportunities the transition towards that economy raises, which constraints it creates, and how the architectural practice changes together with it.
Niels De Temmerman is professor at the department of Architectural Engineering at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). His research focuses on Transformable Structures for Sustainable Development’, such as deployable structures and kit-of-parts systems for architectural applications. He is supervisor of a large number of ongoing and finished PhD research projects in the field of sustainable building.
1:30 pm - 3:00 pm
Wednesday 17th July, 2024