Wiener Wohnen Rosa-Fischer-Gasse 2 1030 Vienna Austria
Which legal and financial conditions are necessary in Europe to increase investment in affordable housing? Which benefits does affordable housing provide for European cities and the economy?
Representatives of the EU institutions, politicians from different European cities, housing experts, housing providers, tenants’ representatives and scientists will discuss these questions comprehensively. The findings of the EU Urban Agenda – Housing Partnership will be presented. The City of Vienna will offer study visits to present the Viennese model of social housing.
BOZAR / Centre for Fine Arts Rue Ravenstein 23 1000 Bruxelles Belgien
Climate change causes an important rise in the sea level, which is a major threat for coastal areas and small islands all over the globe. Even in urban areas at higher levels and inland, the growing quantities of rainwater in combination with spreading urbanization can also cause a major flood risk for entire city areas, something that is happening more often than before.
The 2nd Edition of the Brussels Urban Landscape Biennial dives into the growing problem of floods in urban areas. How to deal with the evacuation of rainwater in an integrated manner? Can landscape architecture generate answers for these complex challenges? What are the limits of the current way of addressing this question? Through workshops, research by design, an exhibition, a colloquium, curated walks and lectures, the two-month BULB festival tries to sensitize the broader public to the importance of water in the urban landscape. Instead of considering water as a threat, it will be approached as a vital and structuring element in the urban landscape.
At the main BULB exhibition at the Centre for Fine Arts, the Bureau Bas Smets, JNC International and Taktyk will be presenting their vision.
Workshop leader: Architecture Workroom Brussels.
Marco Ranzato, the editor of "Water vs. Urban Scape—Exploring Integrated Water-Urban Arrangements” will give a lecture during the Biennial
Museum of Modern Art 11 W 53rd St New York, NY 10019 USA
„Situated between the capitalist West and the socialist East, Yugoslavia’s architects responded to contradictory demands and influences, developing a postwar architecture both in line with and distinct from the design approaches seen elsewhere in Europe and beyond. The architecture that emerged—from International Style skyscrapers to Brutalist “social condensers”—is a manifestation of the radical diversity, hybridity, and idealism that characterized the Yugoslav state.[...]"
Librairie Volume 47, rue Notre-Dame de Nazareth 75003 Paris
Thresholds are an–often overlooked–anthropological constant found in every era and every culture. From the spatial understanding of Greek antiquity to the establishment of the private sphere in the 18th century and the transparency of modern architecture, the threshold has always been a central architectural element. Like a visual symbol of a boundary or a transition, thresholds divide spaces, but are also a connecting element, opening up ways through and across, which have a subtle influence on one’s own perception of space. It is only in recent decades that thresholds have lost significance as part of our everyday experience with architecture. What remains is a growing emptiness between people and the spaces in which they live. Sensual City Studio not only provides an inspiring overview of this important architectural stylistic feature from all eras and cultures, but also shows in particular: thresholds can and must be rethought and rebuilt. In this respect, this book is a plea for the renaissance of the threshold and therefore also a manifesto for a human architecture.
* Sensual City Studio, founded by Jacques Ferrier and Pauline Marchetti, in association with the philosopher Philippe Simay and the architect Estefania Mompean, is a laboratory of ideas, creation and urban foresight. It brings together a network of professionals from the worlds of art, architecture and urban planning, as well as the social sciences. Working at different levels, from design to urban planning, the studio analyses changes in architecture and large modern cities in order to predict the effect that they will have. Sensual City Studio seeks to develop a sensitive, humanist approach to the city, combining sustainable development and new technologies in a quest for innovation and urban delight. The result is a preliminary analysis, procedure and stance which inform the architectural design process.
CIVA Rue de l'Ermitage 55 Kluisstraat 1050 Bruxelles
Urban river floods, inundations, water shortage, dirty water, water pollution, or drowning are nothing new for our urban environments. But is there any other paradigm to follow but going along with the assumption water vs. urban? How can the challenge be met to give more room for water while enhancing the spatial quality of our urban landscapes?
As early as the nineties, the concept of Integrated Water Management has gained momentum in urban design research and practice. Water vs. Urban Scape presents promising new approaches to integrate water in the urban landscape through design-based experiences drawn up for a range of specific socio-spatial urban landscapes across the world such as the diffuse urbanisation in the Northeast of Italy and in Flanders, the booming cities of Shanghai and Istanbul or the expanding Oslo, the informal urbanisation of Kigali and the suburbanisation of Perth. In a second part, four visual essays display possible scenarios of integrated water-urban arrangement in the Brussels Capital Region. With this, Water vs. Urban Scape provides plenty of inspiration for tackling one of the major issues of Urban Design in the urban age.
During the book launch there will of course be time for questions and room for discussion with some of the authors and the editor.
Talk with Andrea Bortolotti, Andrea Aragone, Pauline Cabrit, Catalina Dobre, Bianca Fanta, Roberto Genna, Gery Leloutre & Maëlle Thueaux.
Through speeches, articles and interviews, this book highlights some of the more significant considerations that have run parallel with Vassilis Sgoutas’ own steps in architecture. It also includes a Random Diary, where the focus is not on what was said or written, but rather on experiences and thoughts that have emanated from events related to architects and to architecture. Although this book is a personal book, it is also a mirror of the parallel roads of many architects. Through its pages, glimpses can be caught of the more recent history of the UIA, a unique professional organisation that brings together the architects of the world, in pursuit of common ideals and targets. Memory is our wealth. Having on record these texts and events helps rediscover how our priorities have changed. And how they differ across the globe. In reading between the lines one will be able to gauge what has been the legacy of actions, or inaction, and where architects, as individuals and as a profession, have had a positive influence on the advancement of causes. So it is a little more than mere history, it is also an awakening call.
Introduction speech by
Fani Vavili, Αrchitect, Professor in Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, President of the Hellenic Department of the International Association of Architects (UIA)
Speakers
Nikos Vatopoulos, Journalist – Writer
Pavlos Lefas, Architect, Professor in University of Patras
Yannis Michael, Architect – Planner
Dimitris Filippidis, Architect, Professor Emeritus in Archaeology at the national Technical University of Athens
A discussion will follow, with audience participation.
The upcoming New Town Lab in Sabaudia will take place from the afternoon of May 16th until the evening of May 17th and will focus on public spaces as places of integration. (How) can public space play a role in accommodating the needs and desires of the multifaceted and diverse population of Sabaudia? Four or five locations in the city will be explored by the students from the University of Padua. They have already begun studying how collective spaces – piazzas, parks, markets and public transport hubs – can contribute to making our contemporary cities more inclusive and socially and culturally cohesive. One of the case studies will be the Bella Farnia estate, located 7km outside the centre. This coastal estate consists mainly of holiday houses, small villas and residences which today are partially used to accommodate the migrant community. Two distinct groups co-exist: the Italian middle class and a Punjab (Indian) Sikh community that works in the municipal territory’s many greenhouses.
Japan Architects Association JIA Hall 1F Building Club 2-3-18 Jingumae Shibuya-ku Tokyo, Japan
Since opening its shores to the outside world in the late nineteenth century, Japan has sustained an active relationship of cultural exchange with the West. Japan's grand resort hotels, built during the era between the Restoration of the Meiji Emperor in 1868 until the onset of war in the late 1930s, are some of the most engaging and enduring examples of this cross-fertilization. Eager to champion both its national identity and its status as a modern nation, Japanese hoteliers looked to adapt Western hotel standards to the aesthetic and cultural demands of the Japanese archipelago. With their buildings they provided glamorous settings in which worldly Japanese and curious Westerners could mingle. The grand hotels are romantic hybrids of Beaux Arts grandeur and Japanese temple and shrine motifs, and offer the pleasures of both architectural traditions. They straddle two worlds, being both familiar and exotic to visitors and locals alike. Welcoming the West focuses on the history and design of six of these grand resort hotels: the Nara, the Fujiya, the Nikko Kanaya, the Fuji View, the Biwako, and the Gamagori. Built at a pivotal moment when Japan’s architectural traditions were latent with change and possibility, they are a manifestation of an unprecedented exchange of ideas wrought in timber, stone, and concrete.
Arc en rêve centre d'architecture Entrepôt 7 rue Ferrère 33000 Bordeaux France
From 14 September 2017 to 14 January 2018, arc en rêve centre d’architecture presents the exhibition “infidélités créatives TOPOTEK 1” devoted to the Berlin-based landscape design studio TOPOTEK 1. The exhibition takes place in the stimulating context of a contemporary urban society that is increasingly eager to embrace nature. In the framework of the numerous projects they have carried out in Europe and Asia, the TOPOTEK 1 landscape designers invariably draw their inspiration from local cultural and historic references. They are also interested in other aspects linked to global urban diversity, which they include in their creations.
Thursday 14 September 2017: 6.30 pm presentation, 8:30 pm inauguration
