Vol.11 Regeneration

Our cities and built environment exist within a narrative of growth. But they also exist within a narrative that is constantly rewriting itself in a context of economic changes, resource shortages and ongoing consequences of the climate crisis. The construction industry consumes half of all raw materials extracted annually by humans. Moreover, the sector accounts for nearly 40% of the global CO2 footprint. Statistics like these are well-cited and widely circulated, and whilst there is strong incentive to explore alternative futures, such proposals are quickly dismissed for being too utopian, too naïve, or simply unrealistic. Inflection
positions Vol. 11 as a collection of pragmatic discussions as to what that questioning could look like, focusing on architectural regeneration thoroughly and carefully, beyond mere speculation, from the ground up.

In biological terms, regeneration denotes the ability to renew, restore, or grow tissues in organisms and ecosystems in harmony with natural fluctuations. Applied to architecture, it necessitates similar reciprocities that address the renewal of space, function, and resources. Understandably, as a concept that straddles the ecological world and the built environment, there is no singular approach to regenerative architecture. Rather, it emerges as a whole-scale practice, a framework, an overarching model.

The contributions that follow glide between these many interpretations of the term regeneration. Rather than operating in isolation, they piece together to reveal a variety of approaches that exist within the gaps of existing policy, infrastructure, and traditional approaches. It is at these critical junctures, we can begin to reframe the discussion from one of binaries of the natural and the built, to one of overlapping interests.

Featured Contributors

Bauhaus Earth

Bauhaus Earth is a research institution that leads scientific inquiry into the nexus of climate and the built environment. Their research agenda encompasses a range of topics, including the entire life cycle of materials, the necessary material transition in construction, global and regional nature-based supply and demand chains—and their socio-spatial, environmental, and political dimensions.

Flores & Prats

Eva Prats and Recardo Flores established Flores & Prats, an office based in Barcelona dedicated to the confrontation of theory and academic practice with design and construction activity. The practice has worked throughout Europe on projects of adaptive reuse, social housing and urban public spaces. Together, they have been invited to the previous five editions of La Biennale di Venezia and taught at Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio, Escola Tècnica Superior d'Arquitectura and ETH Zurich.

Neri & Hu

Based in Shanghai, Neri and Hu's architectural ouvre situates itself within the the aftermath of demolition, and erasure of traditional, urban and cultural fabric. Their ethos of working with the existing goes beyond government-designated historical buildings, advocating for the consideration of buildings deemed ordinary or mundane by legislation. Alongside their design practice, Lyndon Neri and Rossana Hu have been deeply committed to architectural education and have lectured across the globe in various universities and professional forums, including University of California, Berkeley, Harvard Graduate School of Design, Yale School of Architecture and others.

Architect Brew Koch

Architect Brew Koch was first founded in 2004 by Dr Peter Brew and Simone Koch. They recognise that the value in architecture is not in the final form but as a catalyst for realising the success of the place or community. It would be better understood as an armature for local relationships to thrive. It might not be noticed at all. For them, architecture is not a singular vision and is never static but is always available.

Simulaa

Simulaa is an architrecture practice defined by considered analysis and a research-based approach that prioritises time-based design thinking that recognises architecture’s inherent entanglement with social, economic, aesthetic, political, and environmental concerns. Directors Andre Bonnice an and Anna Jankovic and teaches at the Melbourne School of Design and RMIT Architecture.

Philippe Rahm

Philippe Rahm is a Swiss architect and principal architect in the office of Philippe Rahm Architectes, based in Paris. His work, which extends the field of architecture from the physiological to the meteorological, has received an international audience in the context of sustainability. He is the 2024 Treseder Fellow at the Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning at the University of Melbourne, and in August he visited to give a lecture on the fundamentals of his research and design methodology to tackle today's climate crisis.

All Contributors

Andre Bonnice

Anna Jankovic

Andrea Crudeli

Architect Brew Koch

Ariani Anwar

Atelier Local

Claire Miller

Clara Reutter

Claudio Torres

Dylan Newell

Emile Straub