Call for papers: Transformation: reBuilding and reThinking the “Built Fabric”—Advocating for New Common Good(s)

Call for papers! Eleventh Forum Architectural Science: Transformation: reBuilding and reThinking the “Built Fabric”. Advocating for New Common Good(s). December 4 to 6, 2025.

The Forum is hosted by the Network for Architectural Science e.V. Regular forums are convened to tackle pertinent issues in architectural science. The eleventh Forum Architectural Science is a collaborative effort involving Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Technische Universität Wien and Architekturzentrum Wien (tbc). 

Concept and organization
Anamarija Batista (Vienna), Waltraud P. Indrist (Vienna)

The eleventh Forum Architectural Science aims to synthesise the recent debates on the transformation of the existing, the “built fabric”.

At the same time, it poses the question of which new advocacies need to be formulated in order to negotiate the issues of social, ecological and aesthetic common good(s) in the context of transformation.

Various actors are currently intensively discussing the issue of transforming the “built fabric”. In light of ecological challenges and socio-economic changes, the handling of existing buildings is to be researched in order to initiate a further paradigm shift. Initiatives and research projects such as Cure a Place of Care (Krvavica), HouseEurope, future.lab, Obsolete Stadt, Denkstatt, AKS Gemeinwohl and Haus der Statistik are investigating the tools, potentials and challenges of transformation. In collaboration with various participants and taking into account different scales, they reflect on the relationship between urban design, spatial, regional and landscape planning, architectural, economic, political and legal requirements as well as future scenarios.

On the one hand, the practical projects and debates on land policy instruments pursue the goal of enabling the material building stock to be reused. On the other hand, they focus on the question of how the common good(s) and better living conditions can be conceptualised in the context of a successful transformation between urban and rural areas.

Nevertheless, it is clear that the question of the social contribution of today’s property transformation is a particularly challenging one. Due to the high wave of privatisation since the 1990s, the increasing importance of the property market as an investment target since 2008 and social diversification, the management of the current transformation is dependent on the consensus of numerous players. More room for negotiation and experimentation and, above all, longer negotiation processes are needed. The potential for planning policy action that was available to modernity in order to fulfil its mission—providing as many people as possible with “good”, aesthetically appealing living space, sustainably integrated into a social and urban infrastructure (keyword: education)—no longer exists to this extent today. We are also faced with the existential question of how to harmonise aspects of social justice with the climate crisis that needs to be overcome.

This leads us to the central questions: What contribution does the transformation make to society, who benefits from it, in what form and in what way? Who is involved in these transformation processes, with what mandate and with what goal? And last but not least: What political, economic and legal framework conditions are shaping or are needed for the current transformation of the “built fabric”?

With the elventh Forum Architectural Science, we would like to draw an ambitious, because synthesised, interim conclusion in times of obvious upheaval. We are explicitly interested in the debates and potentials that scrutinise the transformational focal point between urban and rural space described here. What new advocacy is needed to negotiate the issues of social, ecological and aesthetic common good(s) in the context of transformation in an entangled way? Where should this process start in concrete terms? We want to (re)read current and future alternative spaces, scenarios and processes as well as historical approaches and projects in order to finally discuss them critically as sources of ideas.

Convinced of the enrichment through the encounter of disciplines as well as theory and practice, we express an explicit interest in submissions from different protagonists who research transformation processes or are involved in them. We propose the following topics with regard to the forum theme:

I. Models of thought, instruments, knowledge systems, legislation
What land policy and economic models of thought, instruments and knowledge systems are required for a transformation of the ‘built fabric’? What legislative, institutional (challenges) requirements for implementation arise from current practices? Which interfaces need to be activated for this?

II. Historical planning re-examined
Which historical mechanisms and concepts in architecture, urban, spatial and landscape planning currently provide inspiration for the formulation of future spaces of possibility? What ideologies are inscribed in them? How do these materialise in concrete terms?

III. The common good(s) as a complex agency
How is the question of equality in the common good(s) and the improvement of living conditions formulated and negotiated in the course of the transformation of the “built fabric”? What potential does transformation offer for social and ecological justice? Which actors are involved in the decision-making processes? Who and, above all, what is given agency?

The eleventh Forum Architectural Science from December 4–6, 2025 will take place in Vienna as a discussion platform between theory and practice on the basis of the elaborated contributions.

Please submit your abstract (max. 3,000 characters) and a short biography (max. 100 characters) to the organizers by June 13, 2025: forum11@architekturwissenschaft.net.

The selection process for contributions will be finalized by July 11, 2025.

The forum will take place in Vienna (Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Technische Universität Wien, Architekturzentrum Wien (tbc)) from December 4 to 6, 2025.

Following the event, a joint peer-reviewed and open access publication will be published in the book series of the Forum Architectural Science (end 2026).

Funding for this event is provided by the Sutor Foundation (Foundation for the Promotion of the Science of Architecture and Technology).