RE:WORK BRUSSEL

In the 'Projections' series, the Flemish Architecture Institute and deSingel aim to provide a platform for the existing research by design in Flanders. For several seasons we are showing the work of architectural students and lecturers and independent research groups. We zoom in on the provisional results of this research and take a direct and open-minded look at actual situations. In our choice of projects we take a lead from social topics and/or the issue of the role of the architectural discipline in society. The only constant is that the research is relevant to Flanders and is by no means noncommittal. RE:WORK Brussels. Space for industry, logistics and wholesale trade in the city RE:WORK shows the results of an international master-class in which 38 students from Brussels, Barcelona, Manchester and Bordeaux took part. RE:WORK starts out from the challenges facing Brussels, a metropolis with major demographic growth and a sizeable industrial infrastructure which is however declining rather than reorienting itself. Former residential and employment zones are now entirely devoted to housing. There are hardly any combined forms. The cause is the lack of contemporary economic models of urban interweaving. The master-class examined the optimal use of the available space and the facilitation of a different economy and housing. The students carried out research by design on five very different sites, each with its own economic structure and context: the neighbourhood around Reyerslaan, Demetskaai, Neder-over-Humbeek, the Da Vinci site and the neighbourhood around the Batelage Dock. The refreshing and extremely vivid design proposals display an innovative approach that continues to see the coexistence of city and economy as a premise for the sustainable development of the Brussels metropolis. The production and consumption of different sorts of energy and making space for entrepreneurship available to the new inhabitants of Brussels - with their connections all over the world - are just a couple from a series of recommendations. This research by design argues for the formulation of flexible urban projects that is tied into a broader system but at the same time also embedded in the scale of the neighbourhood and the building. It shows that the actual use of good architecture can make a world of difference. The master-class (2012) was organised by Louise (Laboratory on Urbanism, Infrastructure and Ecologies, Faculty of Architecture, ULB) and STeR* (Master in Urban and Spatial Planning, Cosmopolis research group, VUB) headed by Benoit Moritz and Jens Aerts in association with GRAU and Jan Verheyen (IDEA Consult). With the support of the Secretary of State for Urban Planning for the Brussels Capital Region.