Remaking Cities with Care

In both cities, the morning program begins with British architect and urbanist Finn Williams, City Architect of Malmö, Sweden, whose keynote, Omsorg: Designing the City with Care, explores how Swedish ideas of care can reshape urban governance. Drawing on his experience in the southern Swedish city, Williams considers how cities might strengthen local identity, create greater equality of quality and embrace circularity. Asking what kind of city we want to leave behind, he also challenges the concept of design quality being a luxury competing with social and environmental priorities, instead proposing that it can be a way of achieving them.

Next, Ludwig Engel focuses on the buildings already around us. In The Future is Already Built: The Story of HouseEurope!, the German futurologist and spatial researcher examines why demolition and new construction remain the norm when renovation can offer a more sustainable and socially cohesive alternative. As a leading advocate for HouseEurope!, Engel explores how policy, incentives and collective storytelling could shift the European building industry towards renovation as the norm. His keynote shows HouseEurope!’s evolution from a grassroots initiative into an influential policy lab for systemic change.

The third keynote is Rethinking Materiality: Natural Resources and Human Resourcefulness, by architect and educator Anupama Kundoo, whose research-led practice explores material innovation, low environmental impact and people-centred design. Kundoo challenges pressures towards standardisation, proposing ‘Human Time as a Resource’ and a slower, more experimental approach to making. Her presentation looks at how material research and experimentation can respond to human needs for refuge, purpose and social engagement, while creating architecture founded in ethics of abundance and care.

The afternoon sessions extend these ideas through Australian-focused conversations.  In Melbourne, Kate Dundas of UN Global Compact Network Australia, OFFICE’s Simon Robinson and Professor Marcus White from Swinburne University of Technology explore the value of existing places, while Professor Dan Hill from the University of Melbourne and Shannon Peach from Milieu Property look at the systems surrounding housing and ask whether market forces can deliver the cities we want. The day concludes with the three international keynote speakers returning alongside Australian practitioners to consider the question, If Cities Made with Care Are within Reach, How Do We Create Them Together?, a topic traversing how interconnected systems might create cities that are resilient and fundamentally worth living in. Hear from local Melbourne voices such as Izzie White, Architectus’s Elizabeth Seuseu, Amplifier Collective’s Steven Weir and AHURI’s Tom Alves; and, in Sydney, from Committee of Sydney’s Eamon Waterford, Hassell’s David Tickle and City West Housing’s Leonie King.

Also in Sydney, What if the City of the Future is Already Built? brings together the University of Sydney’s Professor Thomas Astell-Burt, Ali Bounds of BVN and Russell McFarland of Austin McFarland Architects (and a member of the Regional Architecture Association) to question assumptions around growth, demolition and replacement. A second talk features Paulo Macchia of the Government Architect NSW, David Barnard of Tract and Esther Cheong of Atlas Economics discussing housing, governance, finance, equity and markets.

Living Cities Forum takes place in Melbourne on Tuesday, 25 August at The Edge, Fed Square and Sydney on Friday, 28 August at the State Library of NSW. Tickets and the full program, here.