Shared Spatial Education: The Role of Architectural Co-design in Permacrisis Scenarios

Abstract

The urgency of a reflection on the teaching of architecture and, more broadly, on the role of research in the spatial education of users and general public, is realized in the complexity of contemporary challenges. Global changes emerging with much more rapid and unpredictable times and ways than in the past make it necessary to widen the architectural debate in terms of both themes and audiences.

Disciplines dealing with space are now forced to face the uncertainty to which territories and communities are subjected, catalyzed by issues such as climate change and environmental crises that often lead to overlapping hazards drawing multi-risk scenarios. This results in the need to investigate alternatives in architecture1 that consider as a starting point the permacrisis context characteristic of the risk society. 2

The contribution proposes a vision of spatial co-educa- tion as a fundamental component for adaptation to uncertainty, in the direction of risk reduction and mitigation. In this sense, a design-driven research methodology based on participatory practices is proposed for a shared knowledge construction around the complexity of places. In order to understand it as a real co-design tool, however, participation must be thought of outside traditional patterns3, understanding it as a transformative4 process shared among designers, students, users and the public.