Areas made of detached houses violate the principles of sustainability, which in short advocate denser urban areas in order to counteract urban sprawl. Nevertheless, the individual house-model remains firmly established and represents the ideal of the vast majority of people. This contradiction is a major issue, especially as these areas paradoxically have the greatest potential to see an increase in density. This lecture presents work produced by students during a summer workshop at the EPFL, exploring strategies for the future of desperate houses-zones [flyer].

Speaker

Julien Fornet is an architect. He is an assistant lecturer at EPFL’s Laboratory of Architecture and Urban Mobility and works on the “ComplexDesign” doctoral programme. He is also a founding partner of “fastt architectes” in Lausanne, a firm which practises across the French-speaking part of Switzerland and has won numerous prizes over the years.

Talk