Photo: Bob Van Mol

Over the past year and a half, the Architecture Workroom Brussels team, together with the Board, has been refining the organisation's mission, vision and operations.

As a house of cultural innovation for the transformation of the social and physical environment, we look forward to the fourth policy period 2023-2027 of the Arts Decree with great ambition.

New partnerships will be established in order to boost the AWB's range of activities. They will provide the context for increasing the contribution of design in social transitions in the growing network of partners and practices of change.

You can already expect a taster of this renewed approach in 2022. The Future Places Market invites all practices and citizens involved to collectively shape the future agenda of our living environment.

In the Designing The Future sessions, we translate the innovative insights in society into new spatial projects.

AWB's workplace will be the setting for forging new coalitions that will make the transitions happen in specific places: streets, squares, buildings, districts and landscapes. We will announce the programme shortly.

The foundation that will enable us to achieve this is the team of passionate employees. It is therefore logical that we are optimising its structure and operations. AWB staff will be afforded greater autonomy and steering power. The most experienced employees will help define our strategic directions. Internal knowledge sharing and teamwork will serve as the renewable fuel powering the engine. The management team will provide support.

We welcome Frank Van Damme as our business leader. His many years' experience in management and communication will ensure calm and stability. Transition specialist Chris Roorda joins the ranks of the content team.

Several experienced employees are also exploring new horizons. Carmen Van Maercke immerses herself in the design practice with Fallow. Nik Naudts and Els Vervloesem continue to drive innovation in the sector as independent experts in design and socio-spatial research. We would like to thank them for their many years of commitment to AWB and wish them every success in these new challenges.

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WORKROOM

Since 2010, Architecture Workroom Brussels has focused on the future of our living environment. The organisation began as a safe haven to address the link between space and societal transitions, aimed at fostering a futureproof design practice, commissioning and building culture.

It has now become evident that the transformation of our streets, neighbourhoods, and landscapes is both a prerequisite and a lever for achieving societal goals in synergy. Yet we observe that these transformations remain difficult to imagine and implement. They span so many sectors and involve so many actors that responsibility falls on everyone, and therefore, ultimately, on no one.

That is why we make it our mission to create the space that connects them. And with this refined mission comes a new name: WORKROOM, House for transformation. WORKROOM is the shared space where the future of our living environment is not only imagined but also organised.

We are currently taking the lead on three mission-driven transformations:

  • SOCIETAL INCUBATORS - By 2030, stakeholders from the youth, culture, sports, care and education sectors will join forces to create renewed societal spaces that tackle loneliness and counteract the fragmentation and pressure on public infrastructure.
  • FOSSIL-FREE NEIGHBOURHOODS - By 2030, at least ten neighbourhoods will be underway with the transition to fossil-free energy in an inclusive and affordable way, with a view to completely phase-out fossil fuels by 2040.
  • SPONGE LANDSCAPES - By 2030, we will have achieved our water, agriculture and nature goals through a single, coherent approach at catchment area level, in which strong regional coalitions collectively enhance the landscape's sponge capacity.

To make these transformations a reality, WORKROOM works shoulder to shoulder with pioneering designers, local authorities, organisations and businesses, governments, knowledge institutions and impact investors.

Through co-creative design, we imagine shared pathways to the future in exhibitions, publications, innovation programmes and public programmes. These are the workrooms where we connect the actors capable of realising these transformations. From there, we design shared ownership and the organisational, funding and policy models that lead to real change.

The name is simpler. The stakes are higher. WORKROOM is the shared space where we tackle the social and spatial transformations that no one can achieve alone. In an era of polarisation, compartmentalisation and instability, that is perhaps the most radical thing we can do.