Toward a Resilient Water Landscape Without Borders – News – Architecture Workroom Brussels

Water doesn’t stop at the border! In addition to climate challenges, river basins in border regions also face the associated complexities of national borders. So how do we collectively take responsibility in precisely those regions where agreements and rules, data and models differ? Not by continuing to think in terms of self-interest, but by establishing the framework for long-term cooperation through a cross-border coalition at the river basin level.

Since autumn 2025, as part of the JCAR ATRACE project, we have been conducting a study into cross-border area coalitions in the river basins of the Flemish-Dutch border regions: the Dommel, the Mark-Aa-Weerijs, the Voer-Berwijn, the Geul, the Jeker, the Abeek-Uffelsebeek Complex and the Ghent Canals-Creeks-Polders. Together with regional stakeholders such as water boards, provinces, regional landscape organisations, knowledge institutions and research centres, we are mapping out the challenges and existing initiatives.

A great deal of existing energy is emerging from the many cross-border collaborations, projects and consultative bodies. How can we use this energy to work towards a shared overview, joint goal-setting and, ultimately, co-investment for implementation at river basin scale? To address this question, we brought together water managers and local project leaders for each river basin along the entire border during the ‘Borderless Resilient Waterland’ Workshop Day on 25 March. There is a strong willingness for cross-border cooperation, and with the new Blue Deal, the formulation of water security goals across Flanders and the recent call for a Local Blue Deal, there is certainly more momentum than ever on the Flemish side to press ahead with this. The starting signal has been given; we are ready for the next steps!

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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.