Embodied Culture explores the cultural layers of the built environment across time, scale, and practice. The symposium brings together scholars, designers, and practitioners to reflect on how materials, labour, techniques, and regulations shape buildings, and how buildings in turn shape societies and landscapes.

News

• Registrations for the symposium and the guided visits are closed. We look forward to welcoming you in Brussels!
• We are currently exploring the possibility of offering a livestream of the symposium. However, as the technical feasibility has not yet been fully confirmed, we cannot guarantee at this stage that it will be available. Further information will follow as soon as possible.

Information for contributors

Each presentation is scheduled for 15 min. Please submit your presentation (in pdf or ppt) by Monday May 25, 12:00 CET.

Preliminary programme (update May 20)

DAY 1. Tuesday May 26

9.00 am: Registration

9.40 am: Welcome, by Stephanie Van de Voorde

10.00 am: Materials & Landscapes. Chaired by Mari Lending

10.00 am: “Anne Clifford’s Escorial” , by Tim Anstey

10.20 am: “Labour, Education and the Production of Agency in the Coalfield’s Architectural Infrastructures”, by Tabassum Ahmed

10.40 am: “Extractive Landscapes, Pipeline Cities: Material Traces of Bauxite Circulation”, by Alexandre Gaiser Fernandes

11.00 am: “Landscapes of Recovery: Material Flows, Ecological Afterlives, and Post-War Reconstruction in Ukraine”, by Liza Goncharenko

11.20 am: “Embodied Culture in Mid-20th-Century Building Materials: Reading across Sites and Practices”, by Stephanie Van de Voorde, Susan Ross and Jane Mah Hutton

11.40 pm: Discussion. Led by Eireen Schreurs and Chiara Pradel

12.00 pm: lunch

12.00 pm: exhibition “Between Two Lakes”, by Ulrika Karlsson and Cecilia Lundbäck

1.00 pm: Labour, Tools & Agency. Chaired by Linda Clarke

1.00 pm: “Producing Culture at the Building Site: Construction Labour and Visibility in China”, by Will Thomson

1.20 pm: “Earth at Work: Labour, Agency, and the Politics of Massification”, by Thomas Hollard

1.40 pm: “Beyond the Panel: The Embodied Politics of On-Site Prefabrication at the Cité des Bleuets”, by Antoine Perron

2.00 pm: “Mild Steel in the Monsoon: Nai Deng and the Embodied Labour of Siamese Infrastructure”, by Pinai Sirikiatikul and Tilo Amhoff

2.20 pm: “‘Preparing the way for the city’s day’: Analysing Foundational Labour in Windrush Literary Narratives”, by Jacob Moose

2.40 pm: Discussion. Led by Robby Fivez

3.00 pm: coffee break

3.20 pm: Cultural Techniques & Practices. Chaired by Lara Schrijver and Lionel Devlieger

3.20 pm: “Embodied calculations, or how to mix plaster correctly? On construction skills and migrant agency in Brussels”, by Elliott Papazahariakis

3.40 pm: “Wood and concrete in dialogue: Design habits and knowledge transfer in timber architecture”, by Mathilde Planchot

4.00 pm: “Winter Masonry as Cultural Technique: Climate, economy and knowledge in 19th century Norway”, by Bjørg Agasøster

4.20 pm: “Building Products as Weapon: Building labour and the work of architects in interwar Britain”, by Katie Lloyd Thomas

4.40 pm: Discussion. Led by Christoph Grafe

5.00 pm – 6.30 pm: Walking dinner

DAY 2. Wednesday May 27

9 am: Guided visits to WVDM Living Lab, VUB Braem building or USquare

10.00 am: Regulations & Bureaucracy, part 1. Chaired by Katie Lloyd Thomas

10.00 am: “From Treaties to Zoning: The Regulatory Production of Flood Risk in Toronto”, by Aaron Hernandez

10.20 am: “Regulating Mobility: Land Consolidation and Vernacular Architecture in 19th-Century Norway”, by Tora Lie Brunborg

10.40 am: “From afar. Extractive logics in architectural prescriptions”, by

11.00 am: “The Permanent Advisory Committee: material governance in Belgian public procurement“, by Karen Steukers, Lionel Devlieger and Stephanie Van de Voorde

11.20 am: coffee break

11.40 pm: Regulations & Bureaucracy, part 2. Chaired by Jean Souviron

11.40 pm: “Rethinking Obsolescence: the politics of housing repair in Shanghai”, by Yimei Zhang

12.00 pm: “Haunting the Legislation of architecture: The Concept of Trevnad”, by Ann-Kristin Kaplan Wikström

12.20 pm: “A Product of Compromise: Colonial Influence, Commercial Interests, and Local Traditions through Guangzhou’s Qilou Building Codes”, by Yangyi QI and Jia Ren

12.40 pm: Discussion. Led by Michaël Ghyoot

1:00 pm: Lunch

2 pm: Temporalities & Afterlives. Chaired by Tiphaine Abenia

2.00 pm: “Thoravej29: Materials Exceeding Circularity”, by Muhammad Salman Cassimally

2.20 pm: “The Value of the In-Between: Measuring Architectural Afterlives in Vacant Urban Land”, by Janhavi Hemant Patil, Vaishnavi Kini and Joshua D Lee

2.40 pm: “When Buildings Die Fast: The Obsolescence of the Mendes Caldeira Skyscraper”, by Artur Boligian

3.00 pm: “Industrial Pasts, Digital Futures: Architectural Mediation in the Temporality of Infrastructure”, by Zhengfeng Wang

3.20 pm: Discussion. Led by Pauline Lefebvre

3.40 pm: coffee break

4.00 pm: Material Traces & Metacultural Operations. Chaired by Stijn Cools

4.00 pm: “Relocating Spolia: How Embodied Cultural Value Shifts between Donor, Fragment, and Host”, by Judith Cools and Stephanie Van de Voorde

4.20 pm: “Concrete Spolia: historic continuity in precast concrete reuse”, by Helena Westerlind

4.40 pm: “The Afterlife of the Dutch Expo 58 Pavilions: Towards a New Urban Ensemble for Bunde“, by Joshua Kempen and Bie Plevoets

5.00 pm: ““Want to buy a monastery?” – Afterlives and histories of commodification of two Spanish monasteries in the U.S.”, by Louise Vanhee

5.20 pm: “Embodied Traces across the Reuse of Laminated Timber”, by Liese Van Holen, Ine Wouters and Stephanie Van de Voorde

5.40 pm: Discussion. Led by Thordis Arrhenius

6 pm: Closing, by Bie Plevoets (spokesperson of the scientific research network READ.ADAPT.REUSE)

Please note that this programme is still subject to change.

Practical information

Venue: Usquare.brussels (VUB–ULB), Hall AC, Avenue de la Couronne 227, 1050 Ixelles, Brussels, Belgium

Catering: Lunch will be provided on both days of the symposium. A walking dinner will be organised on 26 May.

Travel and accommodation: Participants are kindly asked to arrange their own travel and accommodation.

Guided Visits

Registrations for the guided visits are CLOSED.

On the morning of Wednesday 27 May, symposium participants will have the opportunity to join one of three guided visits at nearby sites that resonate closely with the themes of Embodied Culture. The visits offer a chance to explore buildings and projects in Brussels where questions of heritage, transformation, circularity and design are addressed in particularly tangible ways.

The three visits are:

• USquare (maximum 30 participants). Guided tour by BC architects (BC architects)
• WVDM Living Lab (maximum 15 participants). Guided tour by MAKER architecten (architecten bureau | MAKER Architecten | Belgium)
• Braem Building (VUB Rectorate) (maximum 15 participants). Guided tour by Korei Guided Tours (Interior visits and guided tours in Brussels - Korei)

All three sites are located within a 10-minute walk of the symposium venue. The visits will start at 9:00 on site and will end at 9:45, allowing participants to return in time for the continuation of the symposium programme at 10:00.

More information on the three visits and the guiding organisations can be found here.

Committees & Networks

The symposium is organised by VUB Architectural Engineering within the FWO Scientific Research Network READ.ADAPT.REUSE, the interdisciplinary project Re-Building Brussels (1695–2025) and the Excellence of Science-project Construction History, Above and Beyond.

Scientific Committee (in alphabetical order): Tiphaine Abenia, Thordis Arrhenius, Linda Clarke, Judith Cools, Stijn Cools, Alison Creba, Lionel Devlieger, Bert De Munck, Simon De Nys-Ketels, Robby Fivez, Michaël Ghyoot, Christoph Grafe, Jane Mah Hutton, Imane Huyghebaert, Pauline Lefebvre, Mari Lending, Katie Lloyd Thomas, Bie Plevoets, Chiara Pradel, Lara Reyniers, Mathias Rollot, Susan Ross, Eireen Schreurs, Lara Schrijver, Jean Souviron, Stephanie Van de Voorde, Liese Van Holen, Caroline Voet, Christine Wall      
Organising Committee: Stephanie Van de Voorde, Imane Huyghebaert, Judith Cools, Liese Van Holen (VUB Architectural Engineering)