How can cities follow the principles of natural ecosystems to promote life? What kind of materials and buildings should constitute these future “BioCities”, and how can we make them a reality? These are vital challenges, given the built environment is currently responsible for 40% of greenhouse gas emissions, 40% of material use, 30% of energy consumption, and 20% of solid waste generation worldwide.

This talk will review the work of the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia’s (IAAC) Valldaura Labs, where students of the immersive Master in Advanced Ecological Buildings & BioCities (MAEBB) gain the capacity to answer these crucial questions through “learn by living” in an historic farmhouse estate renovated to feature both digital and manual carpentry workshops, which enable them to design and build cutting-edge prototype structures and co-created public spaces, from forest to fabrication, in collaboration with world-leading experts.

Example projects include, to name but a few: a mobile engineered timber home and event space held together without any glue or metal; a chapel for a robot with a branching canopy roof; a 10-point manifesto on how urban systems can mimic ecosystems; an ephemeral cloud over a prison-turned-school assembled by children during a street party; and the European Union’s flagship platform for upskilling and reskilling the entire construction sector to achieve a carbon-neutral, sustainable, beautiful, and inclusive built environment inspired by the Bauhaus.