8/1/26 18:00 Amphitheatre
Extended Urbanization and the Struggle for Centrality
Prof. Christian Schmid
Thursday 18/12, 14.00
Amphitheater and ONLINE
One of the most important aspects of the contemporary planetary urban condition is the shifting dialectics of centers and peripheries: While processes of extended urbanization have an inherent tendency towards peripheralization, the evacuation of social energies, the loss of population and jobs, and the homogenization and reduction of social wealth, they also open up possibilities for the development of new connections and centralities. As a result, a complex urban topography emerges, characterized by the simultaneity of processes of peripheralization and centralization.
While the theorization of center-periphery relationships has a long history and was extensively discussed in the 1960s and 1970s in the context of the debate on the capitalist world system and dependency theory, the concept of peripheralization was only recently applied in wider contexts. It shifts the focus from a structural analysis of center-periphery relations towards a dynamic conceptualization, that is inspired by Lefebvre’s call for a right to centrality. It implies the struggle for the creation, maintenance, and defense of popular centralities created by the people.
Prof Dr. Christian Schmid is a Swiss geographer, sociologist, and urban theorist, and Professor of Sociology at the Department of Architecture of ETH Zurich. His work focuses on the theory and analysis of contemporary urbanization processes, with particular emphasis on planetary urbanization, extended urbanisation, comparative urban research, and the production of space. Strongly influenced by the work of Henri Lefebvre, Schmid has made important contributions to debates on centrality, peripheralization, and the transformation of urban–rural relations beyond the traditional city. He is one of the key contributors to the theorization of extended urbanisation, most notably through the co-edited volume Extended Urbanisation: Territories, Urbanisation and Social Transformations, which has become a central reference in critical urban studies. Schmid has led and participated in numerous international and comparative research projects examining metropolitan regions and urbanization processes across Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas. He is a member of the International Network for Urban Research and Action (INURA) and has published extensively in leading academic journals and edited volumes, including Vocabularies for an Urbanising Planet: Theory Building through Comparison. He is widely recognized as a central figure in contemporary critical and comparative urban theory.
In the framework of the course EKTOS POLIS: Researching the Urban Otherwise - Wanderings across Extended Urbanisation
Observatory of the Countryside
tutor: Metaxia Markaki
For online attendance contact memarkaki@uth.gr
See the poster here.
Within the framework of the course Theories and Strategies of Reuse (Architecture Theory) of the Master's Degree in Reuse of Buildings and Complexes, the online workshop "Community-Driven Adaptive Reuse" will take place on Thursday 18/01/2025 at 16:00 [UTC+3].
Description of the Conference
Community-driven initiatives are key-factors in salvaging, protecting, disseminating and reusing abandoned and heritage buildings. They manifest a collective and individual desire that often is against official practices implemented by administrations because they are grounded on the needs of neighbourhoods and their inhabitants. Adaptive reuse is thus intended as a spatial agency where individuals, communities, or design professionals actively shape, influence, and redefine spaces beyond conventional, top-down architectural interventions. The conference aims to bring together non-governmental organizations, academics and urban activists that had worked independently on in collaboration with institutions, in community-driven initiatives in Greece.
As part of the course Contemporary Architecture in Old Buildings and sets of the Master's Degree in Reuse of Buildings and Sets, on Thursday 11/12/2025 at 16:00 [UTC+3] the online presentation by Sally Stone, Manchester School of Architecture, entitled “The Future of the Already Built” will take place.
Bio
Sally Stone studied furniture design and then interior design in Manchester. She then worked in architectural practice for a decade before entering academia initially at the University of Cardiff. She received her Doctorate from the University of Westminster. Professor Stone leads the MA Architecture and Adaptive Reuse programme at the Manchester School of Architecture, and her research lies within the areas of interiors, building reuse, and pedagogy. Her recent publications include: Notes Towards a Definition of Adaptive Reuse (2023), UnDoing Buildings (2019), ReReadings Volumes 1+2 (2018, 2004), Inside Information (2022), and Emerging Practices in Pedagogy (2021). She is the 2022 Visiting Professor at IUAV Venice, and the 2025 Visiting Professor at Berlin International University
Summary
For such a long established and deeply entrenched subject, adaptive reuse has a remarkably short history. It is a practice that stretches back to almost the first constructed buildings themselves - for structures have perpetually been altered to accommodate the needs of their different occupants, and yet it has continually lacked the recognition of new-build architecture. However, this century has seen a significant interest in the adaptive reuse of existing buildings, and it is at last beginning to be seen as a professionally relevant and creative way of developing the built environment. This talk will discuss the evolution of adaptive reuse into the force that it assumes today.
SKG Makers by Greek Eco Project
Avgi Metaxa
Wednesday 10th of December 2025 | 18:30-20:00 [Online]
Learning with the Sea
Nancy Couling
Thursday 27/11, 14.00
Hall D and online
Our previous work reveals that we know little about the ocean although it lies directly in front of us, surrounds us, we hear its soundscape and observe its surface. Human–Ocean relations are today characterised by different forms of Ocean Blindness –from lack of knowledge or the dominance of complex science to persistent perception of the ocean as an empty surface or the ruthless exploitation of marine resources with disregard for the ecological consequences.
In collaboration with the art triennale Bergen Assembly (2025) we have explored what a reversed perspective from and with the sea–can teach us about these relations, the more-than-human oceanic world and different systems of inherent oceanic intelligence. Learning with the Sea may require unconventional research methods and produce challenging outcomes.
Nancy Couling is an Associate Professor at the Bergen School of Architecture in Norway. She is also a Senior Researcher & Coordinator MAS in Urban & Territorial Design, ETH Zurich, Switzerland. She was a workshop expert on the urbanization of the oceans at the 5th Holcim Forum 2016 dedicated to “Infrastructure Space”. Nancy Couling completed a Marie Curie Post-Doc Fellowship at the TU Delft with the research project OceanUrb- the unseen spaces of extended urbanisation in the North Sea. Her special field of interest is the entanglement of urbanisation processes with liquid spaces and she is part of the research group “Territories of Extended Urbanisation” led by Christian Schmid & Milica Topalovic, Future Cities Laboratory 2, ETH Singapore. She previously taught and practiced in Auckland, NZ, Hong Kong, Melbourne, Venice & Berlin where she co-founded & -directed the practice cet-0/cet-01 until 2010. She co-edited the prize-winning Barents Lessons- Teaching & Research in Architecture (2012) with Harry Gugger, Aurélie Blanchard & Ludovic Balland Typography Cabinet Basel, and The Urbanisation of the Sea (forthcoming 2020) with Carola Hein, and continues to exhibit, publish and lecture internationally. She formed the interdisciplinary partnership cet-0 in Berlin in 2005, (2005-2010 cet-01) focusing on urban design, and also taught in the Department of Urban Design at Technische Universität Berlin (TU Berlin). She is the author of Barents Lessons: Teaching and Research in Architecture with Harry Gugger and Aurelie Blanchard (Park Books, 2013).
In the framework of the course EKTOS POLIS: Researching the Urban Otherwise - Wanderings across Extended Urbanisation
Observatory of the Countryside
tutor: Metaxia Markaki
For online attendance contact memarkaki@uth.gr
See the poster here.