SUMMARY BEYOND URBAN PROJECTS
Lesson 1 – Beyond Urban Projects: Urban Projects as a
Framework
The course Beyond Urban Projects approaches the urban project as a complex and
strategic design practice situated at the intersection of architecture, urbanism, and
societal processes. The course is theoretical in nature and addresses master’s students in
architecture and urban design, aiming to provide insight into how urban projects are
conceived, analysed, and implemented within complex urban contexts. Urban projects are
not understood as isolated architectural objects, but as multi-scalar interventions
embedded in existing spatial, social, cultural, political, and economic structures.
An urban project is defined as a spatial intervention characterised by a high degree of
complexity in terms of programme, users, temporal layers, and contextual relationships.
Such projects are inherently multi-actor processes involving various stakeholders and
requiring participation, co-production, and transdisciplinary collaboration. The design
process acknowledges both formal and informal uses of space and never starts from a
tabula rasa, but always from an existing context.
The theoretical framework of the course is rooted in postmodern and contemporary urban
thinking that rejects modernist, top-down planning models. Whereas modernist urbanism
was often large-scale and functionally segregated, the urban project emphasises
historical continuity, urban morphology, and existing spatial structures. In this
perspective, “urban” is no longer defined as a geographic location but as a condition:
urbanity refers to a mode of spatial use, experience, and meaning-making that can
occur beyond the traditional city.
A key conceptual distinction is made between urban form and urban process. Urban
form refers to the physical city, buildings, public space, materiality, and morphology as
carriers of collective use and meaning. Urban process describes the city as a dynamic
system shaped by time, users, social change, infrastructure, and economic forces. Urban
projects operate at the intersection of form and process: they structure space while
simultaneously enabling and influencing processes they cannot fully control.
Methodologically, mapping as an attitude plays a central role. Mapping is understood as
an active design approach that combines analysis and projection and aligns with the
principle of research by design. Through mapping, spatial relations, temporal layers,
patterns of use, and latent potentials become visible, allowing strategic decisions and
scenarios to be spatially tested. Design thus functions as a research tool rather than
merely an end product.
Urban projects always operate across multiple scales and pursue a clear strategic
ambition: limited interventions are intended to generate structural effects on their
surroundings. While they possess a degree of autonomy, they remain embedded in
broader urban and societal systems. Their strength lies in connectivity, the creation of
nodes, and the introduction of spatial and programmatic complexity. Participation and
public–private collaboration are essential to ensure both quality and feasibility.
Sustainability is critically framed as building only what is necessary, with minimal use of
material and energy. Urban projects must not only be designed but also realized and
embedded in urban policy. Ultimately, the course stresses that urban space is inherently
ambiguous, dynamic, and unfinished. Urban projects must engage with uncertainty,
,emergence, and conflict, acknowledging urbanity as a human, cultural, and socio-spatial
condition in constant transformation.
The Urban Project, updated: working definition:
1. You never start from scratch, there is a context to work with
2. Multi-scalar approach
3. Strategic mission/ambition: impact on surrounding context (minimum intervention,
maximum impact?): clear priorities / focus
4. Certain status of autonomy, within a bigger system
5. Adding complexity and multiple stakeholders, uses/users, complementary nature
6. Strong social, cultural and economic and political engagement with its environment
7. Making process seeks trans-disciplinarity and based on co-authorship
8. Urban refers to a condition, not a geographic location, and needs to be coined by
multiple definitions from a broader perspective than the original Western point of view.
9. There needs to be a context-specific balance between emergent and planned
interventions
10. Critical Sustainability: you build only what is necessary with a minimum of materials
and energy
, Lesson 2 – Multiple Translations: Why Scale Matters
The second lesson of Beyond Urban Projects focuses on the role of scale and scale
translations in urban projects. It reaffirms that urban projects never start from scratch but
always build upon existing contexts while operating simultaneously across multiple
scales. Urban projects are strategic interventions in which relatively small actions can
have large territorial, social, and economic impacts. They function with a certain
autonomy within broader urban, political, and economic systems, introduce complexity by
involving multiple actors and users, and are deeply embedded in social, cultural, and
institutional contexts. Their production is transdisciplinary and based on co-authorship,
balancing planned strategies with emergent processes. Sustainability is understood as
building only what is necessary, using minimal resources.
Scale is presented not as a technical measure, but as a fundamental spatial and social
principle that shapes how urban space is organised, perceived, and experienced.
Historically, cities have operated under different scale regimes. Medieval cities were
based on bodily scale and proximity, with streets functioning as spaces of encounter.
During the Renaissance, scale became scenographic, structured by perspective, axes,
and representation, turning the city into an urban stage. In modernity, mobility,
particularly the automobile, became dominant, transforming urban space into circulation
space and reducing human-scale interaction. Françoise Choay describes this evolution as
a process of simultaneous concentration and dispersion, leading to the erosion of
traditional urbanity.
Contemporary urbanisation introduces an additional, largely invisible scale:
technological and networked space. Digital infrastructure, connectivity, and accessibility
redefine proximity and distance, increasingly shaping urban growth and success. Urbanity
thus becomes less dependent on physical closeness and more on network logic.
The lesson criticises linear and hierarchical scale models that separate micro-, meso-, and
macro-scales. Instead, it proposes a relational, simultaneous, and multiscalar
understanding in which scales are interconnected and socially produced. Scale is
understood as a manifestation of power relations, economic processes, and institutional
frameworks, drawing on the work of theorists such as Secchi, Brenner, Çağlar, and Glick
Schiller.
Urbanisation is shown to extend beyond the city as a bounded territory, encompassing
regional, national, and global networks of infrastructure, logistics, mobility, energy,
finance, and governance. Local interventions are always embedded in these larger
systems. Cultural practices, consumption patterns, and everyday activities also operate
across scales, linking local identity to global processes.
At the same time, the lesson highlights the transformative potential of small-scale and
local initiatives. Neighbourhood projects and grassroots actions can act as catalysts for
broader urban change and are essential for inclusive and long-term urban strategies.
The lesson concludes with the World Trade Center as a case illustrating extreme
multiscalarity. The WTC functioned simultaneously as an architectural object, urban node,
economic engine, and geopolitical symbol. Its history and reconstruction demonstrate
Lesson 1 – Beyond Urban Projects: Urban Projects as a
Framework
The course Beyond Urban Projects approaches the urban project as a complex and
strategic design practice situated at the intersection of architecture, urbanism, and
societal processes. The course is theoretical in nature and addresses master’s students in
architecture and urban design, aiming to provide insight into how urban projects are
conceived, analysed, and implemented within complex urban contexts. Urban projects are
not understood as isolated architectural objects, but as multi-scalar interventions
embedded in existing spatial, social, cultural, political, and economic structures.
An urban project is defined as a spatial intervention characterised by a high degree of
complexity in terms of programme, users, temporal layers, and contextual relationships.
Such projects are inherently multi-actor processes involving various stakeholders and
requiring participation, co-production, and transdisciplinary collaboration. The design
process acknowledges both formal and informal uses of space and never starts from a
tabula rasa, but always from an existing context.
The theoretical framework of the course is rooted in postmodern and contemporary urban
thinking that rejects modernist, top-down planning models. Whereas modernist urbanism
was often large-scale and functionally segregated, the urban project emphasises
historical continuity, urban morphology, and existing spatial structures. In this
perspective, “urban” is no longer defined as a geographic location but as a condition:
urbanity refers to a mode of spatial use, experience, and meaning-making that can
occur beyond the traditional city.
A key conceptual distinction is made between urban form and urban process. Urban
form refers to the physical city, buildings, public space, materiality, and morphology as
carriers of collective use and meaning. Urban process describes the city as a dynamic
system shaped by time, users, social change, infrastructure, and economic forces. Urban
projects operate at the intersection of form and process: they structure space while
simultaneously enabling and influencing processes they cannot fully control.
Methodologically, mapping as an attitude plays a central role. Mapping is understood as
an active design approach that combines analysis and projection and aligns with the
principle of research by design. Through mapping, spatial relations, temporal layers,
patterns of use, and latent potentials become visible, allowing strategic decisions and
scenarios to be spatially tested. Design thus functions as a research tool rather than
merely an end product.
Urban projects always operate across multiple scales and pursue a clear strategic
ambition: limited interventions are intended to generate structural effects on their
surroundings. While they possess a degree of autonomy, they remain embedded in
broader urban and societal systems. Their strength lies in connectivity, the creation of
nodes, and the introduction of spatial and programmatic complexity. Participation and
public–private collaboration are essential to ensure both quality and feasibility.
Sustainability is critically framed as building only what is necessary, with minimal use of
material and energy. Urban projects must not only be designed but also realized and
embedded in urban policy. Ultimately, the course stresses that urban space is inherently
ambiguous, dynamic, and unfinished. Urban projects must engage with uncertainty,
,emergence, and conflict, acknowledging urbanity as a human, cultural, and socio-spatial
condition in constant transformation.
The Urban Project, updated: working definition:
1. You never start from scratch, there is a context to work with
2. Multi-scalar approach
3. Strategic mission/ambition: impact on surrounding context (minimum intervention,
maximum impact?): clear priorities / focus
4. Certain status of autonomy, within a bigger system
5. Adding complexity and multiple stakeholders, uses/users, complementary nature
6. Strong social, cultural and economic and political engagement with its environment
7. Making process seeks trans-disciplinarity and based on co-authorship
8. Urban refers to a condition, not a geographic location, and needs to be coined by
multiple definitions from a broader perspective than the original Western point of view.
9. There needs to be a context-specific balance between emergent and planned
interventions
10. Critical Sustainability: you build only what is necessary with a minimum of materials
and energy
, Lesson 2 – Multiple Translations: Why Scale Matters
The second lesson of Beyond Urban Projects focuses on the role of scale and scale
translations in urban projects. It reaffirms that urban projects never start from scratch but
always build upon existing contexts while operating simultaneously across multiple
scales. Urban projects are strategic interventions in which relatively small actions can
have large territorial, social, and economic impacts. They function with a certain
autonomy within broader urban, political, and economic systems, introduce complexity by
involving multiple actors and users, and are deeply embedded in social, cultural, and
institutional contexts. Their production is transdisciplinary and based on co-authorship,
balancing planned strategies with emergent processes. Sustainability is understood as
building only what is necessary, using minimal resources.
Scale is presented not as a technical measure, but as a fundamental spatial and social
principle that shapes how urban space is organised, perceived, and experienced.
Historically, cities have operated under different scale regimes. Medieval cities were
based on bodily scale and proximity, with streets functioning as spaces of encounter.
During the Renaissance, scale became scenographic, structured by perspective, axes,
and representation, turning the city into an urban stage. In modernity, mobility,
particularly the automobile, became dominant, transforming urban space into circulation
space and reducing human-scale interaction. Françoise Choay describes this evolution as
a process of simultaneous concentration and dispersion, leading to the erosion of
traditional urbanity.
Contemporary urbanisation introduces an additional, largely invisible scale:
technological and networked space. Digital infrastructure, connectivity, and accessibility
redefine proximity and distance, increasingly shaping urban growth and success. Urbanity
thus becomes less dependent on physical closeness and more on network logic.
The lesson criticises linear and hierarchical scale models that separate micro-, meso-, and
macro-scales. Instead, it proposes a relational, simultaneous, and multiscalar
understanding in which scales are interconnected and socially produced. Scale is
understood as a manifestation of power relations, economic processes, and institutional
frameworks, drawing on the work of theorists such as Secchi, Brenner, Çağlar, and Glick
Schiller.
Urbanisation is shown to extend beyond the city as a bounded territory, encompassing
regional, national, and global networks of infrastructure, logistics, mobility, energy,
finance, and governance. Local interventions are always embedded in these larger
systems. Cultural practices, consumption patterns, and everyday activities also operate
across scales, linking local identity to global processes.
At the same time, the lesson highlights the transformative potential of small-scale and
local initiatives. Neighbourhood projects and grassroots actions can act as catalysts for
broader urban change and are essential for inclusive and long-term urban strategies.
The lesson concludes with the World Trade Center as a case illustrating extreme
multiscalarity. The WTC functioned simultaneously as an architectural object, urban node,
economic engine, and geopolitical symbol. Its history and reconstruction demonstrate
