IAAC Valldaura Labs Hosts Immersive Ecodesign Masters Program in Barcelona's Collserola Natural Park
10km from Barcelona the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia's Valldaura Labs comprises 140ha of forest where global student cohorts learn-by-living in a renovated farmhouse hosting digital fabrication tools alongside a carpentry, gardens and domestic/educational spaces. Practising sustainable forest management to harvest their own 0km lumber and produce cross-laminated timber with an on-site mill and press, students complete one circular self-sufficient prototype building each year.
Regional
Spain
Àrea Metropolitana de Barcelona (AMB)
Ajuntament de Barcelona (Barcelona)
Ajuntament de Cerdanyola del Vallès (Cerdanyola)
Consorci del Parc Natural de la Serra de Collserola (CNP)
It addresses urban-rural linkages
It refers to a physical transformation of the built environment (hard investment)
Yes
Horizon2020 / Horizon Europe
Valldaura Labs has benefited from a Horizon 2020 grant awarded for IAAC’s coordination of the 2017-2021 Robotics for Microfarms (ROMI) project: http://romi-project.eu/
Valldaura Labs has also benefited from multiple European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT) Urban Mobility group grants awarded for IAAC’s partnership in the Fast Urban Responses for New Inclusive Spaces & Habitats (FURNISH) project which has completed 3 editions in 2020, 2021 and 2022: https://furnish.tech/
Valldaura Labs has additionally benefited from an EIT Community New European Bauhaus grant awarded for IAAC’s coordination of the 2022 OPEN NATURE project: https://valldaura.net/open-nature/
No
Yes
As a representative of an organisation
Name of the organisation(s): Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia Valldaura Labs Type of organisation: University or another research institution First name of representative: Michael Last name of representative: Salka Gender: Male Nationality: United States Function: Technical Director of Valldaura Labs and Co-director of the Master in Advanced Ecological Buildings & Biocities Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Carretera BV-1415 (Horta-Cerdanyola), kilometer 7 Town: Barcelona Postal code: 08290 Country: Spain Direct Tel:+44 7736 086183 E-mail:michael.salka@iaac.net Website:https://valldaura.net/
The Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia’s (IAAC) Valldaura Labs (VL) is a uniquely holistic facility dedicated to the investigation of contemporary self-sufficiency. The innovative dimension of VL’s transdisciplinary approach integrates nature-based solutions and materials with advanced design and fabrication techniques to promote development of future buildings and cities contributing to the protection, restoration and regeneration of natural ecosystems and biodiversity. Each October since the first immersive Master in Advanced Ecological Buildings & Biocities (MAEBB) hosted at VL in 2018/19, a global cohort of 15-25 students has come to learn-by-living for one year in an historic farmhouse renovated to feature digital fabrication tools alongside a carpentry, gardens, greenhouses and domestic/educational spaces. Only 10km from Barcelona’s core, VL encompasses 140ha of forest surrounded by the 8,000ha Collserola Natural Park. This potent combination of amenities, expertise and environment enables VL to not only learn from, but also directly incorporate the forest ecology within its energetic and material metabolisms; MAEBB students operate entire nature-based value chains from sustainably harvesting their own fully-traceable 0km lumber processed with an on-site mobile sawmill and small cross-laminated timber (CLT) press through the implementation of one full-scale, circular, self-sufficient prototype building each year, plus public urban elements and landscape restorations. VL routinely practises participatory processes and multi-level engagement with diverse, multiscalar stakeholders such as municipalities, community groups, non-profits, industrial actors, startups, schools, and external research/innovation bodies to realise projects which convey a feeling or an experience of being part of nature and bring a change of perspective towards nature, furthering sustainability and inclusion as well as aesthetics and quality of experience for people.
Nature-based solutions and materials
Built environment
Material traceability
Carbon sequestration
Sustainable forest management
VL recognises the production and operation of the built environment as the primary source of global greenhouse gas emissions (40%). Accordingly VL accepts the key responsibility of designers, architects, engineers, construction industry actors and policymakers to make fundamental shifts in order to meet the projected demand for a worldwide doubling of built floor area by 2060, and renovate the existing building stock, to accommodate urban population growth in light of global climate change. VL acts upon this responsibility by educating emerging professionals through hands-on experience with designing and building for long-term carbon sequestration in durable bio-based materials, especially engineered timber, constituting high-performing structures which optimise passive and renewable energy flows in addition to cyclical water systems. VL develops tools and methods for tracing materials from their points of origin through all transportation/processing phases up to their uses in built structures, enabling quantification of embodied energy/carbon, and students engage with specialists in the harvest of locally-grown wood to gain appreciation for the criticality of sustainable forest management. VL also tacitly educates students by leveraging self-sufficient and circular infrastructures within its own campus: an on-site biomass plant provides heating;, rain and grey water are diverted/stored/repurposed; and the estates’ gardens produce food from seedlings sprouted in an on-site greenhouse irrigated with pumps powered by in-built photovoltaics. Students operate and maintain these functions, hence graduating with a comprehensive intellectual and practical skillset for re-entangling the built and natural environments. VL is exemplary in that, uniquely for Europe, it immerses forthcoming practitioners who will need to make environmentally-sound decisions about how to build in the very ecosystems and value chains which will substantiate and be impacted by those constructions.
Design can inspire a sense of belonging or communal ownership leading towards collective stewardship not only of the designed object itself, but also of the greater environment, by communicating the story of the material origins and the ecosystems from which they derive. VL’s built prototypes illustrate how VL is exemplary in this context. The Voxel: a Quarantine Cabin, a small cross-laminated timber dwelling designed and built by the MAEBB class of 2019/20, is completely composed of local trees harvested by those students. The Voxel pairs with an augmented reality application empowering visitors to scan engravings in the building elements and visualise the nearby locations from which the wood was sourced, plus information about the species, age, appearance, volume and amount of sequestered carbon. Users may then visit the site the tree was removed from and see how, thanks to the careful selection of individual specimens following principles of ecological succession, the forest is indeed more resilient and biodiverse due to that particular tree being used in the building. Other VL projects demonstrating how aesthetics and experience support the objective of reconnecting people with nature include: the Forest Lab for Observational Research and Analysis (FLORA), an engineered timber pavilion raised into the forest canopy offering opportunities to observe a typically concealed web of life; and multiple installations in various urban public spaces under the 3 editions (2020, 2021 and 2022) of the Fast Urban Responses for New and Inclusive Spaces & Habitats (FURNISH) project. All FURNISH elements designed and implemented by VL are made from local timber with features communicating their origins. By making previously vehicular spaces safer and comfortable for pedestrian use during COVID-19, or populating school entry/exit areas with beautiful amenities for play, performance and outdoor gathering, they also support enjoyment, health, wellbeing and a sense of community.
VL is exemplary in the context of inclusion due to the value assigned to and created in urban public spaces by VL projects. Of the 3 aforementioned editions of FURNISH, the first in 2020 oversaw implementations in 7 sites throughout 5 European countries using natural materials (mainly timber) processed with digital design techniques and fabrication technologies to produce modular, rapidly deployable urban elements making outdoor public spaces safer and more comfortable for use during COVID-19. Ranging from street furniture to traffic barriers, dining terraces, learning places and music amplification devices, these elements offered a wealth of social experiences to citizens unable to participate in indoor activities for fear of infection. VL designed and fabricated wooden terraces for open-air dining in Barcelona, and mentored the local design teams associated with installation sites in other nations. The second edition of FURNISH in 2021 featured VL installations for Barcelona’s Escola Entença, providing the underserved population of students aged 3-8 with nature-based elements for creative play, along with universally enjoyable sculptural elements. The third edition of FURNISH in 2022 featured an outdoor classroom, gathering and performance space realised by VL in collaboration with Barcelona’s Escola Provençals to serve young students aged 3-12 in addition to the pedestrian public of the highly trafficked area near the Glòries park. Still, VL is more uniquely exemplary in the context of inclusion due to value assigned to and created in periurban public spaces. VL’s EIT Community New European Bauhaus-funded Opening Public Edge Natures as Networks for Accessible Transitional Urban Re-connection and Education (OPEN NATURE) project completed in December of 2022 combined ecological restoration of a degraded transitional area at the border of Barcelona and the Collserola Park with new public amenities made of natural materials serving adjacent low-income residents.
Apart from the benefits of VL projects to public spaces and the citizens they serve introduced above, citizens and civil society are intimately engaged as co-creators. In the 2021 edition of FURNISH, a ‘cloud’ of wooden frames marking the Escola Entença entry/exit was designed as a system of small, lightweight modules which amalgamate into a larger form. This enabled the young students, along with their teachers, to actively participate in the assembly under supervision of VL researchers and the MAEBB cohort. Thus the installation transformed into a vibrant street festival piquing the curiosity of passersby. For the 2022 edition, VL researchers and MAEBB students engaged classes of 4th graders at Escola Provençals in co-design sessions with guided sketching activities. It was during these sessions that the desired functions of outdoor classroom, musical performance venue and gathering space were identified. Again the young students were able to participate in the installation due to the modular, lightweight, rapidly-assemblable and non-toxic character of the wooden components. OPEN NATURE also engaged young students from 4 urban schools in forest lessons and co-design building sessions at VL. Besides, repeat dialogue between VL’s MAEBB cohort and locals at meetings of the neighbourhood association abutting the project site served the dual purpose of garnering public support and informing the project with place-based knowledge, such as the history of a defunct ancestral fountain accordingly prioritised for renovation. OPEN NATURE’s installation likewise became a festival, with many community members who attended the meetings bringing friends and family to assist the construction, similarly optimised for accessibility through reliance on natural materials such as wood and earth. As with the aesthetic and experiential value of VL projects, the participatory co-creation processes foster a sense of belonging or communal ownership leading towards collective stewardship.
Locally, the Consortium of the Serra de Collserola Natural Park (CNP) managing the park in which VL is located engages in VL initiatives by: exceptionally permitting experimental prototype constructions within protected parklands; coordinating integration of sustainable forest management activities undertaken by VL within its 140ha estate with the broader plan for the park; and, as in OPEN NATURE, partnering directly to help realise VL-led actions. Local neighbourhood associations and schools are also engaged stakeholders as described prior. Regionally, VL partners with the City Council of Cerdanyola del Vàlles, for instance on the development of a fab lab built of local timber; with the City Council of Barcelona for urban public space improvements such as under FURNISH or OPEN NATURE; and with the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona (AMB), for instance on upscaling regional engineered-timber value chains or transition pathways towards biocities. Nationally, VL partners with the Spanish Ministry of Transportation, Mobility and the Urban Agenda and the Higher Council of the Colleges of Architects of Spain to lead a network of stakeholders (Mass Madera) committed to growing the country’s engineered timber industry. At the European level, VL engages with the European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT), the New European Bauhaus and Horizon 2020/Europe through projects with international partners and implementations, like FURNISH 2020, and Robotics for Microfarms (ROMI, 2017-2021). Additional international partners include Built by Nature, a core funder of Mass Madera, Bauhaus Earth and the European Forest Institute (EFI), with which close working relationships have resulted, amongst other achievements, in collaboratively authored texts such as The Re-engtanglement Charter, the Barcelona Protocol and the Green Book of Biocities. Finally, since the MAEBB programme facilitated by VL is taught in English, student cohorts generally represent 10-20 different nationalities.
VL inherently integrates ecology, biology, forestry, agriculture, design, fabrication, technology, social science and architecture and planning. In real terms, specialists from the CNP inform and approve the sustainable forest management actions undertaken by VL within its 140ha property which supply the round wood processed by VL at on-site facilities for use in architectural and urban prototypes. As indicated, the CNP’s forestry specialists, supported by external ecology and biology experts invited by VL, also add value to the education of MAEBB students by communicating the relation between sustainable forest management and the provision of resources for the built environment. These ecology and biology specialists, alongside internal agriculturalists, add further value to the MAEBB curriculum by communicating how architecture can promote biodiversity and plant growth, demonstrated within the VL gardens which MAEBB students maintain and partly subsist from. Within the remit of IAAC, specialists in computational design and digital fabrication technologies add value to the education of MAEBB students by communicating how architectural and urban designs can achieve greater complexity and performance through parametric responsiveness, the integration of sensors/actuators and information systems, and automated fabrication processes enabling mass customisation, rapid deployability and easy disassembly and reuse. It must also be noted that architecture is itself multidisciplinary. VL’s MAEBB students receive instruction formatted as intensive workshops from local, national and international specialists in cyclical waste and water systems, renewable energy systems, passive heating/cooling strategies and nature-based material science and structures in order to develop holistically self-sufficient building designs. Other IAAC staff and researchers instruct the MAEBB students with regards to participatory processes, such that their designs can be co-created with end users.
Beyond the progressive merger of disciplines, VL is extremely innovative compared to mainstream architectural and urban design education due to the uniquely immersive learning-by-living character of the MAEBB programme. Since the majority of MAEBB students reside at VL for the duration of the year-long course, and because the curriculum is profoundly enmeshed with the local ecosystem via sustainable forest management practices, forest product extraction/processing and planting/gardening, MAEBB students graduate with an unsurpassed understanding of the role of nature and place in shaping the built environment. Moreover, MAEBB students benefit immeasurably from sustained immersion within a global community of peers. Outside class hours, the cohort routinely celebrates Diwali, Thanksgiving, Christmas, the Lunar New Year, Eid and the festival of Sant Jordi to name a few. The emphasis VL places on learning-by-doing through the design, fabrication and construction of a full-scale, fully-functional prototype building each year is also an innovative aspect unmatched by other architectural masters programmes. The experience of designing and installing not only physical structures and façades but also electrical, water and waste systems forces consideration of buildings as organisms with material and energetic metabolisms that must be balanced. Innovation is also represented by the combination of nature-based solutions and natural materials with computational design and digital fabrication tools, generating a truly contemporary vision of self-sufficiency.
Because both urbanisation and climate change are global phenomena, the underpinning strategies for environmental responsiveness in architectural and urban design, production and operation taught by VL are adaptable to any point on the earth, though the local environments to which they respond will naturally vary. After the MAEBB programme, many students return to their respective countries, thereby transferring the knowledge gained at VL and embarking on the process of adapting that knowledge to the local ecosystem as professionals. Still, the core pedagogical practice of learning from the local ecosystem to improve the built environment through engaging students with ecologists, biologists and agriculturalists via actual maintenance and extraction of resources from those ecosystems certainly could and should be replicated in other contexts, and would bear quite distinct results. In addition to the transferable techniques and practices promoted by VL, all VL prototypes are documented in open-source formats and made freely available, such that they may be recreated or adapted by anyone anywhere with access to basic natural materials and fab lab tools. To expand the scope of potential transfer and replication, VL has produced two feature-length documentaries presented at international film festivals.
Whilst VL engages in numerous external initiatives, VL’s methodology is most legible in the MAEBB programme. In fact, the MAEBB comprises 2 successive programmes: the MAEBB01 is a post-professional, 90-credit, full-time, 11-month immersive experience of learning-by-living at VL; whereas the MAEBB02 is an optional 6-month extension during which students develop an independent research project with the instruction and supervision of VL staff and access to VL facilities, while living in the city of Barcelona. Both are under the umbrella of IAAC, and formally accredited by the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC). Within the MAEBB01 there are 3 successive modules. The first, an introduction to self-sufficiency, provides theoretical courses and practical training in: ecological interactions and agroecology; ecological thinking; sustainable forest management; parametric design; advanced digital tools; and media production and visualisation supported by supplementary lectures and conferences with leading thinkers and actors in the field. The second, an intensive building design studio sequence, covers: thermodynamic fabrications; ecosystemic structures; metabolic building systems (energy, water/waste and information); resilient envelopes; and the synthesis of all of the above to design and document a holistically self-sufficient, large-scale urban building supported by supplementary lectures and conferences. The third, prototype construction, addresses: material production; design development; prototyping strategies; and ultimately the collaborative construction of a full-scale, fully-functional, self-sufficient prototype building. Other opportunities for rapidly realised real-world implementations leveraging participatory processes are also provided over the course of the programme through partnerships with the EIT, New European Bauhaus and local stakeholders as expressed previously.
VL directly addresses the global challenges of mass urbanisation, climate change, natural resource depletion, biodiversity loss and environmental pollution by providing local solutions in the form of specifically environmentally adapted architectural, urban and ecological implementations made of locally-sourced natural materials and engaging various local stakeholders in co-creation processes. The self-sufficient building prototypes realised by VL not only mitigate global warming by generating all of their own energy through integrated renewables (mainly photovoltaics) but also proactively combat global warming by sequestering substantial amounts of carbon in durable building components. Some of these prototypes mitigate the conversion of land for urbanisation or agricultural use and resultant biodiversity loss by relocating disrupted ecologies to the rooftops or producing food for their inhabitants. In all cases, the trees constituting the structures are individually selected with ecology and forestry experts to encourage and accelerate the sustainable succession of the recently replanted forest towards a more resilient, biodiverse phase of maturity. Environmental pollution is also mitigated through design for disassembly and reuse. The urban elements realised by VL mitigate air, noise and runoff pollution and the inefficient allocation of urban space and resources by promoting increased pedestrianism with public spaces enlivened by accessible, attractive, useful amenities for occupation which incentivise mobility habits that support health and wellbeing. The places for communal activity created along with the participatory processes involved also foster social cohesion, mitigating urban alienation. The ecological restorations realised by VL empower the public to enjoy natural sites thanks to the introduction of occupiable infrastructures, while immediately repairing these natural spaces such that they develop resiliency and provide robust ecosystem services.
Between IAAC’s acquisition in 2008 and 2014 the VL property underwent extensive renovations. From 2014-2018, VL incubated ecotech startups and headquartered the Horizon 2020 ROMI project. In 2018, VL gained an enduring community with the MAEBB, now midway through its 5th edition. Since, VL has constructed 4 fully-functional, self-sufficient prototype buildings made of 0km timber: the Niu Haus (2019), Voxel (2020), Solar Greenhouse (2021) and FLORA (2022). All combine natural materials with digital design/fabrication and off-grid systems to demonstrate an advanced ecological future for the built environment and achieve priceless experiential benefits for the ~100 students involved. In recognition, they’ve been published by the New York Times (2020) and awarded by Bee Breeders (2019), Design That Educates (2019 and 2020) and Monocle (2021). These stand beside academic journal publications by VL’s directorate (2021, 2022). In the city of Barcelona, VL completed urban public space and periurban ecological restoration projects funded by EIT Urban Mobility (2020, 2021 and 2022) and EIT Community New European Bauhaus (2022), with benefits for the involved students as well as citizen end-users. Nationally, VL launched the Mass Madera network (2022) gathering value chain stakeholders to promote growth of the Spanish timber building industry. In the international sphere, VL oversaw EIT-funded public space improvements abroad (2020) and collaborated with EFI to manage events for Barcelona’s role as European Forest City of 2022, including the first conference on biocities welcoming world-leading climate scientists, forest engineers, ecologists and built environment practitioners (2022). In the year ahead, while expanding the MAEBB, VL will nurture national and international partnerships towards securing funding for a Horizon Europe project addressing timber-based decarbonisation pathways for renovating the built environment, resulting in globally-impactful innovation actions.
VL contributes precisely to the development of new competencies as explicated by the European competence framework on sustainability. The future-forward projects of VL and the MAEBB embody sustainability values by valuing ecosystem services and natural materials and promoting the resilience of the environments which provision them, as well as supporting fairness through universal access to wholesome public natural and urban amenities. They also embrace complexity in sustainability by leveraging an iterative design process to frame problems, often through the engagement of end-users, critically think about how natural systems can provide solutions, and in turn consider up-front the impacts those solutions will have on natural systems. MAEBB students are empowered by VL to act upon their individual initiative for sustainable ends and achieve scalable results through collective actions with their peers and mentors as well as external partners, while engagement of end-users empowers acting for sustainability through self-determining political agency regarding the character of communal urban and periurban assets.
