Architectural Democracy

What is Architectural Democracy

We either sleepwalk our way to automated democracy and isolation or we develop tools for us to plan cities and communities for the kind of people we want to become.

Architectural Democracy started as an academic research in Finland 10 years ago. The term was coined by Pedro Aibéo, proposing a framework of the relationships between architecture and democracy for all stakeholders to better understand the complexity of cities and thus to participate more actively in the planning decisions that affect their lives.

Based on growing interest, active affiliations globally, and a track record of collaborations, Architectural Democracy is now considered a nascent movement, an informal academic discipline, encompassing service architecture and has its own developments. Aibéo & team provide leadership, but by no means is there a centralised doctrine.

The purpose of Architectural Democracy

The purpose of Architectural Democracy is to improve resident well being and economic outcomes from both new build and regeneration projects. An adjacent purpose is to reduce social and economic risk for planners and developers. To achieve this we identify for residents the problem of passivity and isolation, and identify directions for constructive engagement that informs planners, developers and other decision-makers.

Non-ideological approach

Architectural Democracy is not ideological. Informed participation is more effective if ideological constraints are avoided and a better balance of decision-making is pursued. This will reflect needs as well as aspirations, and will result in higher wellbeing, economic efficiency, sustainability, etc.

The challenge

Just as people and institutions in a controlled society don’t know how a democracy works and responds to citizen input, both residents and city planners have imperfect models of participation. We simply do not know how to interact. Architectural Democracy has experience in research, gamification and other forms of engagement.

The core: bigger ideas and collaborations

Aibéo and two other partners, Mark Linder and Stefan Gustafsson, constitute a design collective to create ideas for larger collaborations, provide storytelling, stakeholder engagement and advocacy expertise. Architectural Democracy has secured academic, foundation sponsorships, and prestigious invitations. Although we are asked to provide services, the ArcDem team has not settled on a business model. Our current focus is building ArcDem’s convening power to create new and more significant collaborations.

Portfolio

Facade Opener

Strip out buildings' facades

Many cities face the danger of disneyfication, keeping the historical facade but the insides are destroyed to make new modern apartments or hotels. This destroys our heritage and the best part of our architecture. Legislation is not allowing enough flexibility to promote cheaper renovation prices. We decided to take action and make a tool where everyone, with their phones, can open up their buildings in 3D via photogrammetry.

Urban Decision Machine

A tool to understand your city

Are decision-makers properly influenced
by the input of informed residents on sustainability agendas?

Consider the possibility of a non-ideological, gamified platform to inform and gather public opinion. The Urban Decision Machine is a tool to understand your city and find the best path collectively.

Develloped for the Venice Biennale 2020 (premiere postponed for 2021) together with Metsä Wood and Accenture.

Architecture By Kids

City of Doha by Kids

We were invited by the Qatar Foundation to showcase our work at the WISE Conference in Qatar in 2019. We decided to bring in a hands live model show done by local school kids.

Kids used their memory, and their imagination to rebuild Doha in 10 modules of the map with wooden blocks representing buildings.

Critical design thinking and tools are fundamental to acquire in early stages of life, specially in young world economies of the middle-east where such a tradition is still much dependant on expats and not on locals.

Team

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Pedro Aibéo

Aibéo is an internationally awarded Architect (MSc) and Civil Engineer (MSc) with over 50 buildings built in 18 countries. He is also a Vis. Ass. Prof. at UNAM University, Mexico and at Wuhan University of Technology, China. He is the founder of Architectural Democracy.

Mark Linder

Mark's work in public advocacy has led him into sectors where planning policy has been controversial. He has created large scale engagement programs for clients in the US, UK and Venezuela and in Finland. Mark is co-founder of N2 Comms in Helsinki and a Partner in Architectural Democracy.

Stefan Gustafsson

Stefan is a filmmaker, founder of Redneck films, expert in transformational communication and video integration strategy. 20 years of experience creating narration for corporate enterprises, civis sector and governments. Stefan is a partner in Architectural Democracy.