11/05/2026
HOUSEEUROPE! KEYNOTE TODAY, 11 May 💛
as part of
On Reuse – Critical frameworks for working with the existing organised by the
„A Question of Value“ with (b+, HouseEurope!)
Palau Victòria Eugènia, Barcelona
19:30–20:30 Keynote
Architects love to talk about the object: materials, performance, innovation. But it all sits inside a larger assumption we rarely question: the value system that drives architecture and, more broadly, the construction sector. In this system, “value” does not mean responsibility, stewardship or imagination. It means growth, wealth, profit. It has trained us to treat the old as risk, and the new as opportunity. Under this logic, the value of a building is reduced to a single number: its price. It is important to remember that this system was invented, which means it can also be changed.
To renovate, extend and transform means to preserve value and redirect it towards labour, energy and culture. It makes design more complex, more demanding, more inventive. It forces us into dialogue with what already exists, leading to unexpected answers to changing questions. Conflicting questions, but united by values. That is the act of architecting and while one building might not change the system, it can serve as an argument that alternatives are possible and become evidence for systemic change.
