Climate Adaptation Studio

Studio leader: Jan Hugo

In a rapidly urbanising world, cities are becoming both the epicentres of the climate crisis as well as catalysts to develop new eco-literate societies. As a result, designers are challenged to reimagine our cities and their built infrastructure to transform them into climate change-resilient places to improve the health and well-being of urban inhabitants. This project builds on the urban strategy studio, presented by Dr Calayde Davey, by working with the mapping and strategies developed in Q1 for the Hatfield neighbourhood. It will set out to develop architectural solutions that not only improve the climate change resilience of the neighbourhood but also promote additional co-benefits such as resource circularity, walkability, etc., as identified in the Q1 studio. We will explore the range of climate risks we face in the neighbourhood and work with the city and local agents to develop strategies to improve the climate change resilience of the public realm, private spaces and the spaces in between. We will interrogate existing literature on climate change, its associated vulnerability and specifically use regenerative design practices to develop deep-seated and locally relevant climate change adaptation solutions. The findings from this studio will be shared with the city of Tshwane and the World Bank’s City Region Heat Action Plan project, to inform the local climate change adaptation discourse.