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A challenge in implementing Universal Design (UD) is the perceived additional cost, which acts as a barrier to its widespread adoption. The few studies that have examined the cost for UD apply a theoretical research approach, failing to account for the unique design context that influences construction costs. This article presents a research methodology to calculate the UD cost in a realistic, context-dependent manner.

To address this gap, “Research-by-Design” is applied in a case study approach involving twelve cases from three typologies: secondary schools, town halls and small retail shops. Two scenarios are compared to the existing situation: (1) “renovating into a 100% inclusive building” and (2) “building fully inclusive right away”.

Although the methodology is time-consuming, it allows for a fair, realistic and detailed comparison between costs in different scenarios and cases. Findings show how financial implications are strongly related to its scale. Both “renovation” and “new build” scenarios involve costs, but these are considerably lower for the latter. “Circulation” and “Exterior stairs and ramps” are among the most expensive to renovate, but have almost no additional cost in the examined cases for the “new build scenario”.

The research methodology presented in this study is time-consuming, which may limit its feasibility for large-scale cost assessments in diverse contexts.

The research methodology proposed in this study provides valuable insights for architects, designers and stakeholders involved in the implementation of UD. It offers a realistic and context-dependent approach to assess the cost implications of UD, enabling informed decision-making during the design and construction phases.

By revealing the specific cost implications of UD in different building contexts, this study contributes to promoting greater accessibility and inclusion in the built environment.

The applied approach distinguishes this study for its ability to provide rich contextual information on actual cost implications for UD. By considering real cases and their unique design contexts, valuable insights are offered into the true costs of implementing UD in the built environment.

As historic cities evolve, change in their urban form can be expected. Yet, uncontrolled change of land plots, which represent a significant element of urban form, leads to uncontrolled change in buildings' configurations and typologies threatening accordingly the urban character of heritage contexts. Mechanisms controlling plot subdivision, however, can play an effective role in guiding developments and in controlling urban change in heritage settings. The present study seeks to assist decision-makers in their attempt to control urban change in heritage areas through a plot-based approach.

This paper is divided into three sections: the first focuses on plot subdivision as a key aspect of urban form; the second illustrates the case of the heritage village of New Gourna in Luxor and the third includes discussion and implications of adopting a plot-based morphological approach to control morphological transformation in heritage contexts. For the morphological analysis of New Gourna, the study relied on comparative cartographic analysis of original drawings of the village versus the situation in 2022. The morphological analysis focuses mainly on qualitative and quantitative aspects of plot configurations and building patterns.

Findings support the urgency of establishing a plot-based strategy to maintain urban character of heritage contexts in Egypt and call for a plot-based morphological approach to control change and inform new development attempts.

The present research provides an assessment of the morphological transformation of the heritage village of New Gourna. In addition, it proposes a plot-based approach for heritage contexts under transformation.

This study aims to examine the impact of housing construction on single-family housing values and the implications for urban development.

To achieve this objective, the author used the difference-in-difference methodology to examine the effect of multifamily and single-family housing construction on surrounding single-family homes in Stockholm, Sweden. The author analysed data from approximately 480 housing construction projects between 2009 and 2014 and 17,000 single-family detached house transactions between 2005 and 2018.

The research found that multifamily construction projects did not affect the value of surrounding single-family homes, while single-family home construction had a negative impact. The author attributes this result to single-family housing projects typically located in areas with initially positive externalities, while multifamily housing projects are often located on the edge of areas with negative externalities before construction.

The research is limited by its focus on a specific geographic area and time frame, and future research could expand the scope to include other cities and regions and different periods. Additionally, further research could examine the impact of housing construction on other economic factors beyond housing values.

The research has practical implications for urban planners and policymakers. They should consider the potential negative impact of new single-family home construction on existing single-family housing areas while balancing the need for new housing in urban areas. By carefully evaluating construction locations, policymakers can create more sustainable, livable and equitable urban environments that benefit all members of society.

This research paper contributes to the field of housing economics by examining the impact of housing construction on single-family housing values in the context of urban development and climate change mitigation. Using a difference-in-difference methodology, the study provides evidence of the price effect of multifamily and single-family housing construction on surrounding single-family homes, which has important policy implications for urban planners and policymakers. By identifying the negative impact of single-family home construction on surrounding areas and highlighting the need for careful evaluation of construction locations, the research provides valuable insights for creating sustainable, livable and equitable urban environments that benefit all members of society.

Adaptive reuse processes aim to preserve heritage values while creating new values through the architectural interventions that have become necessary. This claim provokes a discussion about the meaning of values, how we can preserve them in practice and how we can translate them into architectural qualities that users experience. Riegl's understanding of the different perspectives of heritage values in the past and present opens up the possibility of identifying present values as a reflection of current social, material and political conditions in the architectural discourse.

This qualitative and practical study compares two Belgian projects to trace the use of values in adaptive reuse projects from an architectural design perspective. The Predikherenklooster, a 17th-century monastery in Mechelen that now houses the public library, and the C-Mine cultural centre in Genk, a former 20th-century coal mine, are compared. The starting point is Flemish legislation, which defines significance through values, distinguishing between 13 heritage values.

The study demonstrates the opportunities that axiological questions offer during the design process of an adaptive reuse project. They provide an overarching framework for tangible and intangible aspects that need to be discussed, particularly in terms of the link between what exists, the design strategy and their effect.

Adaptive reuse can draw on approaches from both heritage conservation and contemporary architecture and explore values as a tool for “re-designing” built heritage.

The purpose of this study is to get a clearer knowledge of the reasons for, approaches to and challenges associated with integrating sustainable development concerns into pipeline construction projects in New Zealand. To achieve this, this study delves deeply into sustainable construction to understand the reasons behind and incorporate sustainable development trials into their newly established product management and development procedure. As a result, this study looks at identifying key elements of sustainable construction practices and various interpretations of sustainability in the construction industry; offering a strategy for incorporating sustainable construction practices into the pipeline construction project in New Zealand; and benefits and difficulties that the construction industry encounters when implementing sustainable construction. Finally, a framework is developed to help in understanding the issues and potential solutions for integrating sustainable building methods into the pipeline construction project in New Zealand.

This study followed a four-step method (Figure 1), beginning with the identification of the data, continuing with the first screening of the data, determining eligibility and, finally, including the data. This data collection is being done to provide knowledge and direction for further research. Data were collected from various websites on the Web of Science and from Scopus databases. Additionally, data were gathered with the assistance of aggregator databases such as Scopus (scopus.com) and publishing databases such as Elsevier (sciencedirect.com), Inderscience, Taylor and Francis (tandfonline.com), Emerald Insight (emeraldinsight.com) and Google Scholar. These databases have been considered by a number of scholars to be reputable databases.

This research provided a thorough description of the key justifications for sustainable construction. This study demonstrated how the idea worked in practice by reviewing the literature on the relevance and analysis of sustainability in construction. This body of research identified crucial components of sustainable construction techniques and varied interpretations of sustainability in the construction industry. To better grasp the current application considerations in the construction sector, it also offered literature on sustainable construction methods. To determine the most effective strategy to make certain adjustments to the current construction processes, the literature also includes a wide range of sustainability-related topics in both developed and developing country contexts. This study also demonstrated the many perspectives and strategies for sustainable behaviors. Because the purpose of this study was to develop a strategy for implementing sustainable construction in New Zealand, it was of the utmost importance to shed light on the most well-known and prominent sustainable construction applications from across the world. The output of this aim provided the literature on construction practices to acquire insight into the ongoing conversations on sustainable practices and systems in the construction industry. This was done to obtain insight into the existing talks.

This research's contribution to the body of knowledge is demonstrated by the fact that this study has led to a better understanding of sustainable construction practices in the construction industry as well as the identification of the most significant challenges that businesses, organizations, educators and policymakers must face to improve their ability to put these strategies into practice. This research has provided a solid foundation for future research that aims to advance knowledge in this field by providing options for future research to evaluate the influence that the approach has had on enhancing the implementation of sustainable construction. Additionally, this study presents options for future research to evaluate the influence the approach has had on improving the implementation of sustainable construction. The successful completion of the research aim in the more traditional forms of higher education in the built environment can contribute to a better representation of new trends in the practice area associated with expanding and improving the construction industry sustainably.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of different levels of place understanding (primarily typo-morphological analysis) on the nature of interventions within historic urban setting and buildings within the City of Amman.

The research methodology depended on an extensive thematic survey and analysis. The typo-morphological analysis addressed several of Amman's residential hills and their connections with the downtown area. The thematic place survey tool included different units of analysis (e.g. buildings, public spaces, streets and sloped lands between streets) and addressed the values of these various buildings and spaces, their typology, typo-morphology and relation to the urban context, nature of change and transformations over time to mention a few. The extensive survey also included semi-structured interviews about these buildings addressing their emergence, historic context and values.

The paper presents an architectural typology for Amman's architecture and its relationship with the city's morphology stressing the specificity of Amman's historic core and residential hills. The paper also discusses the effect of this level of place understanding on the nature and levels of interventions within historic settings and buildings.

This level of place understanding (typo-morphological analysis) can have a positive impact on the practice of architectural and urban conservation by informing the nature of interventions within historic urban setting and buildings within the city. More specifically, this level of place understanding can, first, inform the development of urban and heritage guidelines within conservation areas in one of Amman's residential neighborhoods (Weibdeh) and, second, inform the nature of interventions to existing historic buildings based on respect of building typology.

This paper contributes to the disciplines of architectural and urban conservation illustrating how place understanding can inform practices of heritage conservation and future policies and strategies concerning new intervention within such heritage places.

This document presents BasES, which is a tool kit disseminated as an open educational resource. BasES is focused on the topic of buildings-as-energy services, promoting the knowledge integration to envisage buildings as components of future distributed renewable and interactive energy systems (DRIs). BasES will allow users of exploring and analysing DRIs' emergent properties at the local level, developing, and implementing the tool kit proposed. The specific objective concerns the use of the tool kit in the organisation of a technology support net (TSN) for buildings-as-a-service. TSN is composed of a multitude of actors, who often have different perspectives and scopes, but they are called to work collaboratively in order to establish work rules, requisite skills, work contents, standards and measures, culture and organisational patterns with regard to the emergent systems. Buildings-as-a-service is a completely new topic, and thus, an appropriate TSN is needed urgently. Our tool kit (i.e. Buildings-as-Energy-Services; BasES) will be a ground-breaking cognitive apparatus for involving stakeholders in knowledge transfer and integration processes. Thus, a new generation of product-service systems will be promoted. BasES is expected to configure a multi-stakeholder co-designed UK roadmap on socio-technical innovation in DRIs transition.

Post-socialist urban development changed cityscapes and city life profoundly, reusing public space in a different manner and reinterpreting the role of work, heritage, and consumption among others. Focusing on two case studies – the Outer Józsefváros in Budapest and the Praga North district in Warsaw – the paper examines this transformation, following how and to what extent these characteristic neighbourhoods have changed, how local heritage has been reconceptualised and what role work has played in this process.

The comparative analysis combines a literature review with a case study investigation that includes interviews, on-site visits, experiments with locally driven adaptive reuse, and document analysis.

The two case studies put heritage conservation, identity building and value determination processes in the context of architectural design, economic investment and labour market. The paper shows the relation between aesthetics and economic transition, how work, or its loss, has shaped the areas, creating a milieu of transition in a physical and a social sense, offering a reconceptualization of local identity. It also highlights the seminal value of civic initiatives and artists/artisans to increase the engagement of the local community.

The paper provides a rarely done comparison between two former Socialist cities undergoing similar transformations. It focuses on work as intangible heritage, the connected architectural aesthetics and their role in shaping the identity of various groups.

This systematic literature review investigates the contribution of design thinking (DT) as a process and tool to drive innovation in a sustainable built environment (SBE) and develops a new model for sustainability research integrating DT and future thinking approaches toward achieving a unified DT and foresight notion for future research and applications.

This review was based on the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement. Open-access English articles published between 2000 and 2022 identified using the EBSCOhost, Emerald Insight, DOJA, JSTOR, Scopus and Taylor and Francis database searches were reviewed. The review framework deploys a previously proposed modified Ansoff matrix with an integrated innovation matrix to identify and analyze the challenges and opportunities for innovation growth in SBE. Additionally, a citation analysis was conducted to explore the impact of DT for innovation in SBE, and a proposed framework based on design by drawing on foresight theory was developed.

Research on DT for innovation in SBE faces the challenge of unanticipated impacts. According to the average number of citations per document, innovation associated with new solutions within a new context seems to become highly influential. Additionally, research gaps exist in the integration of foresight and DT into sustainability research to identify new contexts and solutions to SBE. A model of foresight design thinking (FDT) is proposed to guide future research and support the practical application of DT in sustainability.

This analysis was limited by the selection criteria as only certain keywords were used and English-only articles were selected. Future research should consider the use of DT for innovation in SBE using various important keywords, which would improve research findings and expand the contribution of DT to SBE.

The FDT model offers a new holistic framework for the iterative process of reframing and reperception, focusing on divergent and convergent thinking with the goal of contributing to SBE practices.

The integrated framework of DT and foresight can contribute to the study and development of sustainable innovation and a strategic shift toward a sustainable society.

The integration of DT, foresight and sustainability can broaden the horizons of sustainability research by systematically addressing future challenges related to SBE, which can be translated into feasible and innovative solutions. Thus, the FDT model complements the application of DT in sustainable innovation in this research field.

The reuse of timber building parts, when designing new buildings, has become a topic of increasing discussion as a proposed circular solution in support of sustainable development goals. Designers face the difficulty of identifying and applying different design strategies for reuse due to multiple definitions, which are used interchangeably. The purpose of this study is to propose a taxonomy to define the relationships between various concepts and practices that comprise the relevant strategies for reuse, notably design for disassembly (DfD) and design for adaptability (DfA).

Literature reviews were conducted based on research publications over the previous 12 years and located through the Web of Science and Scopus.

A taxonomy for the design process grounded on two strategies for reuse is presented: DfD and DfA. Based on previous work, the taxonomy aims to build a vocabulary of definitions in DfD and DfA to support other researchers and practitioners working in the field.

The research is limited to the design phase of timber-based buildings. It does not take into account the other phases of the construction process, neither other kind of construction methods.

The application of the taxonomy can facilitate communication between different actors and provide a way for building product manufacturers to demonstrate their reuse credentials, enabling them to produce and promote compliant products and thereby support design for reuse strategies.

This paper could contribute to a closer collaboration of all stakeholders involved in the building process since the very early phases of the conceptual design.

This paper contributes a comprehensive taxonomy to support the deployment of circular reuse strategies and assist designers and other stakeholders from the earliest of phases in the building’s life cycle. The proposed definition framework provided by the taxonomy resolves the longstanding lack of a supporting vocabulary for reuse and can be used as a reference for researchers and practitioners working with the DfD and DfA.