www.buildingsandcities.org/about/sofie-pelsmakers.html
Dr Sofie Pelsmakers
Dr Sofie Pelsmakers is an environmental architect, educator, and researcher with expertise in energy demand reduction and holistic sustainable architecture and housing design. Based at Tampere University, Finland, she leads Sustainable Housing Design research - how buildings and spaces work in reality, how they influence users, and how they change over time.
She is particularly passionate about bridging the information gap between research and knowledge application in design and building practice. She is the author of the Environmental Design Pocketbook.
Latest Commentaries
Self-Organised Knowledge Space as a Living Lab
While Living Labs are often framed as structured, institutionalised spaces for innovation, Sadia Sharmin (Habitat Forum Berlin) reinterprets the concept through the lens of grassroots urban practices. She argues that self-organised knowledge spaces can function as Living Labs by fostering situated learning, collective agency, and community resilience. The example of a Living Lab in Bangladesh provides a model pathway to civic participation and spatial justice.
Climate Mitigation & Carbon Budgets: Research Challenges
Thomas Lützkendorf (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology) explains how the research community has helped to change the climate change policy landscape for the construction and real estate sectors, particularly for mitigating GHG emissions. Evidence can be used to influence policy pathways and carbon budgets, and to develop detailed carbon strategies and implementation. A key challenge is to create a stronger connection between the requirements for individual buildings and the national reduction pathways for the built environment.