www.buildingsandcities.org/insights/news/challenges-next-gen-built.html
Next Built Conference: Call for Abstracts
Deadline for abstracts: 05 December 2025
The 3rd International Conference "Challenges for the NEXT generation BUILT Environment" (NEXTBUILT 2026) takes place 4-5 June 2026 and is hosted by the University of Bologna and the Next Built Observatory.
Housing has emerged globally as one of the most pressing social and economic challenges. The supply of affordable, adequate and sustainable housing is struggling to keep pace with demand. Ageing, inefficient and inadequate dwelling stocks, partially influenced by the dynamics of the property market, as well as the need for climate adaptation, and the rising cost of construction materials, are putting significant pressure on the construction sector.
The conference is organised with 4 themes. Abstracts are sought across 4 topics:
- Room for housing: reflecting on affordability, equity and resilience
- Livability, comfort and health: reflecting on the nature of the built environment
- Process workflow and services: reflecting on innovation in the building sector
- Materials without borders: reflecting on reuse and impacts
All abstracts will be double-blind peer reviewed by the Scientific Committee. NEXT BUILT ensures a fair and transparent process is undertaken by all the members involved.
WEBSITE: https://next-built.org/nextbuilt-2026/
CONTACT:
Latest Peer-Reviewed Journal Content
Urban form metrics for building occupancy modelling: applications and impacts
D Reiter, M Jehling & R Hecht
Retrofit realism: affordable low-carbon policies for existing homes
N Eyre & R Khosla
Inside offsite: everyday dwelling in factory-built apartments
L Dorignon & R Horne
MMC for housing: sectoral perception on governance challenges
J Morgan, C Goodier, R Schmidt-III & K Ayinla
Reorganising specification practice for component reuse: an exploratory study
S Gao, K Jones, J Xu & J Glass
Kitchen retrofits to support food practices and wellbeing
F J Andrews, A Sal Moslehian, E Warner & R Tucker
From strategy to delivery: a comparative analysis of MMC roadmaps
G Goldman, D Sorokine, F Suerich-Gulick, C Carbone & M Jemtrud
Thermal comfort, ventilation and mosquito-borne disease risk in Zanzibar hospitals
O Sloan Wood, J B Knudsen, K L Schiøler, E Lupenza, M Msellem & F Saleh
Reusing precast concrete elements in construction: assessing the economic conditions
O Vigren, H Westerlind & T Malmqvist
Institutional readiness for industrialised social housing in Vietnam
T Q Nguyen, B N Nguyen, T H Q To & Z Aziz
Prefabrication for housing retrofit: governance, innovation and resident experience
E Pikas, K Kuusk, P Pihelo, R Liias, J Pukk & T Kalamees
Reframing heat pump transitions: a care perspective
J van der Haer, R Schelwald & F de Haan
Urban informal settlements in Africa: transforming adaptation governance
K Buyana & H Sseviiri
Reusing concrete products in indoor environments: chemical hazard assessment
K Tähtinen, A Helin, E Parshintsev & H Hovi
Negotiating net-zero carbon: an ANT analysis of two buildings
L Schweber & M Green
Design for disassembly: a review of public policy proposals
O Vorobjev, U Uotila, T Joensuu & A Saari
Retrofitting Norwegian residential buildings: an archetype-based dynamic stock model
L S A Rousseau, S Amini, S Akin & E G Hertwich
Decolonising time: vernacular villages and the politics of heritage temporality
R Al-Rabady
Commutes to alternative workplaces: GHG emissions and physical activity
J Taylor, L Thoen, A Espinosa Mireles De Villafranca, P Anashin, J Vanhatalo, D Milián
Bernal & I Okkonen
Nine ‘myths’ about the building stock of Great Britain
S Evans, P Steadman, A Neto-Bradley, D Humphrey, R Liddiard,H Shamsi, J Palmer & G Simons
Join Our Community
The most important part of any journal is our people – readers, authors, reviewers, editorial board members and editors. You are cordially invited to join our community by joining our mailing list. We send out occasional emails about the journal – calls for papers, special issues, events and more.
We will not share your email with third parties. Read more
Latest Commentaries
Living Labs: Maturity, Impact and the Role of Researchers
Living labs are blossoming more than ever. Their first appearances in academic literature were roughly 25 years ago. Dimitri Schuurman (Ghent University) responds to the recent Buildings & Cities special issue “Living Labs: Agents for Change” and focuses on two important drawbacks that also come with living labs booming in practice as well as in the literature.
Building Performance Evaluation in Education – Why Not?
Building performance evaluation (BPE) is a process to understand how buildings perform in use and how inhabitants interact with their buildings. BPE can harness these insights to improve building design, operation and use. Paradoxically, BPE is rarely part of the curriculum for education of designers, buildings and managers. Fionn Stevenson (independent scholar) considers why BPE / post-occupancy evaluation is not being taught to architecture students in the UK and how to mainstream BPE in education and practice.