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The celebration of the European Year of Architectural Heritage in 1975 in Amsterdam had a great impact on architectural debate in West Berlin, which held a similar event one year later entitled A future for our past. There was a climate of great tension in the city between the precursors of the urban development plans and the social movements in the affected neighborhoods. The article discusses the extent to which a methodological change was possible, from an approach that obliterated the existing new proposals in order to readjust the role of heritage in the urban reconstruction. The idea of declaring existing urban fabric as patrimony became the central debate of this period, in which the idea of demolition and replacement became an expression of social inequality. This article comparatively analyzes the celebration of two proposals promoted by Berlin’s architectural senator Hans C. Müller in 1976: The pilot project for Block 118 in Charlottenburg and the Symposium on Urban Structure and Urban Form in Tiergarten Süd. Two innovative and methodologically distinct approaches were to establish the principles that would regulate the internationally known reconstruction of the IBA, both the Old and the New, two years later.

The complex structural behaviour of masonry, with its brittle response in tension, frictional response in shear, and anisotropy, makes it challenging to model accurately. Tile vaults, with their unique features such as different binders and bricks placed flat, have distinctive structural performance, and determining the most suitable assessment method is still a subject of debate in both academic and professional circles. This paper presents a study on the structural analysis of tile vaults, aiming at evaluating different numerical approaches for this type of structure. The examination of these approaches and their effectiveness in capturing the structural behaviour of tile vaults intends to offer valuable insights to researchers and professionals in this field. Experimental research was initially carried out in order to provide data for the calibration of the structural models. Two full-scale vaults were tested. Furthermore, several material characterization tests were also performed. The numerical assessment was carried out through limit analysis and non-linear static analysis with numerical models based on the Finite Element Method (FEM). Two FEM models were prepared using different modelling approaches for masonry, namely the macro-modelling and the simplified micro-modelling approaches. The results of the limit analysis presented a load capacity significantly lower than the ultimate load obtained from the experimental tests. The calibrated FEM models presented good results in comparison to the experimental results, namely in terms of damage pattern and load capacity.

This article aims to explore the potential and limitations of participatory design and co-manufacturing processes, taking the city of Barcelona as a reference. It is characterized by an aging building stock, tourist pressure, and difficulties for citizens in accessing affordable housing. In this sense, a selection of six cases of co-design and co-manufacturing is presented, as a range of small-scale interventions that were shared and discussed in the “Debate sessions. Co-Design and Co-Fabrication in Architecture” within the Co-Hab-Raval project, which motivated this research. Thanks to these case studies, it has been possible to analyse a wide range of intervention practices. The article exposes the socioeconomic context of Barcelona and its lack of affordable housing, which motivated the practices presented. In addition, the cases are carrying out a comparative analysis based on the parameters of agents involved, the type of users’ participation, and materials resource management. Finally, the results obtained highlight the relationship between the construction systems and the self-construction and reuse strategies used, as well as the importance of the plurality of agents that intervened in the design process to enrich the proposals and empower users, especially in vulnerable environments.