The assignment for the graduation studio Dwelling Designing for Health and Care focuses on designing a health- or care-related building that promotes an inclusive and supportive living environment for the lonely in society. Tarwewijk, an urban neighborhood in Rotterdam South, serves as the central case study.

Loneliness is a growing social and health issue that needs to be addressed in Western cities, particularly in urban neighbourhoods. While occasional loneliness is not inherently harmful, chronic loneliness poses serious health risks, including depression, heart disease, and increased mortality (Cacioppo et al., 2006; Thurston en Kubzansky, 2009; Penninx et al., 1997, Coalitie Erbij, 2018; Holt-Lunstad et al., 2015). In the Netherlands, elderly individuals are especially vulnerable due to declining physical and cognitive health, which hinders social connections (Campen et al., 2018). The Campaign to End Loneliness emphasizes its severity, equating its health impact to smoking 15 cigarettes daily (Holt-Lunstad et al., 2015).
However, young adults aged 16 and 24 are also at high risk of loneliness, according to international surveys, especially in Western countries (e.g., Hammond et al., 2018; Nemecek, 2020; DiJulio et al., 2018; Pyle & Evans, 2018; Payne, 2021; Ibbetson, 2019). Factors, such as relocation for education or work (Kaplan etal., 2020), or reliance on digital communication, rather than socializing in person with friends, family, neighbours or colleagues (Roe & McCay, 2021), contribute to this trend. Urban contexts further amplify loneliness in this group when feelings of distrust, insecurity, or lack of belonging arise (Pyle & Evans, 2018). This shows the complexity of loneliness because it is multifaceted, multigenerational and context-specific (Moore et al., 2023), requiring tailored urban interventions to promote inclusion and social engagement.

In conclusion, loneliness among elderly people and young adults is increasingly prevalent and detrimental to health in urban neighborhoods. This study investigates how urban neighbourhoods, like Tarwewijk, can incorporate multigenerational communal spaces that foster social wellbeing, social engagement and a sense of belonging in the neighbourhood, hypothesizing that such designs are an architectural means to alleviate loneliness.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS
In what way can the design of
communal spaces in urban neighbourhoods, such as the Tarwewijk, help reduce loneliness among residents of different age groups?
1. What specific factors contribute to feelings of loneliness among residents in the Tarwewijk?
2. What roles do the current communal spaces play regarding combating loneliness in the Tarwewijk?
3. How can the design of (future) intergenerational communal spaces be catered to the social needs of the elderly and young adults?

The research of the thesis explores to what extent a multi-species design practice in architecture based on affordances informed by the act of human and non-human space-making in abandoned ruins helps to achieve a symbiotic relation between architecture and biodiversity. For this purpose, a theoretical framework triangulating affordances, multi-species design and architecture was developed. This was done throughout different exploratory methods such as reviewing literature, as well as an on-field studies of the abandoned ruin “Palácio Ford” in Porto, Portugal. The architectural project is about the design of a multi-species residency consisting of different kinds of towers that contribute to the growth of an urban forest by interaction with the environment. The interventions were developed as Baubotanik structures which combine living trees and technical construction methods in one object. Thus, the project explores new ways of living in a growing architecture which forms an urban forest within the city of Porto.

Currently due to the virtualization of the way of money and the role of the bank itself of money transactions being replaced, although the National Bank of Belgium has a huge space, it is difficult to play a role in the current society. In addition to this, this huge banking system not only embodies national capital but also alienates it from its urban context. In the future, the National Bank of Belgium will have fewer employees, how to use the extra space to make this building permeable and maintain it as a symbol of the National Bank?

This project aims to transform the traditional space of the bank and add new public spaces open to the public by using the working mode of co-working, so as to provide better working space for different social groups. Besides, my project also provides a new public interior for city dwellers by introducing other public spaces. Through the introduction of different programs. The bank will be turned into a huge collection of workspaces, as well as new containers that can contain various urban activities.