The Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD) is a graduate school of design at Harvard University. The GSD offers master’s and doctoral programs in architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, urban design, real estate, design engineering, and design studies.
The Harvard Graduate School of Design was officially established in 1936, combining the three fields of architecture, urban planning, and landscape architecture under one graduate school. The GSD has over 13,000 alumni and has graduated many famous architects, urban planners, and landscape architects. The school is considered a global academic leader in the design fields.
Attendees to the workshop were master students of architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, urban planning and design studies.
The training’s purpose was to introduce participants to the circular economy principles, new business models and applications to the built environment.
A fundamental concept that was introduced was a bold change in the way we think of buildings. Dynamically and flexibly designed buildings can be incorporated into a circular economy – where materials in buildings sustain their value.
Thanks to projects such as buildings-as-material-banks, buildings can be designed to enable a circular economy. Through design and circular value chains, materials in buildings sustain their value – in a sector producing less waste and using less virgin resources. Instead of being to-be waste, buildings will function as banks of valuable materials – slowing down the usage of resources to a rate that meets the capacity of the planet.
The training discussed the development of various projects that have been developing and integrating tools that will enable the shift: Materials Passports and Reversible Building Design – supported by new business models, policy propositions and management and decision-making models.
