Let’s talk about breathing new life into old settlements

A forum on conserving rural buildings will begin in Tongji University tomorrow morning.

The weekend forum has invited architects and urban planners from home and abroad to discuss and share their experiences, ideas, and practices in the conservation and development of heritage asset in rural areas.

It follows the 2017 international forum “Built Heritage: A Cultural Motivator for Urban and Rural Development,” which was sponsored by Tongji University and the Architectural Society of China.

This year the forum addresses the fact that a tide of urbanization has damaged the basic foundation of traditional culture, typical rural settlements and their cultural landscapes, causing the historical and geographic characteristics of those landscapes to degenerate or disappear.

This phenomenon is a global one, affecting different countries and regions in different ways. There is a worldwide need to provide specific responses addressing the various challenges.

In the case of China, a national strategy for rural vitalization leads the work in this regard.

Through considered measures, there are expectations in China that change can be controlled and that the country can follow an ecological track of economic and social development, thereby enabling adaptive conservation and revitalization of the rural built heritage.

The Chinese and English keynote speeches are open to the public who are interested.

A detailed agenda for the forum can be found at http://en.icobhs.com/.

Venue: Bell Hall, College of Architecture and Urban Planning (CAUP), Tongji University Address: 1239 Siping Road

English Contact: Huang Feiran at +86 0216598-2193

E-mail: huang@icobhs.com