- Sustainability is a major focus for buildings going forward.
- Health in all its forms is also what architects will need to consider in designs.
- Data and technology continues to change how architects design and test.
Cities around the world will be defined by seven megatrends this year, all of which will have lasting positive impacts if followed, and maybe detrimental if ignored.
The list was created by HDR, a global engineering, architecture, environmental and construction services company.
Seven megatrends for cities in 2023
- Drive to net zero
- Sector symbiosis
- Inclusion, Diversity & Equity (IDE)
- Data-driven design
- Designing with country
- Wellness-driven design
- Resilience
How were the megatrends identified?
It is in the DNA of those working in the sector, HDR’s Director of Design, Simon Fleet, told The Property Tribune.
“The trends come from all the discussions we have with our clients, stakeholders, government, and institutions,” said Fleet.
“We have a wide exposure to the market, which comes from the fact that we are a global company of 12,000 people across multiple sectors and geographic locations. I think this really helps us to unlock insights into where the market is heading and forecast patterns and dynamics ahead of the curve.”
Drive to net zero
The first megatrend that will define city-shaping in 2023 is stopping greenhouse emissions. HDR said the building sector accounts for more than 40 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions, and over the next 30 years, is estimated that another 232 billion square metres of buildings will be constructed.
This is all the more poignant against the backdrop of significant recent extreme weather events, from flooding to bushfires, and more.
Sector symbiosis
The trend of sector symbiosis has been a once-in-a-generation evolution. This trend comes via major social upheaval over the past few years, including a global pandemic, climate change, poor mental health, trade wars, real wars, and digital transformations.
HDR noted several examples were setting the stage for the year ahead, including mRNA technology platforms, research laboratories, containment facilities, innovation precincts, hospitals without walls (for example, telehealth and mobile health solutions), hybrid classrooms, vertical university campuses, and wellness-driven defence bases.
“With projects crossing sectors more than ever, 2023 will witness health, education, science and technology converge as trans-disciplinary innovation takes precedence and new typologies emerge.”
HDR
It was also noted innovation and knowledge precincts will be leaders in the space, solving some of the most complex problems across education, science, and medicine, with architects increasingly designing for “creative collisions”.
Inclusion, diversity, and equity
Architects will look to “further entrench inclusivity and equity into clients’ physical spaces,” said HDR. This will include the full diversity spectrum, from language and culture, to gender and age, all looking towards enriching the user experience.
Disability inclusion will also be front of mind, HDR recounted United Nations data noting some 15 per cent of the world’s population, or one billion people, have a disability. The comfort of these individuals will be top of mind for designers.
“Architects will be increasingly expected to consider anthropometric architecture and design in totality – going beyond fulfilling functional aspects of wheelchair-friendly designs and placing an emphasis on healing, wellness, and space psychology more holistically,” said HDR.
Data-driven design
HDR said emerging (building information modelling) BIM technologies and Revit means traditional workflows of design have made way for newer methods like computation design tools and generative design.
Model validation and prototyping will continue to see major shifts, with digital twins, digital fabrication, robotic prototyping, artificial intelligence, augmented reality, predictive analytics, and parametric modelling all giving designers the upper hand.
Notably, HDR said architects will be able to set themselves apart and get a competitive edge if they can humanise data-driven design and design with empathy.
Designing with Country
With reconciliation taking centre stage, architecture practices are looking to champion genuine, reciprocal relationships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and non-Indigenous Australians – and authentically embed reconciliation within their business models. In 2023, architects and other design industries will increasingly incorporate measurable reconciliation goals into their everyday business operations and collaborate with First Nations user groups throughout the master planning and design process.
Not only will this Designing with Country consultation process help to authentically embed projects within their spiritual, ecological, geological and knowledge systems, but it will educate and inspire architects to create sustainable, restorative and equitable projects underpinned by principles of reconciliation for years to come.
Wellness-driven design
By 2050, the United Nations predicts that 68 per cent of us will be living in urban areas, up from 56 per cent today. In a climate where poor mental health is on the rise, neighbourhoods, town centres and their amenities need to act as an antidote to loneliness – a place where connections are made and dichotomies of spaces and people converge to form a sustainable social patchwork.
In 2023, architects will continue to take design dialogue beyond city-shaping to consider how obesity, social isolation, inter-generational connectivity, loneliness, mental health and equality by diversity can cultivate wellness-driven design outcomes.
Additionally, with more employees working from home than ever before and cities becoming decentralised nodes, sustainable and self-sufficient suburbs underpinned by permeability, walkability, health and wellness will continue to transform neighbourhoods.
Resilience
Rising interest rates, energy prices and supply chain disruption, coupled with the impacts of climate change, are causing organisations to review their financial and built-form resilience. In 2023, organisations will increasingly prefer assets with reduced grid dependency, such as those with on-site generation and storage, along with re-using products and/or specifying materials with short procurement times, reduced processing and from local suppliers where possible.
Ultimately, architects will be expected to incorporate climate resiliency and circular economy approaches into projects, with the latter being a key component of reducing embodied carbon.
Complex problem solving
Projects will respond to the trends in different ways, Fleet said, because it is a complex problem-solving exercise. They can also be interrelated:
“For me, the drive to net zero and resilience are almost entirely interlinked. I think you can’t design for net zero without also thinking about how your buildings will respond to things like climate change over the next 30 to 50 years.”
The trends can’t exactly be ignored either, with some becoming legislative changes, and others being tectonic shifts in culture.
“For example, the drive to net zero is a global imperative. Projects can’t turn their backs on it. In Australia, designing with Country is also becoming an increasingly important imperative as designers look to authentically embed principles of reconciliation into projects. Similarly, designing healthy buildings is becoming a societal imperative so, again, this presents challenges and in turn opportunities for the industry.”
The benefits of being on trend also result in a more productive workforce. Fleet noted wellness-driven design and healthy buildings mean people take less time off and therefore you have a more efficient and effective workforce.
Some of the challenges in measuring the costs and benefits are in the definitions. Fleet noted one example: Dose the building owner receives the benefit or does it go to the tenants?
It may also be difficult to define and measure at different levels, whether individual, broader environmental, or societal level impacts.
