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Urban Design in a Time of Climate Change

Hagan’s paper was one of a small number from the ‘Sixth International Conference on Design Principles and Practices’ (UCLA, 2012) selected by the editorial board to appear in Design Principles and Practices: An International Journal – Annual Review.

The annual multidisciplinary conference at which the paper was presented addresses a range of critically important themes relating to design today. This paper interrogated the practice of urban design within a new dispensation that recognises metabolic functions of a city to be as important as social and economic ones – ecological urbanism. It used case study examples of Hagan's research-by-design to examine what this new requirement means for urban design practice and its role in both climate-resilient cities and urbanity in São Paulo, Brazil; Wuppertal, Germany; Hull, England; and, in particular, Gothenburg, Sweden. The paper describes and assesses Hagan's research in developing an environmentally led spatial plan for the future development of Gothenburg, publicised in the city’s brochure, RiverCity Gothenburg, the Outcome of the International Workshop (2011).

Hagan was invited to present this research at the British Embassy in Buenos Aires in 2012 to an invited audience of Argentine building industry leaders. She was also invited to deliver a keynote at the Sociedad de Central de Arquitectos conference, ‘Arquitectura+Sostenibilidad’ (2012), entitled ‘Why Bother?’ On the strength of this, Hagan was invited to co-organise a symposium with the British Argentine Chamber of Commerce and UK Trade and Investment at the Argentine Embassy in London (2013). On this occasion there were industry leaders from the UK, including the leading international construction firm Skanska, and building industry professionals from Argentina.