We have looked at allt the partners different approaches, lessons and aspirations on people-led development. By using the experiences from Bi0n I, the training conclude some ways for the partners to improve the placemaking process and further strengthen people-led development.

Placemaking is enabling and empowering people to create and participate in making places that they love and feel connected to.

– CoDesign Studio

The above description is borrowed from CoDesign studio. The work produced within this network is very much about placemaking, and finding alternative development paths. In this staff training session all partners focus on their own process and how to strengthen the placemaking strategies for each association.

The purpose of this guide is to enable anyone interested in self-construction to prepare for a future project: as an organizer, participant, beneficiary, neighbour, or decision-maker, in full awareness that material and humans play here in constant interaction. For this in each part, we will find a list of tools to best support these factors in the daily workshops. This guide was the specific task of the HE2B team (Haute Ecole Bruxelles Brabant) and its CÉRISÈS laboratory within the LearnBi0n partnership.

Design and Build with Ø km (local and recycled materials), a 4 week building workshop in Milan, Italy. During this workshop we built with recycled materials and low tech building methods to suit the needs of the Casa Chiaravalle community.

During this workshop we built a small rammed earth library to suit the needs of the local community in Valverde de Burguillos, a small village located in Extremadura, Spain

Design and Build with Canes, a 4 week building workshop in Colleserola Natural Park , Spain. During this workshop we built an external covered space of 30 sqm to be used for cultural meetings and for theoretic classes during CanyaViva’s courses cane construction.

Design and Build with Cordwood, a 4 week building workshop in Östertälje, Sweden. During this workshop we built a cordwood building to suit the needs of the newly established social enterprise Eko-Odlarna. They cultivate organic produce on a small plot of land on the outskirts of Östertälje.

Design and Build with Wattle-and-Daub and Light Earth, a four weeks workshop in Casaprota, a town of 740 inhabitants in the inner Sabina region, Italy. During the workshop we colonized an abandoned concrete-skeleton using natural building techniques and aiming at revitalising it as a venue for community gatherings and small events.

Design and Build with Compressed Earth Blocks, a 4 week building course, in Montemor-o-Novo, Portugal. During the workshop we built a prototype for artists in residence at Oficinas da Cerâmica e da Terra, a research department from Oficinas do Convento ONG.

The participants to integrate the #5 course Design and Build with Rammed Earth started to arrive during Saturday. At dinner time the group was already filling an entire room of the only restaurant in the village.

Sunday morning it was time to start! Each partner presented himself and the work developed by his own organization, as well as the past/future courses inside of the LearnBIØN project.

Here we are, since Friday, at Casa de la Cultura de Valverde de Burguillos for another LearnBIØN meeting with all the partners. Meanwhile, participants for the Course #5 Design and Build with Rammed Earth, are arriving.

Our common principals

The Learn BIØN – A Handbook Guide for Hands-On Learning from the Building Impact Zero Network was made during our first Erasmus+ project LearnBIØN.

Here we collectively wrote down the common ground for the network, our principals. Our aim is to share knowledge, practices and experiences, in order to contribute to the built environment and to our communities.

The LearnBIØN project entered in its active phase with the first Build and Design Workshop on its run in Portugal. Under the coordination of Oficinas do Convento, the whole network-team gathered in Montemor-o-Novo for three days to share experiences on technical and logistical aspects related to our training project, to organise the upcoming workshops and to develop future perspectives on our way of understanding sustainable architecture.

Our whole team gathered in Brussels for our first training course. HE2B had prepared an interesting program for us, including both group discussions and site visits with a chance to engage with different stakeholders.

We started our first meetings in Brussels on the 22nd-25th may, the first meeting where all partners gather and finally meet. We thank François and HEB who has prepared our visit and the program.

We discussed the project, the overall objectives, the budget and documentation.