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- MARKET ARCHITECTURE: HOW CAN ARCHITECTURE BE DESIGNED TO MAXIMIZE MARKET VALUE?(2026) Tegnér, StinaThis thesis investigates the relationship between architecture, money and value, and explores how architecture operates within the market. In order to build something, capital is required. Buildings are seen not only as shelter but as investment objects expected to generate financial return. Housing is a commodity on a market and the value is not necessarily defined by the quality of the building but by market mechanism such as supply and demand. The aim of this master thesis is to investigate how architecture in the form of housing acts as a commodity on a market and to speculate on how the market affects and influences architectural design. This project speculates about what happens when architecture is designed primarily to maximize economic value on a market. The main research question is: How can architecture be designed to maximize market value? According to the theory of supply and demand, the value in a market is set by the market mechanisms of supply and demand. In a free market, the price moves towards the equilibrium point. The method is based on letting the market guide the design. To enable this, data about the housing market is collected, analysed and translated into architecture. The method is based on treating the data literally, where it not only describes reality but is also used to shape it. Through a series of investigations, the thesis analyses supply and demand in the housing market of Gothenburg and explores where demand is located and what architectural attributes that are linked to high market value. The findings are translated into architectural design through a speculative design project. The design is located in a context identified through the investigations and incorporates architectural attributes linked to high market value. The aim of the design is not necessarily to develop a realistic proposal, but rather to speculate on the consequences of allowing market logic to guide architectural design. In this sense, the project also points towards and sometimes exaggerates the potentially absurd outcomes of such a logic.
- THEN THE STONES SPEAK: Balancing the Weight of Terezín’s History with its Need for Contemporary Development(2026) Richardson, Joshua JamesTerezín is facing a crossroads. The historic bastion fortress town in north-west Czechia is most widely known as the site of the Nazi-controlled Theresienstadt Ghetto, a major prison and transit camp for Jews during the Holocaust. Between 1941 and 1945, 144,000 prisoners were transported to Terezín. Most were sent onwards to extermination camps such as Auschwitz and Treblinka. 33,000 died in Terezín itself. Yet today, Terezín is still a living town, with a population of around 3,000. In many ways, the future of Terezín’s Dresden Barracks – the largest building in Terezín – can be seen as a paradigm for the changing face of Holocaust commemoration throughout Europe. Uninhabited and damaged by years of weathering, in its current state it serves neither to memorialise the thousands persecuted within the Nazicontrolled Theresienstadt Ghetto, nor to support the town’s current need for inhabitants and infrastructure. Then the Stones Speak focuses on the coming postwitness era, where no survivors of the Holocaust remain. Mediating between site-specific and broader social current issues, the thesis will explore questions that on the surface may seem intuitive. How best to preserve sites of historical trauma when living memory is lost? Should one preserve these sites, or should the needs of current and future inhabitants take precedence? The thesis will take a multi-layered approach, focusing on a broader background on Holocaust sites and sites of trauma around the world, before zooming in on Terezı́n and the Dresden Barracks. A reuse approach for the dilapidated building will be proposed following interviews with municipality officials, ghetto survivors and historians, site visits, and investigations into the experiences of prisoners within the Dresden Barracks through written accounts and artworks produced during the ghetto years. The scheme will involve an overall programme, as well as detail designs of moments throughout the building, incorporating the concept of “past presencing” as a means to mediate between the building’s traumatic history and the current living needs of the town. The aim of the thesis is to contribute to a growing discourse over the contemporary use of sites such as Terezín as its development progresses in real time.
- 48 Rue de Meaux: Transformation of a vacant Parisian Hôtel Meublé into social housing through an exploration of its inherent values(2026) Laurell, AstridParis is facing an ongoing housing crisis, with thousands of people experiencing homelessness at the same time as a large portion of the building stock is vacant. A type of hotels, “Hôtels Meublés”, have historically functioned as a housing solution for individuals struggling to find permanent housing, but the number of such hotels have rapidly declined during the mid 20th century due to demolition or transformation into tourist hotels. This thesis argues for transforming the remaining Hôtels Meublés, many of which are in very poor condition, into social housing, and does so through a case study of an 1863 vacant hotel located in Paris’s 19th arrondissement. An assessment of the building’s condition, together with a discussion on its inherent values is conducted. The values are discussed in relation to the building’s age, its social function, its monetary worth, and its connection to the city, drawing on the terms “Age Value”, “Use Value”, “Exchange Value” and “Locus” from writings by Alois Riegl (1903/1982), Aldo Rossi (1966/1984), and Henri Lefebvre as interpreted by Purcell (2002). This analysis leads to the choice of Facadism as a transformation strategy. A distinction is thereby made between the preservation of the facades, and the adaptation of the interiors to contemporary standards. Interior access to the building is not granted by the current property owners, which is why a video interview published by Le Parisien in 2022 is used to study the interior spaces. The existing is approached from a perspective of adaptive reuse with the objective of reconfiguring the interior spaces to achieve a higher standard of living. The project results in a total of 15 fully equipped apartments as well as shared facilities for cooking, washing and socialization. This thesis addresses the housing crisis on a building scale and does not claim a solution to homelessness. It does however intend to show an example of how the transformation of one abandoned building can contribute to the continuation of a building type characteristic of Paris, while also filling an important function in a city with a seemingly endless demand for housing.
- REWRITING THE SCRIPT: On How to Approach Adaptive Reuse of Culturally Significant Buildings Through the Transformation of an Obsolete Elementary School into Housing(2026) Larsson, SigneIn recent years, the closure of elementary schools has become increasingly prevalent in Sweden. Establishing a discourse on what should happen with the new multitude of obsolete buildings that have gone from functioning to vacant. Societal changes change how we use buildings, which buildings are needed, and which are not, and it is often complicated to adapt existing structures to societal needs; however, in an age defined by the climate crisis and resource scarcity, adaptive reuse is no longer one option but an ethical imperative. This thesis investigates how respect for buildings with cultural significance can be balanced with the need for transformation through the adaptive reuse of an obsolete elementary school into housing, assuming the building will not return to its original educational function. The School complex in question, Igelboda Skola, located in Nacka, Stockholm, was shut down in June 2025 and has since been completely emptied. The methods used involve literature studies on preservation, adaptive reuse, and change of buildings over time. Preservation ideology was used to formulate a design manifesto that aims to care for the heritage values within the buildings, while the adaptive reuse discourse was used to identify strategies for the transformation. This resulted in adopting the methods of restoring, reusing, reinventing, and readjusting. In addition, archival material was studied, and the building was documented through photography during multiple site visits, including one extensive visit within the main building. The project demonstrates how adaptive reuse can be applied in a hypothetical transformation of Igelboda Skola. It seeks a balanced approach that preserves the existing fabric and cares for its historical layers, while implementing the architectural interventions necessary to achieve a functional programmatic transformation. It showcases one approach to reimagine obsolete architecture through aesthetic care and contextual sensitivity. Overall, this research suggests that buildings are dynamic, shaped by time, use, and change, and that there’s inherent value in this reality. As an increasing number of buildings face obsolescence, architectural practices must refine their methodologies in order to articulate a defensible position against unnecessary demolition. This project contributes with one example on how to translate an existing architectural language by listening to it and re-writing it.
- TO READ A BUILDING: Negotiating and Translating Value(s) of Smedjan 12(2026) Landgren, Lisa; Tamm, EdithContemporary planning processes often favor the already-built as static objects of proclaimed heritage value or determine plans on residual land value and densification arguments. Preceding outdated planning frameworks are still being executed which favour tabula rasa - despite current local and global ambitions of preservation, transformation and ‘sustainability goals’. This systemic tension is evident in the urban transformation of Malmö’s oldest industrial site, Norra Sorgenfri. Contextualizing the thesis within this area and the demolition-threatened building block Smedjan 12, To Read a Building emerges through the identification of a perception shift in previous cultural heritage assessments. A facade alteration is seemingly used as the main argument for extensive demolition. Furthermore, this raises questions relating to value, authenticity and perception(s) of our built environment. This thesis aims to research whether adaptive reuse can be repositioned as a critical architectural act by evaluating complex realities. By considering multiple value perspectives, the thesis investigates whether a building can inform its own narrative, present-day agency and future relevance. Moreover, it investigates the architect’s role as a mediator and negotiator in architectural transformation processes. Which values are to be considered in favour or against a building’s continuous lifecycle? How may the architect identify and negotiate between conflicting values? Discussing these questions through a value-based analysis and design iterations, the thesis addresses the following values: resource, emotional, heritage, exchange, social use and functional use. The purpose of the approach is to challenge established reasoning related to transformation. Additionally, evaluating the state of a building, not overlooking the existing condition and informalities within, provides room for varying conditions. This ‘As Found’ approach, coined by Alison and Peter Smithson in the 1950s, holds the potential to shift current perceptions and advocate for the already-built. Rather than striving for a static end-product, the thesis proposes a future scenario based on carefully curated interventions and a phasing strategy as an alternative transformation process for Smedjan 12. To Read a Building makes room for the already-built’s never-ending story, demonstrating that “more than any other human artifact, buildings excel at improving with time, if they are given a chance” (S. Brand).