Community Engaged Architectural Design Learning
The Case of Altering Practices for Urban Inclusion
Authors/editors: Burak Pak & Aurélie De Smet. Co-editing and graphic design: Vitor Breder.
Innovator, educator and architect
Burak PakAssociate Professor, PhD
İstanbul University
Faculty of Architecture · Department of Architecture
Principal Investigator · TÜBİTAK 2232-A
I am an Associate Professor at İstanbul University’s Faculty of Architecture. My research concerns the design of circular built environments and the technologies used in resilient circular architectural design. I work with students, researchers, residents and partner organisations on participatory design, housing and architectural education.
01 / Books
Selected books
Solidary Mobile Housing
Aurélie De Smet, Burak Pak, Yves Schoonjans, Géraldine Bruyneel & Tineke Van Heesvelde (eds)
Collective Spaces for Super-Diversity
Brussels / Istanbul / Belfast / Shanghai
Burak Pak & Anthony Aelbrecht (eds)
02 / Research
Design for circular
built environments
I explore how architects can combine circular design with social participation: retaining and adapting buildings, organising material reuse, and involving the people who inhabit and maintain them.
Current research · Principal Investigator
Circular Housing for Increasing Earthquake Resilience in Türkiye
I lead this research project at İstanbul University, supported through TÜBİTAK’s 2232-A International Fellowship for Outstanding Researchers Programme.
About the TÜBİTAK 2232-A programme ↗Technologies for resilient circular architectural design
Research on digital design methods and artificial intelligence examines how architects can assess existing resources and develop options for adaptation, reuse and recovery. Recent work includes AI-driven circular design and circular housing for earthquake resilience in Türkiye.
Participation & design empowerment
Through collaborative housing projects, I study how residents and civil society organisations participate in design decisions. This work addresses the distribution of knowledge, resources and authority across the design process.
Urban commons & spatial technologies
My work on collective spaces, participatory mapping and civic platforms explores how people use and govern shared urban resources. Studies of digital participation also examine whose experiences are represented and who can contribute.
Community-engaged architectural learning
I develop and study teaching practices in which students collaborate with community partners on real spatial questions. Design-build projects, live projects and reflective inquiry connect architectural learning with residents’ everyday experience.
Altering Practices / Alt_Shift
I founded Altering Practices to bring critical spatial research into dialogue with collaborative learning and practice. Through Alt_Shift, researchers and designers work with citizens, civil society organisations and public partners on the social and political conditions of spatial change.
About the collectiveSelected funded research 10 projects +
| Project | Funder |
|---|---|
| Enhancing the transdisciplinary capacity for situated creative practices | KU Leuven IOF |
| Rethinking circular architectural design as a participatory and inclusive practice | FWO-Vlaanderen |
| Proof of Concept for the Solidary Mobile Housing Co-Creation Model and the Realized Housing Prototype (PoC SMH) | Innoviris Brussels |
| Solidary Affordable Housing for the Houseless: A Mobile model in the Brussels Capital Region | Innoviris Brussels |
| A Virtual Environment for the Analysis and Evaluation of Alternative Urban Development Projects for the Brussels Capital Region | Innoviris Brussels |
| Remaking the Public Space | Erasmus Lifelong Learning Intensive Programme (European Commission) |
| Incubators of Public Spaces | JPI Urban Europe (European Commission) |
| Linking places through artistic practices | Creative Europe (European Commission) |
| SArPe – Socially situated Architectural Pedagogies | Erasmus+ (European Commission) |
| Circular Housing for Increasing Earthquake Resilience in Türkiye | TÜBİTAK 2232-A |
03 / Publications
Selected writing
Selected articles, chapters & edited books
9 selected publications
- 2025Article
Towards architectural design empowerment: an analysis of the Solidary Mobile Housing project’s development process through Theory of Action in Direct Design Empowerment Framework
CoDesign, 21(3), 517–539.
- 2025Chapter
AI-Driven Circular Architectural Design
In Artificial Intelligence-Aided Design for Sustainability, pp. 251–271. Springer.
- 2024Article
Architectural Disruption in the Age of Computation: A Critical Review on Digital Architecture
METU Journal of the Faculty of Architecture, 41(1), 147–172.
- 2022Edited book
- 2020Article
Responding to the urban transformation challenges in Turkey: a participatory design model for Istanbul
International Journal of Urban Sustainable Development, 13(1), 32–55. Published online 2020.
- 2020Article
Between Post-Flâneur and Smartphone Zombie: Smartphone Users’ Altering Visual Attention and Walking Behavior in Public Space
ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information, 9(12), 700.
- 2019Article
An Operational Framework for an Online Community Based on the Commons, Dissensus and Shared Knowledge
Postdigital Science and Education. Published online 2019.
- 2017Article
FixMyStreet Brussels: Socio-Demographic Inequality in Crowdsourced Civic Participation
Journal of Urban Technology, 24(2), 65–87.
- 2014Article
Geoweb 2.0 for Participatory Urban Design: Affordances and Critical Success Factors
International Journal of Architectural Computing, 12(3), 283–305.
04 / Doctoral research
PhD supervision
Completed doctorates & ongoing research
I have supervised and co-supervised doctoral researchers working on the urban commons, housing, architectural education and digital participation. Their individual contributions are presented below, with the colleagues who shared the supervision.
Selected images & drawings
Görsev Argın Uz
Walking and attention in hybrid public space
Aurélie De Smet
Co-creating Solidary Mobile Housing
Caroline Claus
Sonic research along Brussels’ L28 railway
Completed doctorates
Hülya Ertaş
Towards a New Critique for the Architecture of the Commons
Research on the politics of commoning, knowledge production and architectural critique.
Supervisor: Burak Pak. Co-supervisor: Caroline Newton. Appointed supervisor: Filip Mattens.
Görsev Argın Uz
Post-Flânerie: Shifting Rhythm, Visual Attention, and Experience While Walking in Hybrid Public Space
Recipient of the 2023 İlhan Tekeli Doctoral Thesis Award, presented in 2024.
Supervisor: Handan Türkoğlu. Co-supervisor: Burak Pak.
Aurélie De Smet
Increasing Socio-Spatial Resilience through Temporary Appropriation of Urban Waiting Spaces for Housing
A Participatory Action Research on the Solidary Mobile Housing Project in Brussels
Participatory action research with residents and civil society partners in the Solidary Mobile Housing project.
Supervisor: Burak Pak. Co-supervisor: Yves Schoonjans.
Caroline Claus
Towards a Decentering of the Listener in Planning and Design Research
Attuning to Affective Sonic Materiality for Transitory Railway Space along Brussels Line 28
Sonic research and critical spatial practice along Brussels’ L28 railway corridor.
Supervisor: Burak Pak. Co-supervisor: Peter Cusack.
Jorgos Coenen
The Design of Civic Public Displays for Human-Data Interaction
Design and evaluation of public displays through which citizens can engage with locally relevant information.
Supervisor: Andrew Vande Moere. Co-supervisor: Burak Pak.
Elie Daher
Enabling Participation in Performance-Driven Architectural Design in the Early Design Stage
Methods and digital tools for involving end-users in computational design decisions.
Supervisor: Burak Pak. Co-supervisors: Yacine Rezgui and Sylvain Kubicki.
Hanne Van Reusel
The Commons Architect.e: Altering Urban Architectural Design in Brussels
Supervisors: Burak Pak and Johan Verbeke († 2017). Co-supervisors: Luca Caneparo and Dag Boutsen.
Ahmet Gün
An ICT-Based Participatory Design Model Proposal for Urban Transformation Areas in Turkey
Supervisor: Yüksel Demir. Co-supervisor: Burak Pak.
Ivo Vrouwe
Sensemaking in Construction: The Necessity of Making
Supervisor: Burak Pak; previously Johan Verbeke († 2017). Co-supervisors: Laurens Luyten and Jos Lichtenberg.
Ayşe Zeynep Aydemir
Experiments, Practices and Positions in Architectural Design Studio
KU Leuven supervisor: Kris Scheerlinck. Co-supervisors: Burak Pak and Arzu Erdem; Arzu Erdem also supervised the doctorate at Istanbul Technical University.
Ongoing doctoral research
Vitor Silveira Breder Rocha
Rethinking Circular Architectural Design as a Participatory and Inclusive Practice
FWO-funded doctoral research on participation and socio-spatial inclusion in circular architectural design. Project period: 2022–2026.
Supervisor: Chiara Piccardo. Co-supervisor: Burak Pak.
05 / Teaching
Studios &
collective inquiry
At KU Leuven, I initiated the Faculty of Architecture’s first community-engaged service-learning track. Students worked with residents and local organisations through design studios, electives and Master’s dissertations.
The selected studios below were developed with colleagues in the Alt_Shift network. Both editions of the Commons studio are archived here, with the studio briefs, 11 student projects and their drawings. Student authors and collaborators are credited throughout.
Explore the Commons studio archive →
The community-engaged learning work received a UNISERVITATE special mention in 2022 ↗, shared with Aurélie De Smet.
Drawing: Vilius Balčiūnas · Rethinking North Quarter as a Socio-Spatial Experiment on Transitioning Towards Postcapital Future
Envisioning the Architecture(s) of the Urban Commons
Students explored how architectural design could support shared ownership, solidarity and collective forms of living. Their dissertations examined urban commons through critical spatial practice and alternatives to conventional property relations.
Tutors: Hülya Ertaş & Burak Pak
KU Leuven, Faculty of Architecture
Drawing: Moujan Mahdian · Sonic Collective Memory
Sonic Urbanism Studio_L28
Students explored sound and vibration as aspects of urban design along Brussels’ L28 railway corridor. Their proposals explored how listening, spatial interventions and relationships between human and non-human activity could inform the transformation of railway land.
Tutors: Caroline Claus & Burak Pak
KU Leuven, Faculty of Architecture
Drawing: Julie Charlot · School Camp-us: Rethinking the Architectural School as a Commons through Participatory Design
Envisioning the Architecture(s) of the Urban Commons
Students used design to explore collective ownership, self-organisation and shared urban resources. Proposals included an architectural school as a commons, participatory construction and ways to activate underused public spaces.
Tutors: Hülya Ertaş & Burak Pak
KU Leuven, Faculty of Architecture
Drawing: Sarah Thorisaen · Alive: Sonic Identities
Sonic Urbanism Studio_L28
Students explored the sound and vibration of Brussels’ western railway edge through critical listening and design. They developed proposals for public spaces that engaged with the existing sonic qualities and changing uses of former industrial railway land.
Tutors: Caroline Claus & Burak Pak
KU Leuven, Faculty of Architecture
Temporary housing & inclusive collective spaces
In the 2020–2021 Master’s dissertation studio, Aurélie De Smet and I worked with ten students and Solidary Mobile Housing and WoonBox partners. Students explored how temporary housing could be developed alongside inclusive collective spaces in Brussels.
Read the studio account06 / Master’s research
Selected Master’s theses
Student research and design
KU Leuven, Faculty of Architecture
Architecture Factory 5.0: [Mobile] Housing Production as Social Innovation
A proposal for co-design platforms and mobile factories through which residents could participate in designing and assembling housing.
Studio coordinators: Burak Pak & Aurélie De Smet
Drawing © Mahdi Ghotbi
The Autonomous City: Possible tangencies of an alternative [right to the] city and affordable mobile housing
A study of temporary use, affordable mobile housing and collective governance, developed for the Circularium site in Brussels.
Studio coordinators: Burak Pak & Aurélie De Smet
Drawing © Vitor Silveira Breder Rocha
Incremental Mobility for Waiting Space Activation
An exploration of how mobile facilities and community organisation could support affordable housing and the temporary use of vacant sites.
Studio coordinators: Burak Pak & Aurélie De Smet
Drawing © Julita Borys
Alleviating youth houselessness by re-using the vacant as temporary housing ↗
An adaptive-reuse proposal for housing and shared spaces in Jette.
Studio coordinators: Burak Pak & Aurélie De Smet
Responsive Mobile Housing: Changing in Response to Change ↗
Housing designed around changing household needs and collective space.
Studio coordinators: Burak Pak & Aurélie De Smet
Discrete Community: Integrated Mobile Housing and Collective Spaces as Co-creative Living ↗
A proposal combining modular construction with community participation.
Studio coordinators: Burak Pak & Aurélie De Smet
Waiting Spaces in Brussels as an Architecture of Solidarity ↗
A study of how vacant urban sites could accommodate shared spaces and encounters between different communities.
Studio coordinators: Burak Pak & Aurélie De Smet
These drawings and project accounts are published in Community Engaged Architectural Design Learning ↗. Each project remains the work of its named student author.
My supervision and co-supervision includes 51 Master’s dissertations. Explore the doctoral research and supervisory teams above →
07 / Applied work
Projects &
collaborations
My applied work includes participatory housing, community-based design and consultancy for public and creative organisations. Research and teaching have often developed through these long-term collaborations.
Solidary Mobile Housing
Residents, civil society organisations and university partners co-developed a model for transitional housing on underused urban land. The work combined participatory design, social guidance and a modular construction system, leading to a pilot of eight housing units and shared space.
Project initiation and research with Aurélie De Smet, Yves Schoonjans, SAAMO Brussel and CAW Brussel.
WoonBox
The first WoonBox pilot introduced ten modular housing units within a vacant building. Burak Pak and Aurélie De Smet organised the design course; Vitor Breder’s selected student proposal was built by Vandereyt Houtskeletbouw and SAAMO Brussels.
Course co-organiser with Aurélie De Smet. Student design: Vitor Breder. Construction: Vandereyt Houtskeletbouw and SAAMO Brussels.
A-Place / A Just Place
Through A-Place, artists, students and communities explored relationships between people and places. Activities in Brussels included work with Foyer Bodegem residents and A Just Expo at Grand Hospice.
KU Leuven project supervisor. A Just Expo was developed through work led by Rosaura Romero and City is our Playground.
ELAZİZ
Elazığ Architecture Gathering
An ongoing programme of architectural discussion and collaborative research in Elazığ. As a member of the organising committee, Burak Pak contributes to a process in which architects, researchers, students and local stakeholders identify questions about the city’s built environment. The opening gathering and participatory workshop took place on 9–10 October 2026.
Organising committee member and speaker. Hosted by the TMMOB Chamber of Architects, Elazığ Branch, with university partners.
Programme & organising partnersConsultancy & professional practice
My consultancy experience includes the Marmara Municipalities Union’s innovation plan, covering 188 municipalities, and advisory work for Wired Pieces and OpenProcessing. I founded the European Spatial Research and Design Accelerator in 2023.
Circular design training
As a certified CIRCO trainer, I bring circular design training into my professional practice. This complements my research and teaching on circular built environments, participation and the continued use of buildings and resources.
08 / Qualifications
Education & professional development
Academic education
- 2009PhD in Architectureİstanbul Technical University
Design activities and decisions in conventional and computer-aided architectural design processes. - 2003MSc in Architectureİstanbul Technical University
Architectural computational design - 2000Bachelor’s in ArchitectureYıldız Technical University
Professional qualifications
- Certified CIRCO TrainerCircular design
- Circular Built Environment SpecialistCircular Economy Institute, London
- Higher Education Learning & TeachingKU Leuven
Certificaat Basiskwalificatie Onderwijs - Associate Professor RecognitionTurkish Interuniversity Board
- Licensed ArchitectChamber of Architects, Türkiye
Executive education & programmes
- McKinsey ForwardProgramme graduate
- 2024Corporate Innovation EcosystemsMIT Sloan School of Management
- 2024Entrepreneurship Acceleration ProgramThe Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
- 2023Artificial Intelligence ProgrammeSaïd Business School, University of Oxford
- 2023Strategic Innovation ProgrammeSaïd Business School, University of Oxford
Further completed courses +
- Circular Economy for a Sustainable Built Environment — Delft University of Technology
- Sustainable Construction in a Circular Economy — Parsons School of Design
- Systems Worldviews: From Sustainability to Regeneration — ETH Zürich
- Stakeholder Collaboration: Organizing for Environmental Justice and Equitable Solutions — University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science
- Stakeholder Outreach: Effective Communication of Complex Environmental Threats — University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science
09 / Background
Academic appointments
- Current
- Associate Professorİstanbul University · Faculty of Architecture
- Aug 2025 – Mar 2026
- Senior Lecturer & Master’s Programme DirectorDeakin University
- Sep 2022 – Mar 2023
- Adjunct ProfessorKU Leuven · Faculty of Architecture
- Sep 2017 – Sep 2022
- Assistant ProfessorKU Leuven · Faculty of Architecture
- 2013 – 2017
- Doctor AssistantKU Leuven · Faculty of Architecture
- 2009 – 2013
- Postdoctoral Research FellowHogeschool voor Wetenschap en Kunst · Sint-Lucas Faculty of Architecture
- 2003 – 2009
- Research Assistantİstanbul Technical University
Academic service
Organiser and chair of eCAADe 2022, “Co-creating the Future”, and lead editor of the 2024 International Journal of Architectural Computing special issue on co-creation and inclusion in and through spatial design.
Contact
Burak Pak
Associate Professor, PhD
İstanbul University · Faculty of Architecture