Every year, the Colombian Society of Architects convenes representatives, experts, and special guests to address pressing issues related to everyday architecture. At this year's Colombian Congress of Architecture and Urbanism, the overarching framework was defined by the concept of "social architecture."
This highly relevant topic, both in Latin America and globally, maintained a strong focus on sustainable construction throughout the event. Here, sustainability is understood as a multidisciplinary concept that balances environmental, social, and economic factors within the architectural field.
Throughout much of the congress, special attention was paid to strengthening communities socially by fostering civic activities through the adaptive reuse, recovery, and revalorization of deteriorated public spaces. According to Juan Miguel Duran Vélez, an architect and urban planner experienced in developing strategic visions for sustainable territorial development and participatory processes for community infrastructure, "remedial urbanism and the urban acupuncture we have become such experts in are the result of poorly planned urbanism."
