Introduction: In recent decades, there has been a rise in mental illnesses. Community infrastructures are increasingly acknowledged as important for sustaining good mental health. Moreover, green spaces are anticipated to offer advantages for both mental health and social cohesion. However, the mediating pathway between green space, social cohesion and mental health and especially the proximity and characteristics of green spaces that trigger these potential effects remain of interest. Methods: We gathered data from 1365 individuals on self-reported social cohesion and mental health across four satellite districts in European cities: Nantes (France), Porto (Portugal), Sofia (Bulgaria), and Høje-Taastrup (Denmark). Green space data from OpenStreetMap was manually adjusted using the PRIGSHARE guidelines. We used the AID-PRIGSHARE tool to generate 7 indicators about green space characteristics measured in distances from 100–1500 m, every 100 m. This resulted in 105 different green space variables that we tested in a single mediation model with structural equation modelling. Results: Accessible greenness (900–1400 m), accessible green spaces (900–1500 m), accessible green space corridors (300–800 m), accessible total green space (300−800), and mix of green space uses (700–1100 m) were significantly associated with social cohesion and indirectly with mental health. Green corridors also showed negative indirect and direct associations with mental health in larger distances. Surrounding greenness and the quantity of green space uses were not associated with social cohesion nor indirectly with mental health. We also observed no positive direct associations between any green space variable in any distance to mental health. Conclusions: Our results suggest that accessibility, connectivity, mix of use and proximity are key characteristics that drive the relationship between green spaces, social cohesion and mental health. This gives further guidance to urban planners and decision-makers on how to design urban green spaces to foster social cohesion and improve mental health.

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The conference “Conventional to Experimental—Mass Housing and Prefabrication” on which this volume is based was hosted by the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, DOCOMOMO Israel, DOCOMOMO Germany, and the EU COST-Action Middle Class Mass Housing (MCMH-EU) and held online on June 14 and 15, 2021. Mass housing and prefabrication are both recurring themes in architectural academic research and discourse, as well as prominent subjects in the daily debates on housing shortages and possible solutions for providing affordable and quality lodging in the near term. Today, the connection between prefabrication—a field of engineering— and mass housing worldwide is as real as it was in the early days of the modern movement in the interwar period. As early as in the 1920s, prefabrication was one of the solutions proposed by modern architects to answer the housing shortage and to provide affordable homes in Europe after World War I.@en

In 2022, Docomomo International launched a call for papers on Modern Movement in Ukraine together with Docomomo Ukraine. More than 20 proposals were received, most of them from authors based in Ukraine itself—despite the difficult circumstances. The Docomomo Journal 67 presented a first selection of those articles to display regional and architectural particularities and current challenges of archiving, documenting, protecting, and preserving the modern heritage. Nearly 100 examples of Ukrainian modern buildings were presented in a graphical overview. The modern Ukranian architecture was dominated by Constructivism from the mid-1920s to the early 1930s, with Kharkiv as the epicenter of production, while Socialist Realism with the Stalin Empire emerged from 1932, lasting until 1955, with Kyiv as the capital of Ukraine. From December 1919 to January 1934, Kharkiv was the first capital of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic and the cultural, economic, and educational center of the new Ukrainian Republic. The status as new capital led to prestigious master plans and construction projects, among them the world-famous Derzhprom building at Freedom Square–as a symbol of Constructivism–or the Kharkiv Tractor Factory–as a symbol of the industrialization of agriculture. The leading role of Kharkiv as a forerunner and capital of Constructivism is often expressed by the famous State Industry House (Derzhprom) built from 1925 to 1928. Being the only modern ensemble in Ukraine nominated as UNESCO World Heritage, it became and still is the focus of identification and pride—despite the many controversial reflections and discussions about the conservation efforts and changes carried out since the original construction in the 1950s and after the year 2000. This explains the many articles dealing with Freedom Square and Dherzprom as a reaction to the call for papers in 2022 and also Docomomo International’s commitment to dedicate this special issue of the Docomomo Journal to Kharkiv under the title From Constructivism to Modernism in Kharkiv.@en

Exploring the influence of green space characteristics and proximity on health via air pollution mitigation, our study analysed data from 1,365 participants across Porto, Nantes, Sofia, and Høje-Taastrup. Utilizing OpenStreetMap and the AID-PRIGSHARE tool, we generated nine green space indicators around residential addresses at 15 distances, ranging from 100m to 1500m. We performed a mediation analysis for these 135 green space variables and revealed significant associations between self-rated air pollution and self-rated health for specific green space characteristics. In our study, indirect positive effects on health via air pollution were mainly associated with green corridors in intermediate Euclidean distances (800-1,000m) and the amount of accessible green spaces in larger network distances (1,400–1,500m). Our results suggest that the amount of connected green spaces measured in intermediate surroundings seems to be a prime green space characteristic that could drive the air pollution mitigation pathway to health.@en

Introduction: Non-communicable diseases are the global disease burden of our time, with physical inactivity identified as one major risk factor. Green spaces are associated with increased physical activity of nearby residents. But there are still gaps in understanding which proximity and what characteristics of green spaces can trigger physical activity. This study aims to unveil these differences with a rigorous sensitivity analysis. Methods: We gathered data on self-reported health and physical activity from 1365 participants in selected neighbourhoods in Porto, Nantes, Sofia, and Høje-Taastrup. Spatial data were retrieved from OpenStreetMap. We followed the PRIGSHARE guidelines to control for bias. Around the residential addresses, we generated seven different green space indicators for 15 distances (100–1500 m) using the AID-PRIGSHARE tool. We then analysed each of these 105 green space indicators together with physical activity and health in 105 adjusted structural equation models. Results: Green space accessibility and green space uses indicators showed a pattern of significant positive associations to physical activity and indirect to health at distances of 1100 m or less, with a peak at 600 m for most indicators. Greenness in close proximity (100 m) had significant positive effects on physical activity and indirect effects on health. Surrounding greenness showed positive direct effects on health at 500–1100 m and so do green corridors in 800 m network distance. In contrast, a high quantity of green space uses, and surrounding greenness measured in a larger radius (1100–1500 m) showed a negative relationship with physical activity and indirect health effects. Conclusions: Our results provide insight into how green space characteristics can influence health at different scales, with important implications for urban planners on how to integrate accessible green spaces into urban structures and public health decision-makers on the ability of green spaces to combat physical inactivity.

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Docomomo International is proud to present the results of the international project Shared Heritage Africa: Rediscovering Masterpieces and other selected papers from our call for papers Shared Heritage Africa – Campuses, published in December 2022. The SHA project itself, coordinated by Docomomo Germany, focused on rediscovering post-war modern buildings from the 1950s-1980s in the partner countries Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda, and Rwanda. This period of independence from colonial rule, from the United Kingdom (Ghana 1957, Nigeria 1960, and Uganda 1962) and from Belgium (Rwanda 1962), has a great socio-political significance and influence on the educational systems and buildings. The rediscovery of this heritage focuses on exploring the values, challenges, and opportunities through the eyes of their contemporary users. Concentrating on the post-war modern buildings constructed after indepen-dence from colonial rule, the project celebrated projects that are situated at the periphery of the architectural discourse and, therefore, seldom documented despite their social, economic, and political significance.@en

In the interdisciplinary field of green space health research, there is a demand to reduce the effort to assess green space, especially for non-spatial disciplines. To address this issue, we developed AID-PRIGSHARE, an open-source script that automates over 400 QGIS processes to substantially reduces the time-intensive task of generating green space indicators. AID-PRIGSHARE calculates greenness, public green space, access to green infrastructure, and green space uses within distances of 100–1500 m around geolocations. This substantially reduces the effort for sensitivity analysis and may provide support for research that aims to understand the impact of different green space features and distances on health outcomes.

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After the two 2022-issues of the Docomomo Journal, number 66 on ‘Modern Plastic Heritage’ and number 67 on ‘Multiple Modernisms in Ukraine,’ this issue reveals another chapter of an often and diversely described theme of Modern Movement and a pressing subject worldwide: Housing.@en

MCMH has been generally underestimated in urban and architectural studies, and there is still a lack of comparative analysis and global perspectives. From 2019 to today, the COST Action Middle-Class Mass Housing in Europe (MCMH-EU) has created a transnational network among researchers conducting studies on MCMH sites in Europe since the 1950s. The Action aims to develop a more comprehensive understanding of MCMH sprawl in cities and deepen the knowledge by focusing on the existing cases, public policies, new concepts and research methodologies. Besides the current methods, surveys, and contextualisation that allow us to map the existing cases, the Action also aims to show the diversity and resilience of MCMH in terms of adapting to the current urban and social conditions.@en

Reconstruction and recovery of historic cities after destruction due to conflict or natural disasters have gained increasing relevance in the last decades. The investigation of international examples of recovery after war or natural catastrophic events can provide knowledge for improving guidance and strategies for sustainable reconstruction/ intervention in similar cases in the future. This paper aims to identify and analyze the legal, administrative, social, and economic factors that can favor the reconstruction and recovery processes of the historic city and its residential neighborhoods. An extensive review of international examples and literature on guidance has been conducted to provide insight into best practices and potential solutions. As a result, a set of lessons learned that can be used to address post-conflict and post-disaster recovery and reconstruction in similar situations is given.@en

The relationship between green spaces and health is attracting more and more societal and research interest. The research field is however still suffering from its differing monodisciplinary origins. Now in a multidisciplinary environment on its way to a truly interdisciplinary field, there is a need for a common understanding, precision in green space indicators, and coherent assessment of the complexity of daily living environments. In several reviews, common protocols and open-source scripts are considered a high priority to advance the field. Realizing these issues, we developed PRIGSHARE (Preferred Reporting Items in Greenspace Health Research). It is accompanied by an open-source script that supports non-spatial disciplines in assessing greenness and green space on different scales and types. The PRIGSHARE checklist contains 21 items that have been identified as a risk of bias and are necessary for understanding and comparison of studies. The checklist is divided into the following topics: objectives (3 items), scope (3 items), spatial assessment (7 items), vegetation assessment (4 items), and context assessment (4 items). For each item, we include a pathway-specific (if relevant) rationale and explanation. The PRIGSHARE guiding principles should be helpful to support a high-quality assessment and synchronize the studies in the field while acknowledging the diversity of study designs.

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The COST-Action (CA 18137) on Middle Class Mass Housing in Europe (MCMH-EU) has established a transnational scientific network to document the productions of middle-class mass housing built in Europe since the 1950s in order to investigate this specific topic and share knowledge. Considering that middle-class mass housing dominates most of our cities, the research translates into the study of the extensive development of cities in Europe after World War II. The breadth of the theme and the differences between the countries make it difficult to construct a systematic and unified criticism of middle-class mass housing, albeit concentrating on the post­war period. The COST-Action has the goal to build a network to gather research representing the pooled knowledge and experiences from the network of multidisciplinary researchers. So, transversally throughout the Working Groups, an inventory of case studies, a collection of articles, and studies on the policies were produced. This paper elaborates on the collected and produced material and data in order to trigger comparisons and reflections on the approaches and methodologies to face the complexity of middle-class mass housing topic. The comparison was built by using different methods intersecting multiple points of view and following specific thematic tracks that seek to deconstruct the complexity of the middle-class mass housing topic into singular aspects. This paper presents the results of data analyses, visualisation techniques and comparative studies to identify massification processes, morphological structures, demographic and policy developments. It shows a combination of several methods to build a cross-sectional and systematic approach to the diverse knowledge envisioned to develop a methodology for future research. This can be especially useful for future developments and insights towards joint or individual European guidelines, laws and policies to improve the dilapidated housing stock, current housing situation and to compete the housing crisis in general.

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Purpose: Housing interventions carried out in accordance with current regulations in the Old City of Aleppo, both before and after the Syrian war, are minor in comparison to those carried out without a license and illegally. This suggests current policies are inadequate and needs upgrading. Design/methodology/approach: This article critically reviews current Syrian policies and their implementation on residential heritage in the Old City of Aleppo with the aim to identify gaps and propose directions for modifications. Next to a review of the text of official policies and implementation documents, the archive of the Directorate of the Old City has been consulted and license applications, presented in the period 2018–2022, have been examined. Moreover, interviews with decision-makers from academics and practice were conducted. Findings: Major limitations of these policies and relative application procedures have been identified: these involve: legal/administrative, economic and social aspects. Originality/value: The specific needs have been highlighted and some proposals for improvement made.

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The Modern Movement encompasses a diverse collection of both iconic and ordinary treasures of architecture worldwide, among which some are safeguarded with respect to their values, while others were demolished, have undergone alterations, neglect, or lack of maintenance and preservation over time. Docomomo has been playing a pivotal role in documenting and safeguarding significant architectural works of the 20th century. Its National and Regional Working Parties (WPs), spread across the globe, have diligently compiled archives of photographs, drawings, historical records, and research materials related to Modern Movement architecture, town planning and landscape design. However, the decentralized nature of these archives poses challenges in terms of accessibility, coordination, and attaining a more comprehensive record of the Modern Movement with a global perspective. Therefore, this study undertakes the explorative task of compiling data from these separate online-available archives of the WPs to attain a broader overview of the documented objects of Modern Movement architecture on a global-scale. The collected data is analyzed to identify patterns, trends, and influential architects and to elaborate on the potential factors contributing to the current status. The study involves analysis of the predominant format of building use/function among documented architectural works, examination of the geographical and chronological coverage of available lists, and the distribution of intervention status within the inventory. These aspects provide valuable insights into the functional diversity, geographic spread, and preservation status of architectural works documented in the dispersed archives. This study also facilitates comparative studies between different regions and countries, shedding light on the shared characteristics and unique contributions of the Modern Movement across diverse cultural contexts. The results help identify trends, gaps, and areas of focus for future research and documentation efforts, ensuring the holistic appreciation of architectural works, and contributing to the scholarly understanding and preservation of this modern heritage.

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The article presents the potentials and capacities of extracurricular activities such as student workshops for strengthening existing curricula and introducing emerging specialised areas, topics, and challenges into architectural higher education. The specific objective of this study is to enhance and test different pedagogical models for learning on the sustainable rehabilitation of mass housing neighbourhoods (MHN), as a specific type of modern heritage, through innovative extracurricular teaching practices based on interdisciplinarity, flexibility, and adaptability. This research presents three student workshops focusing on the rehabilitation of mass housing neighbourhoods (MHN), involving students, academics, and professionals from the field, organised in Germany, Serbia, and North Macedonia in 2022. Moreover, it engages a comparative analysis of the learning formats and approaches developed within this discipline-specific cross-border collaboration. The study provides (1) an insight into the comparative analysis of learning capabilities and (2) the formulation of workshop models supported by diagramming of the workshop structure. The conclusion of the article summarises the findings and highlights the essential aspects for engaging student workshops, as an instrument for generating operational knowledge in the field of mass housing rehabilitation.@en

In an era of rapid architectural evolution, the preservation of architectural heritage, particularly that of the Modern Movement, stands as a paramount challenge. This contribution aims to showcase the collaboration between Architectuul, an open data architecture community, and Docomomo International, a global non-profit organisation dedicated to the documentation and conservation of buildings, sites and neighbourhoods of the Modern Movement, which is present with national working parties in 79 countries. Since 1990, Docomomo International has been collecting, researching, and documenting information of over a thousand Modern Movement buildings in systematic ‘building fiches’, part of which have been published in the Docomomo Journal, biannual international conference proceedings, and several book publications in English and other languages. Consequently, Docomomo has established itself nationally and internationally as a point of reference and partner for organisations like ICOMOS, UIA or the Getty Conservation Institute. Nevertheless, only a fraction of this rich material is readily accessible in digital form, and over the years, Docomomo has recognised the critical and challenging task of building a sustainable, continually updated, cost-efficient, and openly accessible archive to disseminate this architectural knowledge further across geographies and cultures, beyond the printed versions and local digital repositories.@en

Industrial heritage is among the products of modern urban development, and the influencing factors of its regeneration and development are often complex. Due to different national conditions, the research progress and approaches in industrial heritage reuse in China are different from other countries. While industrial heritage sites in Europe have become part of urban redevelopment in several regions, China still focuses mostly on single objects, lacking systematic analysis, especially at the urban scale. Regarding the city of Nanjing, an operational approach to complex urban dynamics is proposed based on a simplified analysis of official statistics, maps and GIS technology. The influence mechanisms of Nanjing’s urban planning on industrial heritage regeneration and development after 1990 are analyzed. The results show that urban growth boundaries, traffic accessibility, eco-environmental policies, population distribution, industrial renovation investment and natural resource change all have a significant impact on the abandonment and regeneration of Nanjing industrial heritage. This study expands the research perspective of industrial heritage reuse in China and proposes a clearer systematic planning strategy for the future of industrial heritage in cities.

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The Conference and Communication (ConCom) course at the Detmold School of Architecture and Interior Architecture (TH OWL) introduces students in the master‘s program to scientific work and pursues the goal of establishing a correlation between teaching and research. In particular, it is about conveying current knowledge and new findings in the form of the so-called non-written output (NWO) or non-traditional research output (NTRO). ConCom tests innovative teaching and learning formats at the intersection of scholarly research and outreach in the field of the built environment, with a particular focus on cultural heritage, digital technology, and their societal impact. This has enabled the 40 students from many nations to conduct cross-cultural and cross-sectoral research in interdisciplinary and international teams. This diverse and low-threshold form of explorative dissemination increases the visibility of research findings and promotes their inclusive communication. In the academic year 2021/22, the ConCom course took up the topic of the 19th DOCOMOMO Germany Conference “Modern Movement. Industrial Heritage thought ahead” organised in collaboration with Zollverein UNESCO World Heritage Site in Essen. The students were asked to research, document and interpret the topic of industrial heritage based on scientific articles, reports and publications (e.g. related to history, typologies, distribution, design, aesthetics and construction, spaces, transformation and reuse). Building on a literature review in the pre-semester, students choose specific topics related to modern industrial heritage and developed their theme in the context of the scientific conference. Complementing the contributions in the conference, ConCom served as a platform for students to explore Modern Movement’s (MoMo) achievements around the world, but also to explore digital tools and their applicability for communicating research results (Fig. 1). On display are websites, apps, films as well as applications of 360 degree images, augmented and virtual reality and as such they are aiming to contribute to the DOCOMOMO Virtual Exhibition – MoMove (MoMove 2021).@en

When moving the Docomomo Headquarters to Delft in January 2022, it announced a new cycle of the Docomomo journal by turning the journal fully open access and by introducing a peer-review process. This allows for further scientific indexation of the journal and attracting a wider range of authors. In September 2022 the Docomomo Journal was indexed by Scopus and the issues 1-65 from 1990-2021 are available online in our Docomomo journal Archive. Since then, the Docomomo Journal 66 on Modern Plastic Heritage was published and with this Docomomo Journal 67 we are approaching the country that has dominated our political and cultural discussions in 2022: Ukraine. In January 2022 it was not predictable that national autonomy, human lives and cultural heritage are threatened and destroyed by Russian aggression that started on 24th February 2022. In March of this year, Docomomo International published the Solidarity Statement on Ukraine and has since then been working on this special issue on the Multiple Modernities in Ukraine.@en