The provision of Affordable Housing in our cities is central to delivering the UN Sustainable Development Goals and for people to continue to thrive in our cities through a period of urbanisation.  The challenge is unprecedented. We are facing rapid and unplanned urbanisation, climate change together with an energy crisis and rising cost of living, migration, and the financialization of housing.

The first edition of the Norman Foster Foundation’s Public Debates on Cities: Affordable Housing took place Wednesday 16 November 2022 with the support of the Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction. It tackled the challenges and potential solutions to provide affordable housing in cities of different contexts globally.

With a fiveminute keynote and debate between the following experts:

Peter van Assche, Founding Principal, bureau SLA, Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Chairman, Committee for Architectural Review and Monuments, Utrecht, the Netherlands
Tatiana Bilbao, Principal, Tatiana Bilbao Estudio, Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico
Jonathan Ledgard, Founder, Rossums Studio, Lausanne, Switzerland; Director, Afrotech Future Africa Initiative (AfrotechEPFL), Ècole Polytchnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPLF), Lausanne, Switzerland
Stuart Smith, Director, Arup Germany, Berlin, Germany
Maria Vassilakou, Former Vice Mayor, Vienna, Austria

And ae conversation between the two Pritzkerrecipients:

Alejandro Aravena, Executive Director, ELEMENTAL, Santiago, Chile; ELEMENTAL Copec Chair, Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile
Norman Foster, President, Norman Foster Foundation