Office

Mission

1010 architecture urbanism

… is a design office for architecture and urbanism: our work unmistakably stems from the rich background and history of these branches of knowledge. In practice, we often look beyond the current day boundaries of these disciplines from the ambition to contribute to a holistic urban experience.

… regards its surroundings with an inclusive gaze. We are open to the multiplicity of voices that inhabit our towns and cities, including the often unheard cries from the physical environment (water, soil, energy and matter); the driving forces for our future.

… as practitioners with one foot in academia, we impersonate a research-based attitude with great curiosity, always on top of the latest developments in the field.

The work of 1010 is the result of an ongoing creative process: rooted in the places we design, engaged with users and residents, aware of the aspect of time as key ingredient of the spatial project – the time for the minds to mature, the momentum, the time to let something grow and build.

partners:

BERT GELLYNCK

Graduated in Architecture (1999, st. Lucas Gent) and Urbanism & Spatial Planning (2005, KU Leuven). Before starting 1010au in 2012 with Nadia Casabella, I gathered a diverse and colourful experience in architecture, furniture design, artistic practices, landscape design and urbanism in Belgium and abroad. These explorative years were extremely valuable and still influence my holistic perspective on the daily design practice. Between 2000 and 2012, I was a freelance author for various architecture magazines, such as Archis, A+, Mark magazine, Ruimte. Between 2006 and 2023, I became an Assistant Professor at the Univeristy of Gent, faculty of architecture and urban planning, where I was tutoring design studios related to urban design and transition questions. In 2013 I was appointed as Guest Professor at the architecture faculty of RISEBA in Riga (Latvia). My long experience as a writer and teacher gave me the opportunity to reflect upon the many societal and environmental forces that influence the field of architecture and urban design. Whereas my diverse teaching experience activated strong pedagogic skills that have proven to be useful in both the world of academia and practice. Between 2018 and 2022 I was an external member of “Stadsatelier Oostende”, a quality chamber that provides advise about architecture and planning issues for the city of Oostende. I am a registered member of the Order of Architects.

NADIA CASABELLA

Graduated as Engineer Architect (1997, Barcelona Polytechnic University) and Urban and Regional Planning (2005, London School of Economics). While graduating, I went for an Erasmus exchange to the Landscape School in Versailles and started working as a critic for specialized publications. Shortly after, I changed words by stones and moved to an abandoned village in the mountains to reconstruct it into seasonal lodges. These two experiences, the confrontation to the living and its dynamics, and the need to muddling through material scarcity to make architecture, defined my professional career afterwards. I moved abroad to Rotterdam: the absolute place to be at the turn of the century, overflowing abundance in every respect. I stayed there for five years, then returned to Barcelona to pursue and academic career. Coming back was confronting: the "Barcelona school" I had been trained within fell shortly faced to contemporary urban questions: immigration, poverty, climate change, resource exhaustion... Decided to move on, applied for a scholarship at the London School of Economics to further my education. London became another turning point, allowing anyone to look big, bigger... and to complexify our understanding of cities. Afterward, I moved back to Holland, The Hague, worked on a regional think tank for three years (Atelier Zuidvleugel). Started commuting to Brussels, where I eventually settled down, first as a researcher (Cosmopolis), then as an educator at university (ULB Faculty of Architecture). After the 2008 collapse, it became evident that business-as-usual would reign over unless everyone, in a collective endeavour, would start doing things differently. In 2012, my life partner (Bert Gellynck) and I started 1010 architecture urbanism, aiming to contribute, if only modestly, to a more regenerative and inclusive transition, by adopting a systemic approach to urban design and planning. **

Collaborators:

MATHIAS HAUWAERT, Master Eng. Architecture, UCLouvain

GIULIA RAVERA, Master Architecture, Politecnico di Torino

ANOUK ROGER, Master Architecture, ENSAB Rennes

VINCENT VAN PRAET, Master Eng. Architecture, KULeuven