Reuse Isn’t Easy — But It’s Essential
- Frazer Macdonald Hay
- Jun 11
- 2 min read
Adaptive reuse remains one of the most underutilised tools in our architectural and planning toolbox. It’s often poorly executed by architects untrained in reuse, heritage specialists unsure of its place within conservation doctrine, and planners or governments who rarely have access to professionals who specialise in this field.
But adaptive reuse isn’t just relevant in post-conflict contexts. It has massive untapped potential for places recovering from so-called “natural disasters” and in regions facing depopulation, economic decline, or a vague, eroded sense of place.
The key? Contextual reading.Layering values and materials.Acknowledging the past while reimagining relevance. Recognising both local and national connections embedded within the fabric of a building.
We have to stop reducing adaptive reuse to the tired formula of “put a café in it.” Not every cultural heritage site needs to become a shop, library, or art gallery. Gentrification might generate short-term returns, but it rarely delivers long-term resilience.
I know what you're thinking: OK Frazer, so what’s the alternative?
My answer: hybrid spaces.Architectural programs that combine functions, shift across time scales, and activate space in dynamic, layered ways.
Stop treating heritage as a daytime economy. Embrace 24-hour thinking. Embed smart city technologies—IoT, monitoring, data, fabrication labs, AI—not to overwrite meaning, but to granularise it, link it, animate it.
Let some parts remain in ruin or decay.Use only fragments of the space.Curate the building as an urban artefact, a social exhibit, a conceptual playground.Dissemble it—philosophically, physically, poetically—and distil it down to what’s truly significant.
Our buildings deserve more—from us as professionals, from the communities that surround them, and from the systems that claim to serve them.
#AdaptiveReuse #ArchitecturalHeritage #CulturalHeritage #ReuseNotDemolish #HistoricBuildings #PlaceBasedDesign
#HybridSpaces #SmartCityDesign #UrbanInnovation #FutureOfCities #DesignForChange #UrbanRevitalization
#DesignThinking #CriticalHeritage #SpatialJustice #MemoryAndPlace #PostConflictRecovery #DecolonisingDesign
