Build Equal

In the Design Group's part of the Build Equal project - run by Luleå University of Technology together with actors in the construction industry with the support of the Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth and the regions of Norr- and Västerbotten 2025-2027 - we focus on how spaces and built environments can be designed and experienced as inclusive through design.

The project aims to strengthen the supply of skills in a traditionally male-dominated industry by creating workplaces and environments that do not reproduce exclusionary social norms but instead open up for diversity, participation and innovation.

Our contribution is to develop knowledge and methods for how atmospheres, spatial structures and interior experiences play a role in the experience of inclusion. In other words, it is about functional aspects of building and interior such as light, sound and materiality, as well as how spaces "feel", how they invite or hinder, how materials, light, sound, orientation, social zones and flows shape the "welcoming power" of the perceived space. Our case involves the ACE Powerhouse on the Skellefteå campus, where our role is particularly relevant in the new research and education environment that will serve as a hub for electrification, collaboration and future building.

In practice, our part in Build Equal means working with mapping and analyzing existing environments and planned spaces with a focus on how social norms - gender, age, ethnicity, disability - are expressed or invisible in the interior, choice of materials, furniture and flows. It also includes method development for participatory workshops and co-creative processes where different groups are involved in formulating the spatial and atmospheric conditions that make them feel included or not. It involves "design labs" where we test different spatial scenarios and thereby develop knowledge about how our environments can be designed for well-being and inclusion.

ACE Powerhouse offers a concrete arena where social and climate sustainability are both values to fulfill and crucial conditions for the house to function as the meeting place for research, education and innovation for everyone it is intended to be. In our work, we want to contribute to ACE Powerhouse becoming a spatial model for inclusion. This means that all aspects of spatiality (physical, sensory, cognitive, ecological, systemic, social, ethical), visibility, choice and representation become central. By exploring how this can be embodied through materiality, orientation and furnishing and how it affects people's experiences, we can develop guidelines and scenarios that the construction industry and others can use in future projects.

• Build equal (entire project)
• ACE