Just before the holiday, our students took part in a workshop led by Japanese architects experts in disaster reconstruction. Professors Norio Maki of Kyoto University’s Research Centre for Disaster Reduction Systems, Masahiro Sawada of Nagaoka Institute of Design’s Department of Architecture and Environmental Design, and Ikuo Kobayashi of Kobe Yamate University shared their expertise gathered over years of collaborating in the reconstruction efforts after Japan’s most recent and deadly earthquakes. The three professors were accompanied by Moriko Kira, a Japanese architect based in the Netherlands who investigates and spreads best practices in disaster reconstruction.

At the open conference Rebuilding Japan: Lessons in Architectural Response organized by our program and held on December 12 in Barcelona, each of them presented their distinct approach to one of the last three major earthquakes in Japan: Maki’s role in policy-making in the recent Tohoku earthquake, Sawada’s bottom-up approach in the rural case of Nigata, and Kobayashi’s NGO and community-led efforts in the urban case of Kobe. You can read an interview with the professor Norio Maki (in Catalán) published shortly after in El Punt Avui, or the review of the conference published in Spain’s leading El País newspaper (summarized here in English).

Below is a video interview with Norio Maki during his workshop with the master students. (We apologize for the wind interference!)

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