Project
Living Summer School offers students from across Europe the opportunity to participate in an informal learning experience focused on different aspects of territorial innovation since 2020. Each year, the program centers around a specific urban planning and design theme, addressing the need to rethink how we live, build, and engage with our environment.
The first edition of the summer school focused on waterscapes, while the second explored social space. The third edition was dedicated to makeshift interventions, and this year’s theme delves into the concept of repair as a transformative force for sustaining and rejuvenating environments. In an era defined by limited resources and increasing environmental degradation, repair has taken on critical significance.
To encourage the cross of knowledge and enrich the reflections, the Living Summer School created a constellation of partenaire from Kortrijk to all of Europe. In alignment with their ideas about learning, building, and living together, Constructlab and Fablab Torino were invited to participate in the organization of the fourth edition. The summerschool was hosted in Kortrijk, supported by local partners like Bolwerk, Heerlijkheid van Heule, and Wildebras. Each of them worked with a group of participants on various projects. To stay connected across different locations, Soundcamp, an art cooperative that works on transmission ecologies—from DIY broadcasting devices to public sound and radio projects—was invited. They taught us how to build our soundbox to stay in touch with the sounds of the various Summer School locations in a radio format.
In addition to the core activities, this year’s program included a parallel conference that brought together European educators and youth workers outside the traditional academic sphere. This conference aimed to share knowledge and insights into informal education across various fields, further enhancing the learning experience offered by the summer school.
This week at Bolwerk focused on repairing a container for Bolwerk’s garden!
The organization of this container was chaotic, so we kicked off the week with a major cleanup. Once that was done, the Bolwerk team moved on to brainstorming ideas for the transformation and quickly put them into action. Servaas, one of Bolwerk’s founders, Jonas, who occasionally works in the workshop, and Arthur from Constructlab organized the week’s activities, streamlining access to the machines by teaching participants how to use them for tasks like cutting wood and metal, welding, and even creating custom tools. Together with the participants, they transformed the container into an organized garden shed.
An intense week full of emotions and informal learning, ending on a high note.
Wildebras, an association that grew out of LZSB (which experiments in public spaces), researches and experiments on how wild play can fit within the city of Kortrijk. Spaces and materials are explored, tested, and adjusted. The headquarters of Wildebras: ‘De Wildernis’
‘ De Wildernis’ is hidden in a forest on an island in the Gebroeders Van Raemdonckpark, an important natural site in the middle of the city.
This island was made accessible through Wildebras in 2016, and since then, it has developed into an open, public space where children can play and explore freely.
De Wildernis is an “Adventure Construction Playground.” It is a heaven for children. Getting dirty, jumping in puddles, climbing trees, using hammers, nails, and pallets, making fire, … all of this is allowed. Children can experiment freely in a controlled environment.
This week’s leading questions were: How can we document the knowledge this island holds? And how do wild play and protecting nature go together?
The most important part of our experience was discovering the philosophy behind this space. The best way to understand a “wild play” area was to unlearn our adult habits and act like children—playing games, making fires, and climbing trees. This hands-on approach helped us gain deeper insights. We gathered input from locals and non-locals about the trees, soil, history of the island, documenting, etc.
The knowledge we gained throughout the week was shared through small interventions and invitations around the island, encouraging further exploration and stimulating wild play.
Repair – Reuse – Restore – Regenerate
The goal was working on social relations and the ecosystem in a place, the Heerlijkheid farm, that is an important actor in the local community. This edition of the summer school was about creating an experimental living environment where construction becomes a tool of togetherness, and a way to connect with the ecosystem – human or not- of the farm.
Through the repairing and reuse of your trailer from 2023’s edition, we were able to build a new place to meet. Besides, we worked on how to connect with the farm’s volunteer. Through our research concerning the social camping the farm is about to install, we create a tool to let everyone draw ideas and participate in this project that will last for months. The project was completed by a third part : toilets again ! We did a separate unit, movable, that can be install depending on the needs.
Thanx to everyone who participated:
Alba Carbajo Cano, Alessia Liscia, Ana Spagnolo, Ariane Caillaud, Arthur Bed, Bashar Maharmeh, Bernadetta Budzik, Billie Rivière, Cristina Macelli, Damiano Frison, Daniel Sars, Diego Bonilla, Elena Falomo, Elise Julie Avet, Eric Tron Gianet, Georgie Grantham, Grant Smith, Ines Wassermann, Jadd Hallaj, Jan Stricker, Jeanne Faucoup, Jonas Bohez, Julian Ortega Martinez, Julie Merlino, Kathleen Vandamme, Louise Lafage, Lucas Devolder, Manon Lambeens, Margot Cossart, Marta Doroteja Lekaviciute, Melanie Pouhaer, Miguel Lallana, Mila Betemps, Mort Drew, Nawel Bennabi, Oisin Tully, Oriol Pinell, Pablo del Pozo del Olmo, Pjotr Vandierendonck, Robbe Verschure, Romane Nembrini, Ruben Benoit, Sasha Baraitser Smith, Servaas Benoit, Siene Vanesser, Simon Verschelde, Stan Van Mirlo, Théo Finkel, Valentijn.
