Move a little closer, people !

How do we transform, rather than extend, the sprawling residential landscapes that have shaped our cities for 150 years?

Susanne Eliasson, co-founder of GRAU and Bordeaux’s Lead Consulting Architect, introduces the concept of the “Garden Metropolis” to rethink proximity between people through landscape and architecture. Drawing on research and projects across different urban contexts, she outlines new strategies for the climate-conscious city of tomorrow. Join us to see how architecture can bring us closer together.

Susanne Eliasson is a Swedish-French architect and co-founder of GRAU, a Paris-based practice working at the intersection of architecture, urbanism and landscape, which she leads together with partner Anthony Jammes. Since 2021, she has served as City’s Lead Consulting Architect in Bordeaux, advising the municipality on all architectural and urban projects related to the municipality.

GRAU focuses on the contemporary metropolis and how we can transform it collectively: through large-scale urban visions, housing and living prototypes, writing, exhibitions and public discussions on the city. The office’s research on 20th-century horizontal urbanism led to the publication Apprendre de Caudéran (2017) and the exhibition Métropole Jardin – Garden Metropolis, presented at arc en rêve centre d’architecture in Bordeaux in 2022.

Susanne received the Young Planners Award from the French Ministry of Housing in 2016 and was the first resident of Villa Albertine in Chicago (2022). She is currently Guest Professor at EPFL Lausanne.

GRAU architects and urban designers

AUDITORIUM 26/27

Lecture series about architecture and urban planning.

NEW! – the idea that true innovation often stems from rediscovering old knowledge, forgotten materials and overlooked
perspectives.

What do we really mean by ‘new’? Maybe we have experienced it before? Perhaps genuine innovation lies not in the unprecedented, but in rethinking what we have left behind. Not as nostalgia, but as a fresh understanding of knowledge, materials and practices — and how they can reshape what we build, make and think.