Urban future-making

Funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) and jointly organized by the University of Hamburg (UHH), HafenCity University Hamburg (HCU) and Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH).
Project Term: 2026 - 2031 (second funding phase)

Our mission is to investigate the agency of built environment professionals in the face of pressing challenges for transformative change.

Urban areas have become crucial sites where aspired pathways towards desirable futures are imagined, forecasted, and variably negotiated. Through the lens of ‘urban future-making’, the research training group explores the activities of experts and administrators responding to expected threats and risks to urban societies through measures related to the built environment. The central question is whether reflexive and responsible professional agency in urban future-making is possible under present conditions of heightened uncertainty and multiple crises.

For more information, visit the Urban Future-Making website.