IABR-

IABR–2020

The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned us in the fall of 2018 that to avoid catastrophe, human societies have 12 years to completely transform the way we use energy and land.
Change is urgently needed and on a scale for which ‘there is no documented historical precedent’. That is why IABR–2020 starts from the premise that we are facing the deepest crisis in human memory. And that we have no time to waste. Can we transform our urban landscapes and living environments, comprehensively and democratically, with time for serious reflection on how we do it and for whom– while doing it?

Water and Energy Transition
IABR–2020, having as its provisional working title Down to Earth, will focus on two immense challenges, energy transition and water –too much, too little, too dirty. We approach them as levers, that is, they are not only challenges for which we have to find solutions, they are also leverage for the transformative comprehensive change of our urban landscapes, and for learning new ways to inhabit the Earth.

Curator Team
To address these issues, from the global level to that of the urban quarter, a new curatorial team has been appointed.
Sarah Ichioka has been appointed curator for Water as Leverage, and Thijs van Spaandonk curator for Energy Transition as Leverage.
As in 2012 (5th IABR, Making City) George Brugmans will chair the curator team. He wrote an open letter to the curators in which he outlined the challenges and starting points.
The curators will work closely together with a small group of co-curators. One of them is Robbert de Vrieze, co-curator in and on behalf of the Bospolder-Tussendijken, the city district in Rotterdam where the IABR–Atelier Rotterdam explores the concept of the “energy district” and that will be one of two locations where IABR will manifest itself in 2020.
Other co-curators will be appointed after the Summer.

THE MISSING LINK – a diptych
Arguing that spatial design is crucial leverage, the IABR–2018+2020–THE MISSING LINK focuses on the question of how we can effectively realize the urgent acceleration and scaling of the transition to a resilient future. Initially, in 2017 and 2018, we concentrated on the Delta of the Low Lands, among many other things by establishing and implementing collaborative research projects with partners, provinces and municipalities in the Netherlands and in Belgium. What and how can design contribute to our future in the delta?
Click here to read more about IABR–2018.

In 2020 we will not just focus on our own Delta, but reconnect the IABR to the world; building, for instance, on the Water as Leverage/Asia practice, spearheaded by Henk Ovink, and that IABR co-initiated.
More information about IABR–2020, about plans, planning and approach, follows after the summer when the Curator Statement and Open Call will be published.

The New Normal?
Family in flood water, Semarang, Indonesia

© Beit Emmett

M4H+BoTu
IABR–2020 will take place in the autumn of 2020, to be able to connect to the International Climate Adaptation Action Summit that will be hosted by The Netherlands, with much of the action happening in Rotterdam.
The most important locations of IABR–2020 are the Merwe-Vierhavens area (M4H) and Bospolder-Tussendijken (BoTu): a city harbor that is a breeding ground for the new circular economy, and a vulnerable and culturally very diverse Rotterdam district. M4H+BoTu: two adjacent areas we jointly named Test Site M4H+ during the previous biennale. Together, they are representative of the many challenges facing not only the city of Rotterdam but also many other cities. The water challenge and energy transition play a part here, but here we can also explore the new circular economy, the housing challenge, accessibility, and social inequality. Here, the poor and unemployed live alongside start-ups and enterprising artists. Old and new meet, city and port, rich and poor, local and global.

M4H+BoTu is an exemplary Test Site for the transition: challenges and approaches come together in the now and how, and in a very provoking manner as well. It is an ideal location for the IABR, in and after 2020.

The IABR has fully committed itself to contribute to the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations and of the objectives stated in the Paris Climate Agreement.
The IABR is a research and development institute as well as an international cultural platform. Therefore, contribute we can with the tools that we have: research by design, the power of the imagination and the potency of design.

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◂IABR–2020 /

Curators IABR–2020: Sarah Ichioka and Thijs van Spaandonk

Sarah Ichioka has been appointed curator for Water as Leverage, and Thijs van Spaandonk curator for Energy Transition as Leverage of IABR–2020.

The Curator team will be chaired by George Brugmans and the curators will work closely together with a small group of co-curators. One of them is Robbert de Vrieze, co-curator in and on behalf of the Bospolder-Tussendijken, the city district in Rotterdam where the IABR–Atelier Rotterdam explores the concept of the “energy district” and that will be one of two locations where IABR will manifest itself in 2020.
Other co-curators will be appointed after the Summer.

Sarah Ichioka (Oakland, 1979) leads Desire Lines, a strategic consultancy for environmental, cultural and social-impact organizations and initiatives based in Singapore.

Sarah Ichioka, Curator Water as Leverage

© Cynthia van Elk

Sarah has held leadership, planning, editorial and curatorial roles for multiple reputable institutions of culture, urban policy and research, including the LSE Cities Program, La Biennale di Venezia, Tate Modern, the Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism, and Singapore’s National Parks Board. Before relocating to Asia in 2014, Sarah was Director of The Architecture Foundation (UK), and a Co-Director of the London Festival of Architecture.
Sarah has served as advisor or judge for a wide range of cultural and spatial initiatives, including the European Prize for Urban Public Space, Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative, the Resilient by Design Bay Area Challenge, and Water as Leverage for Resilient Cities Asia. She chaired the international jury of the XXII Triennale di Milano (2019) and the Curatorial Board of the British Pavilion at Venice (2010) and is currently a member of Design Singapore Council’s Innovation by Design panel.

Educated at Yale and the London School of Economics, Sarah has been honored as a World Cities Summit Young Leader, one of the Global Public Interest Design 100, by Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and the British Council / Clore Foundation's Cultural Leadership International Fellowship.
Thijs van Spaandonk (Tilburg, 1981) studied Architecture at Eindhoven University of Technology. In different roles and responsibilities, Thijs explores and addresses the cultural aspects of the major challenges our environment is facing.

Thijs van Spaandonk, Curator Energy Transition as Leverage

© Marcel Kampman

Thijs is partner at BRIGHT, an R&D cooperative for urban development, he co-founded with Gerjan Streng in 2017. Bright produces observations and prototypes to investigate and intervene in the impact the systems of energy, food, mobility and economy have on our surroundings. Recently Bright was intensively involved in the exhibition Places of Hope in Leeuwarden; the Dutch Climate Agreement and the Regional Energy Strategy for the Province of North-Holland; a serious game to support neighborhood Climate Agreements in Amsterdam with Play the City and Space & Matter; the educational game Ministry of Food in collaboration with Lava and the national broadcaster KRO-NCRV, and a series of bat houses. Bright is member of international design collaboration The Cloud Collective, a cooperative that wants to address the social impact of architecture and design.

Education plays an important role in exploring the profession. After teaching at various Academies of Architecture, Thijs is currently head of the Urbanism Master’s Program at the Rotterdam Academy of Architecture. The focus is to explore how climate mitigation and climate adaptation can and will impact the city of Rotterdam and more specifically, what competences architects and urbanists need to develop to be involved in this process.
Thijs van Spaandonk is part of the Future Urban Regions research group. His research-by-design focuses on the delta region of Zeeland, where he was raised. He is co-author of the book Urban Challenges, Resilient Solutions: Design Thinking for the Future of Urban Regions.

Thijs was involved in international collaborations in Delhi and Beijing and has acted as visiting critic at Columbia University (New York) and Hong Kong University (Hong Kong).
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◂IABR–ATELIERS (2017 - 2020) /

IABR–Atelier The Ark of Dordrecht

Water safety as leverage for sustainable urban development

Dordrecht is not just a city, it’s also an island. And due to its location in a transition area between the sea and major rivers, theIsland of Dordrecht is extremely vulnerable to flooding. Wisely, the city of Dordrecht is always looking to improve the measures that protect it from the water.After all, its water safety strategy has to take into account the unlikely possibility of dikes breaking and the city flooding. As it stands, if there’s a flood the people who are not able to leave the city on time are advised to take refuge in their attics.
But the higher-situated district De Staart, which lies outside the dikes, may provide a better and safer alternative – if it is converted into a large-scale temporary shelter.
What is the best way to set up De Staart to function as a safe haven in the event of flooding? And how can the city use the resources this takes as sensibly as possible? Not just for the exception, but also for other problems Dordrecht needs to solve?
De Staart in Dordrecht

In IABR–Atelier The Ark of Dordrecht, the IABR and the city of Dordrecht examine ways to use water safety as a leverage for a new and widely supported sustainable urban development strategy. They look for possibilities to turn De Staart into a safe haven in case Dordrecht needs one, as well as a location in which both (part of) the city’s housing challenge is met and truly sustainable urban development is realized in the best possible manner.

The Atelier is led by landscape designer Adriaan Geuze (West 8 Urban Design & Landscape Architecture), who curated the second IABR, The Flood, in 2005. Geuze was born in Dordrecht.

Vulnerable
Because the island of Dordrecht is vulnerable to flooding, the authorities have been working on the development of a so-called ‘multilayer safety strategy’ for many years. This may also involve evacuation in the event of extreme storms, which can only be predicted a short time in advance. In the worst-case scenario, it is estimated that only 20,000 of Dordrecht’s 120,000 inhabitants will be able to flee the island on time. The people left behind in the flooded area are advised to take refuge on the upper floors of buildings, which the safety strategy calls ‘vertical evacuation’. But it is hard for that many people to survive in the city’s attics for any serious amount of time and evacuating them from the tops of buildings is also relatively complicated.

Evacuation to Areas Outside the Dikes
Fortunately, there is a possible alternative – one that involves better conditions that reduce the risk of casualties – and that is to evacuate people to higher ground outside the dikes. De Staart, the district east of Dordrecht’s historical city center, between the Wantij waterwayand the Beneden-MerwedeRiver, meets these conditions. And because the area is easily accessible from the water, it is ideal for the next step of the evacuation: getting people to safety at other locations in the country. However, this alternative has not yet been sufficiently researched. It is as yet unknown how many people De Staart can accommodate. And people are not eager to evacuate to areas outside the dike, either: intuitively, it feels unsafe – running towards the water rather than away from it.

Connection with Other Challenges
Due to its location, De Staart is eminently suitable as a large-scale shelter in the event of flooding. But it’s a complicated area. Half of De Staart is currently residential – a socially vulnerable residential area partly located on a former illegal dump – and the other half is an industrial zone, with many chemical companies. There is a waste incineration plant that supplies heat to the heat network, a water company, a major reservoir and a penitentiary. And this in a unique location, between two rivers, near the historical city center and with national park De Biesbosch just around the corner.
Therefore, anyone that considers the future setup of De Staart cannot but wonder about the future prospects of this unique but complex area. And this is best done against the background of the major housing challenge Dordrecht faces – space for at least 6,000 more homes must be found within the existing city – and the need to create new jobs in manufacturing industry as well as room for all of the interventions needed for the energy transition. Only looking at all of this in conjunction will allow us to get to grips with the real challenge.

Water Safety as Leverage
The IABR–Atelier The Ark of Dordrecht investigates how to set up De Staart as a safe, self-sufficient shelter to use in the event of imminent flooding, in such a way that the approach can serve as leverage for the initiation of truly sustainable urban development that will help to meet the housing challenge the city faces, that will make room for the next economy after the energy transition, that will ensure good accessibility, and that will reconnect the city of Dordrecht with water and nature.

The IABR–Atelier The Ark of Dordrecht is a collaboration of the IABR and the city of Dordrecht. The lead designer is Adriaan Geuze ((West 8 Urban Design & Landscape Architecture).

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◂IABR–ATELIERS (2017 - 2020) / IABR–Test Site M4H+ /

What do you need?

M4H as a breeding ground for the circular economy

In 2018, Team1010 examined ways to take the next step in M4H’s transformation into a breeding ground for the circular manufacturing industryat IABR–Test Site M4H+. How can area development in M4H contribute to Rotterdam’s ambitious goals to realize a fully circular society with closed material cycles by 2050? Which test projects and which coalitions can help this development take shape? And how can sustainable area development be combined with the position of Rotterdam as a global port, and, as such, a hub for the huge amount of raw materials, waste, and semi-finished products that traverse the region? In a circular economy, these flows will have to be shortened, valorized, and eventually closed. The degree to which this is achieved depends on local capacities, skills, people, and places. So, what will it take?

M4H+

picture: Frank Hanswijk

What do you need?
For its research, commissioned by IABR, the City and the Port of Rotterdam, Team1010 took the drive and strength of the parties that are already active in the area as its starting point. Entrepreneurs were first asked about their ‘maker story,’ ‘growth story,’ and ‘circular story,’ and subsequently about their aspirations: What do you need for your company to flourish in the circular economy? The – extensive – talks with stakeholders and experts continued during IABR–2018, when three circular chains – the agrifood & biohub, the building materials bank, and a textile refinery – were investigated to identify concrete opportunities.

Growing towards a biobased economy

Image: Team1010

In June 2019, the publication Wat Heb Je Nodig? (What Do You Need?) was presented, in which Team1010 demonstrates how a city harbor like M4H can in fact develop into a breeding ground for a circular manufacturing industry. By actively forging coalitions and stimulating the debate in the area, the team furthermore made the taking of further steps possible. It also developed a methodology that is applicable in other locations, a method that aims to address the missing link between ambitions and their realization, and thus to help bridge the gap between plans and projects.

Textiles: preserving values, creating jobs

Image: Team1010

Guiding Principles and Spatial Framework
The results of the research will find their way to implementation in various ways. We identified concrete opportunities for projects, pilots, and additional collaboration in the M4H area to which the City and the Port of Rotterdam as well as the entrepreneurs in the area can contribute. And the Guiding Principles formulated as part of Team1010’s research were included as a guideline in the Ruimtelijk Raamwerk (Spatial Framework), the city’s guiding framework for the development of M4H in the coming years. And for good reason: the Principles promote mutually shared values for policy and development in M4H and are aimed at achieving a progressively more circular, inclusive, and sustainable future.

The book
The publication Wat Heb Je Nodig?(only available in Dutch!) can be ordered in the IABR–web shop.
Still available in our webshop is The Productive City – Development Perspectives for a Regional Manufacturing Economy in which the Atelier Rotterdam identifies opportunities for the future of the Metropole Region Rotterdam The Hague from the perspective of the next economy. Click here for more info or to order the book.

Test Site M4H+ is a collaboration of the IABR, Rotterdam Makers District, the City of Rotterdam and the Rotterdam Port Authority.
The research by design for Test Site M4H+ has been carried out by TEAM1010, consisting of 1010au, Mariska Vogel en Ronald Van Der Heijden, under the umbrella of the IABR–Atelier Rotterdam.

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◂IABR–ATELIERS (2017 - 2020) / IABR–Atelier Rotterdam /

Collective Strategies for Energy Districts

​Energy Transition at the Neighborhood Scale

In the coming years, Rotterdam’s neighborhoods will switch from conventional to renewable energy one by one. The energy transition will be the largest conversion the city has faced since its post-war reconstruction. However, many of its neighborhoods also face other challenges – ones that their residents often consider much more urgent. Unemployment, school dropout numbers, debts and public security: these are the themes vulnerable neighborhoods set store by, not the energy transition. Other neighborhoods have yet other questions, such as how to climate-proof the neighborhood or how to find space for new dwellings.

Bospolder-Tussendijken

picture: Frank Hanswijk

Towards Energy Districts
It is on the scale of the district that large systems touch people’s immediate living environments. The energy transition will have consequences at the level of the neighborhood, the street and the dwelling. Fortunately, collective action can be organized at that very same level, that of the neighborhood. Is it possible to use the energy transition as a lever for simultaneous, solution-oriented work on other challenges in neighborhoods? To develop collective strategies that ensure that the large investments necessary for the energy transition also serve other goals, strategies that provide social added value in and for the neighborhoods themselves? This is the central question of the IABR–Atelier Rotterdam’s project Energy Districts, which examines and tests how urgent challenges can be addressed coherently and how the energy transition can thus be used as a lever for a more socially inclusive form of urban development.

Testing and developing in and with the neighborhood
The IABR–Atelier Rotterdam is testing and developing the concept of the energy district in Bospolder-Tussendijken (BoTu), working together with local stakeholders and using the local dynamics in and opportunities of the neighborhood. The aim is to develop a working model that can also be used in other neighborhoods as well as more widely, outside the city of Rotterdam.

Workshop in Bospolder-Tussendijken

picture by Frank Hanswijk

In the program of the recently elected Municipal Executive, Bospolder-Tussendijken is designated one of the neighborhoods eligible for an ‘integrated sustainable area approach’. In the coming years, plans will be drafted to make the neighborhood gas free. But BoTu is also a ‘vulnerable’ neighborhood that faces urgent social challenges. Therefore, and together with local stakeholders, the IABR–Atelier is now investigating how the energy transition can contribute to making BoTu a more inclusive and resilient neighborhood.

For more information about Bospolder-Tussendijken click here

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IABR–Atelier Rotterdam

Energy Transition as leverage for socially inclusive city making

Space for Energy in Rotterdam

picture: Frank Hanswijk

The energy transition is one of the key challenges of the coming decades. One important issue is how the transitions will actually take shape. How the advantages and disadvantages will be distributed is not yet clear. The energy transition will involve more than infrastructure and the most important question may well be: What kind of new urbanity will the energy transition allow us to create?

The IABR–Atelier Rotterdam will turn the opportunity created by the energy transition the city and port face into a driver for inclusive urban development and an engine for other important challenges regarding food, the productive city, living, social equality, and others.
This means the Atelier considers energy transition not only a goal, but also a means to work on an attractive future and a resilient and inclusive Rotterdam.

Bospolder - Tussendijken

picture: Frank Hanswijk

The Energy Transition as an Urban Project
The energy transition is a technical challenge, of course, but at the same time it is also a spatial challenge that we have to integrate into a social agenda. After all, the reduction in the consumption of energy and the transition to renewable energy impact every aspect of daily life. From the way people travel to more energy-efficient dwellings and energy-producing neighborhoods. But is there a level playing field for everyone involved, can everyone keep up with the changes or even benefit by them? Energy poverty as a consequence of the energy transition is already imminent, especially in the more vulnerable neighborhoods.
Given the right approach, conversely, the energy transition can contribute to a high-quality, attractive future if it is used as a means to work on a resilient and inclusive Rotterdam in which citizens are enabled to be not only energy consumers, but also energy producers.
The question the IABR–Atelier Rotterdam raises is about what this new urban quality is that the energy transition will allow us to achieve. What ecological and social added value for the city, its neighborhoods, and every individual citizen will the energy transition be able to generate?

Experiment, Test, Develop
Against the background of the challenge of the energy transition the IABR–Atelier Rotterdam tests new methods for inclusive urban development and generates concrete spatial proposals with the intention of eventually realizing them. In the period between 2017 and 2020, research by design is used for different lines of action and at various scale levels.
At the building level, the Atelier has focused on the development of new building typologies for the energy transition, the results of which were presented at IABR–2018. At the district level the Energy District concept is tested. While Test Site M4H+ highlights integral area development.

The platform of IABR–2018 has mainly been used to present and exchange expertise and knowledge and to actively involve partners and actors (from the city and region as well as beyond) in shared knowledge development.
We are now working on further developing the "energy district"–concept, specifically in Bospolder-Tussendijken. The results will be presented at the IABR–2020, after which they will have to be implemented.

The IABR Atelier Rotterdam: Energy Transition is a collaboration between the IABR, the City of Rotterdam (Urban Planning Department and Resilient Rotterdam) and, at Test Site M4H+, also the Port of Rotterdam Authority.

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◂WATER AS LEVERAGE /

Water as Leverage for Resilient Cities: Asia

Spearheaded by the Dutch Special Envoy for Water Affairs Henk Ovink, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the Global Center on Adaptation, 100 Resilient Cities, Architecture Workroom Brussels and the International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam launched the collaborative project WATER AS LEVERAGE FOR RESILIENT CITIES: ASIA at the UN Climate Conference COP23 in Bonn, Germany, on November 9, 2017.


Floods in Chennai, India

picture by OOZE team WaL/Asia

No time to waste
We have no time to waste if we want to safeguard our planet and our future, and achieve our climate goals, our sustainable development goals, and reach beyond. To realize the necessary changes we need to build strong and result-oriented coalitions with the ambition to proactively connect innovative and integrated design, good planning, and a strong process to financial commitment and implementation.
Taking up the challenge, the International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam, the Dutch Water Envoy and Architecture Workroom Brussels have initiated Water as Leverage.
In partnership with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), 100 Resilient Cities (100RC), UN-Habitat, FMO Dutch Development Bank, Pegasys, Partners for Resilience, Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) and Water Youth Network, and supported by the UN/World Bank High Level Panel for Water and the Global Center on Adaptation (GCA), we have launched our first project, Water as Leverage for Resilient Cities: Asia (WaL/Asia), on November 9, 2017 at COP23 in Bonn, Germany.

Asia
Nowhere on earth are water-related disasters as widespread and costly, both in terms of human life and loss of (social) wealth, as in South and South East Asia. Asian cities account for 83 percent of the population affected by sea level rise. That is why, together with the AIIB and 100RC Asia, we decided to test how water can be used as a lever for change in Asia first.

Workshop in Semarang, Indonesia

© Team One Resilient Semarang


Three cities, six design teams
After a short and intense period of thorough research, fieldwork, and workshops, the Water as Leverage for Resilient Cities: Asia–consortium partnered with the cities of Khulna (Bangladesh), Chennai (India) and Semarang (Indonesia). These partnerships are carefully chosen, based on the explicit articulation of water-, urban-, and climate-related challenges that these city regions have, the strategic position as a pilot for similar cases they could be and, as such, the potential in terms of sustainable solutions and transformative capacity.
In 2017 a worldwide Call for Action was launched after which, in June 2018, the Advisory Board of WaL/Asia selected six design teams, two for each city.

2nd regional workshop in Singapore

© Cynthia van Elk | Water as Leverage

Challenge
These three city regions are only a starting point: building on the outcomes a working methodology will be derived and continuously adjusted, as a foundation for following partnerships.
The challenge of Water as Leverage is to match long term comprehensive urban planning with short term innovative transformations ; ambitious climate adaptation plans with bankable projects; developing ever more knowledge of the water system with building more resilient cities; research, design and implementation with inclusive urban alliances. Result driven collaboration is essential, across all sectors, all layers of government, all stakeholders—from activists and vulnerable communities to private and public institutions.

WaL/Asia Regional Workshop Singapore

© UN Habitat, picture by Cynthia van Elk

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◂WEBSHOP / Books + DVDs /

IABR–2018+2020–The Missing Link

catalog 8th edition IABR (2018)


IABR−2018+2020–THE MISSING LINK
George Brugmans (ed)

2018, IABR, Rotterdam

design: Studio De Ronners

ISBN: 978-90-825137-2-1

124 pages
english / dutch
paperback / full color

€ 15 plus postage and all transfer costs
order your copy directly from IABR

IABR–2018+2020+THE MISSING LINK
8th International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam
1 June – 8 July 2018

There is a direct connection between the future of the city, the subject of the IABR since its founding, and the key challenges of our time, climate change
and rapidly growing social inequality. And as these challenges quickly become more urgent, the position of the IABR becomes increasingly firm and
action-oriented.
What then can the IABR, small player in a huge force field, actually do?
The tools that it has are the power of imagination and the ability of designers to show us what we can want. Nothing more – but nothing less, either.
For such an endeavor to be effective, an environment in which good plans can be turned into concrete projects is vital. It is already happening, but with difficulty and not nearly often enough. There is a missing link. In every respect, and everywhere. That is why, in the next three years, the IABR will fully focus on finding that missing link, on bridging the gap between innovative design and sustainable realization. To start with in the Delta of the Low Countries, with research and Ateliers taking place in the Netherlands and Belgium, and with exhibitions and programs in Rotterdam and
Brussels.
IABR–2018+2020–THE MISSING LINK: one program, two biennales, in two countries.

This bilingual catalog starts with a general introduction, the Curator Statement and the Research Agenda 2018-2020, followed by introductions to the IABR–Ateliers, the Delta Atelier, the main exhibition and the program in Rotterdam and the exhibition in Brussels.

With contributions by Floris Alkemade, Leo Van Broeck, George Brugmans, Joachim Declerck, et al.
Edited by George Brugmans

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◂IABR–2018–THE MISSING LINK I /

Main Partners and Strategic Alliances

The Dutch government, the City of Rotterdam and the Creative Industries Fund NL are IABR's main partners.

The IABR is a lead partner of the Dutch government in implementing the Action Agenda for Spatial Design (ARO) 2017 - 2020 of the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations. The IABR is funded in the Culture Plan 2017 - 2020 Budget of the City of Rotterdam and subsidized as part of the Grant Scheme for Multi-Year Architecture, Design and E-Culture Programs of the Creative Industries Fund NL (SCI).

Strategic alliances
As part of its multiyear policy plan 2017-2020, Towards a Resilient City, the IABR has entered into two action-oriented collaboration agreements.
One is with the Special Envoy for International Water Affairs of the Kingdom of The Netherlands (Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management). The aim is to globally explore potentially viable projects for which "water" can be the key to finding integrated and innovative solutions to existing challenges. One focus is on South East Asia where water related problems are most urgent. In partnership with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the Global Center on Adaptation and 100 Resilient Cities, IABR, the Special Envoy and AWB have initiated the project Water as Leverage for Resilient Cities: Asia. The Special Envoy and the IABR, together with Deltares and the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, have also initiated the World Water Atlas.
The second agreement is with Resilient Rotterdam (Department of Urban Development, City of Rotterdam), resulting in the IABR–Atelier Rotterdam 2017 - 2020, in which other active partners are the Port Authority of Rotterdam, Delfshaven Cooperation and others.

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