From visionary utopias and speculative designs to unrealised commissions and abandoned plans, unbuilt projects for the built environment offer rich material for critical inquiry. Remaining fixed to the page (or screen), or to the model-makers’ benches, unmade proposals can help shape discourse, influence practice, and reflect—or react against—the cultural, political, and technological contexts of their time. Some may have been designed from the outset as capricci, and, therefore, were never meant to be made; some find their home within iterative design processes; and others have suffered the disappointing hand of rejection or abandonment. Other spaces are intentionally—or unintentionally—unbuilt: via demolition, rewilding, or ‘blank’. All tell manifold stories.

This conference invites proposals from scholars, practitioners, historians, and those working in interdisciplinary fields, to explore the significance of the unbuilt to the built environment. Contributions examining the conceptual, aesthetic, and ideological dimensions of unbuilt work are sought, as well as the role of the unbuilt in pedagogy, conservation, and digital (re)construction.

Topics may include, but are not limited to:
Theoretical frameworks for understanding the unbuilt
Case studies of notable unbuilt projects
The politics of commissions, cancellations, and revisions
Digital tools and virtual environments for visualising and (re)constructing the unbuilt
The role of archives and drawings in preserving unbuilt work
The interpretation of unbuilt schemes through written and visual media
Speculative design and its impact on architectural thought, history, and theory
The unbuilt in education and studio practice
The aesthetics of incompletion and absence

Submit an abstract of 200–300 words by 15/02/26 using this form:
https://forms.cloud.microsoft/e/yWDubB2eSp