Abstract Background Heating is a key challenge for Europe’s decarbonisation goals, accounting for a large share of energy use and emissions while shaping everyday life, comfort, and vulnerability. This article compares home heating transitions in Finland, Romania, Sweden, and the United Kingdom through an integrated framework combining energy democracy, energy citizenship, and energy justice. The study examines how ownership, everyday practices, and inequality intersect to shape citizen roles in heating transitions across diverse political and infrastructural contexts. Results Based on archival and secondary material, the analysis reveals strong contextual variation in how citizens engage with heating systems. In Finland and Sweden, municipally owned district heating offers collective stability but limited direct agency. In Romania, the collapse of state-controlled networks has left households dependent on individual and often inefficient systems. In the United Kingdom, liberalised markets promise consumer choice but deepen vulnerability through cost pressures and weak accountability. Across all cases, household participation is structured by infrastructures, welfare regimes, and historical legacies rather than by individual choice. Integrating democracy, citizenship, and justice highlights how governance models, daily practices, and inequalities interact in shaping heating transitions. Conclusions Citizen-centred heating transitions require policy approaches sensitive to national contexts and social realities. Empowerment must go beyond rhetoric to include participatory governance in collective systems, equitable regulation in liberalised markets, and targeted support for vulnerable households. The study contributes an analytical framework that captures the social depth of decarbonisation and supports the design of heating transitions that are democratic, participatory, and just.

During industrialisation, work and home were mentally and physically divided. Nevertheless, homes are important workspaces. However, contemporary homes are not designed to accommodate work, and the home as a space of work has received scant attention from architectural scholarly work. How homeworkers navigate the spatial constraints of contemporary homes and create their workspaces remains underexplored. This paper investigates the tactics individuals in Finland employ to appropriate the home and create workspaces. It is based on a qualitative, in-depth multiple case study comprised of home visits, interviews, and visual and spatial documentation. Findings discuss three key tactics homeworkers employ to appropriate their home and create workspaces: positioning work at home; creating workspaces with objects; and by choreographing spaces into being with their bodies. Findings can inform the design of future homes as sites where dwelling and work intertwine and highlight the importance of planning highly qualitative indoor and outdoor environments to support all sorts of work at home.

Sustainable dwellings should prioritise designs that prevent early obsolescence by supporting occupant needs, their comfort and wellbeing. This includes the provision of good indoor environmental quality and adequate and usable private spaces, including balconies. Yet, visual comfort is still overlooked, specifically in Finland, with its added balcony glazing, its northern position and Nordic climate. This study examines how different glazed balcony designs affect daylight in Finnish apartments. It explores how orientation and geographical location affect daylight performance seasonally considering balcony depth. The research methods include: (1) in-situ daylight factor measurements supplemented with observations and residents’ interviews in 10 Finnish case studies; and (2) seasonal assessment of daylight availability and visual comfort using parametric simulations of a selected case study in four orientations, three geographical locations and with three balcony depths. Findings reveal that while balcony depth directly impacted daylight availability, balcony glazing had little effect unless daylight was already scarce. Good daylight generally occurred only in shallow-plan layouts with dual orientation, or when unobstructed by a balcony. Minimising room depth can compensate for the daylight-reducing impact of the balcony. A balance of daylight access, privacy and solar overexposure is needed. PRACTICE RELEVANCE New insights from this study offer guidance for better balcony and apartment design. Key recommendations include the following: (1) Optimise balcony and room depth to maintain daylight access. In single-aspect designs without additional windows, balcony depth should be reduced to compensate for the daylight-reducing impact of the balcony. (2) Balcony design should be adapted to geographical locations, e.g. in high-latitude regions such as Finland, shading from balconies offers limited benefit due to the low solar angle, hence other strategies should be prioritised to mitigate summer solar overexposure. (3) Daylight considerations should be integrated with spatial planning, prioritising daylight-sensitive spaces such as kitchens while ensuring privacy for spaces such as bedrooms. Daylight metrics need integration with user feedback for holistic design decisions. Although the findings cannot be generalised based on a single tool, the authors suggest further development of simulation tools to better address the impacts of glazed balconies.

Resilient solutions in the built environment primarily focus on technical aspects, with implementation processes often based on a top-down approach that overlooks people’s perspectives. However, social resilience plays a crucial role in addressing polycrises, and social infrastructure is critical for building such resilience. This study aims to enhance understanding of how social infrastructures can improve social resilience. Through analysis of 58 Futures-Wheel workshops with 179 multidisciplinary experts investigating 128 crises,seven groups of social impacts were developed. Subsequently, three Finnish social infrastructure cases were selected to explore how and to what extent they address the identified social impacts. The findings indicate that social infrastructure fosters resilience by generating two specific forms of social capital: bonding capital (essential for immediate response) and bridging capital (critical for prevention and adaptation). However, the analysis also identifies critical trade-offs, including risks of green gentrification, exclusionary group dynamics, and resource fatigue in volunteer-led initiatives. Consequently, policymakers, urban planners, and community organisations should adopt a context-specific approach that balances these networks and integrates both bottom-up and top-down perspectives. By doing so, they can ensure that social infrastructure not only supports everyday life but also strengthens communities’ ability to cope with crises.

How do individuals reflect on and relate to hybrid heating arrangements and the 'stacking' of heating modes in their home? Drawing on a set of oral histories (n = 110) collected in Finland, inhabitants' long-standing engagement with versatile heating arrangements is explored. This is not a novel phenomenon but one that has evolved over time. The reasons and motivations for stacking of heating modes is situated in the themes of preparedness, thermal delight, everyday activities and the environment. In addition, the main drawbacks of hybrid heating systems, including financial limitations and hybridity as a tool to alleviate energy vulnerability pressures, are analysed. This nuanced perspective on heating transitions illustrates heating transitions as complex, contextual processes that are constantly negotiated at the level of the dwelling. As a hybrid system, it combines both technologies and everyday activities flexibly. Leveraging experiences with hybridity in domestic heating requires a holistic understanding and is crucial for the development of sustainable heating futures.

Decarbonising domestic heating is central to Finland's goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2035. While policy debates largely focus on technological change, less attention has been paid to how individuals experience and negotiate heating transitions in everyday life. This paper examines domestic heating transition in Finland through 54 oral histories collected in Finland during winter 2023. Oral histories provide a unique lens to capture long-term experiences, memories, and ways of managing warmth at home.The oral history analysis identifies four interlinked themes: preparedness and hybridity, financial considerations, environmental concerns, and thermal comfort and delight. Findings show that heating transitions are deeply embedded in habits, economic realities, and emotional attachments, extending far beyond technical performance or cost. Hybrid heating systems are valued for resilience and flexibility, but financial barriers limit access for low-income households, raising concerns about energy vulnerability. Environmental awareness is growing yet often negotiated alongside rural realities. Thermal comfort and delight emerge as central household preferences but remain absent from policy debates.These findings underscore the need to move beyond technological framings of heating transitions. By foregrounding lived experience, this study advances a more holistic understanding of heating transitions and the broader societal shifts they entail. Recognising non-technological drivers is essential for facilitating just and all-encompassing heating transitions. Including these dimensions in policy debates is also key in designing transitions that reflect the diversity of household realities and support sustainable domestic heating transitions.

Falls at home are a major cause of injury and mortality among older people. This research investigated the alignment between older adults' perceptions and research observations of home-related fall risks via literature review, interviews of older adults, and field observations in their home environments. The results show a clear mismatch in the kind and especially number of risks noted. Also, some risks were brought up by older people but not found in literature. This highlights the importance of raising awareness of fall risks among older people, and of more inclusive home assessment processes. Broadening the concept of home environment in research is also needed.

The boundaries of work and home are constantly evolving. Working from home challenges the prevailing understandings of what a home is supposed to be and do, and what work is. Currently, most research around working from home and architecture focuses on spatial and functionalqualitiesof homes that facilitate work productivity, highlighting inhabitants' struggle with integrating work in their homes. Instead of further identifying challenges, this article focuses on why these challenges have emerged. Through an interdisciplinary literature review illustrated with example homes, this article explores why contemporary work does not seem to fit in the home; how conceptions of work and home have shifted over time; and how this has affected spaces and functions of the home. Findings highlight that these shifts have rendered homes spatially and functionally 'rigid', and that work has slowly been excluded from the spatiality of the home. This results in dwellers having to continuously manage physical, temporal and social boundaries in their homes, a practice often found tiring and challenging. To address this, design approaches for reintroducing fluidity in the spatial logic of the home are proposed.

In October 2022, the 14th ATUT symposium Making (A)mends was held at the Tampere School of Architecture. Making (A)mends plays on the word ‘mend’ and to ‘amend’; to mend in the sense of repairing or restoring something, but also in the sense of redeveloping and putting something back together. ‘Amending’ is about improving, changing, adapting, and putting ourselves on a new path. At the time of the conference, we had just come out of a two-year COVID pandemic of lockdowns and little face to face contact. It made visible the positive impact we have on each other and that we need each other as fellow human beings, but it also became visible – when we slowed down and gave back the city to nature – how nature and non-humans were able to take up that space. For a short time, we could glimpse a different kind of planet. Yet climate records continue to be broken around the world: hottest temperatures, longest heatwaves, worst droughts ever recorded; extreme and record flooding and rainfall. And we are guilty of contributing to this: architecture and built environment projects continue to exploit, disrupt and damage the planet. We also witnessed war and conflict, and this showed how we are deeply interconnected as humans to each other but also to our environment. It shows that a better, more sustainable, inclusive and restorative world is not possible without peace. Fixing the climate, biodiversity and security crises we face as a society are extraordinarily complex and challenging tasks. Research has shown that radical transformations of our physical, political, organisational, social and value structures are needed to respond to – and prepare for – these crises and to restore the past damage that our activities and (in)activities in the built environment have inflicted. Architecture and urban planning have a fundamental role to play in this, given the long ‘lock-in’ of the urban plans and spaces and places we are part of designing and their potential (negative and positive) impacts over time with the associated local and global (in)justices they create. This special issue provides several different perspectives on ‘Making (A)mends’ to address how we can and must be part of the solution and raises at times uncomfortable questions about our own role, responsibility and values as architects and urban planners, how we got here, and how we can make (a)mends, urgently.

Amidst sustainability challenges and in an increasingly urbanised context, housing design qualities are crucial to promote residents' wellbeing. Despite the role balconies play in establishing connections with the surrounding environment and enhancing housing qualities, questions around how to design balconies that meet users' needs remain under-characterised. An online survey and analysis of Finnish residents' (n = 393) attitudes to and uses of their balconies is presented. This provides improved insights into and understanding of the implications of glazed balcony design on housing qualities and users' wellbeing. The subjective data are analysed in three steps via summary statistics, content analysis and co-occurrence analysis. Results reveal that balconies are greatly used, and that glazed enclosures of balconies-a specific characteristic in Finland- enhance the balconies' space functionality throughout the year. However, glazed balconies are perceived to be potentially harmful to overall indoor environmental quality, increasing overheating risk, and reducing daylight and purge ventilation in the living space if not used as designed. This study shows the need for a user-oriented approach to design balconies that enhance housing qualities and users' wellbeing.

Purpose The paper aims to understand Finnish architects' attitudes towards the use of timber as a structural material in multi-storey (over two--storeys high) residential construction. Design/methodology/approach The study was conducted through a literature survey mainly including international peer-reviewed journals and similar research projects. Furthermore, the literature survey informed the generation of the web-based survey questionnaire design to gather information on architects' perceptions, attitudes and interest in the use of wood in multi-storey (over two-storeys high) residential buildings. Findings The paper's findings are as follows: (1) respondents perceived the most important advantages of wood as a lightweight, local and ecological material; (2) wood construction (compared to concrete) included perceived concerns about it being more costly and needing more complex engineering and (3) respondents had a favourable overall attitude towards the use of wood particularly in low-rise residential construction, whilst their perception of tall housing, including timber ones, was mostly negative. Originality/value No studies have evaluated the use of wood in tall residential buildings and architects' perceptions in Finland.

The built environment and various ongoing crises, e.g. climate change, the biodiversity crisis, and declining well-being due to the pandemic, are interconnected. Resilience of the built environment has become increasingly important and construction professionals have a focal role in promoting it. This paper investigates the opportunities that professionals possess to introduce key aspects of resilience in building projects in their everyday practice in Finland. Six targeted focus group interviews for Finnish city planners, housing specialists, housing developers, housing architects, public building and landscape architects, and sustainability specialists were organized, encompassing 32 different professionals. A crisis preparedness checklist was developed and used as a concretization of resilience. Findings show that (1) currently all Finnish built environment professionals, except housing architects, are able to integrate some aspects of resilience in their current work; (2) aspects of resilience should be introduced to building projects and processes in their early stages; (3) all key aspects of resilience cannot be introduced by one profession; (4) interdisciplinary committee work and resulting information products by the Finnish Building Information Foundation provide a feasible opportunity for collaboration and integration of resilience to Finnish building projects and processes. This study highlights the need for dynamic built environment professionals' engagement.

Since the 90s, an increasing number of unexpected crises and disruptions have emerged (e.g., wars, pandemic, extreme heatwaves, heavy flooding, and forest fires around the world) (Wheeler 2022). At present, the probability of these and new, different crises and disruptions happening simultaneously is on the increase (Schrecker 2012). The way all housing is designed, and transformed, plays an important role in both mitigating and adapting to the singular and simultaneous impact of these different crises and disruptions, and in safeguarding citizens. This chapter aims to synthesise and illustrate 1) knowledge about the role housing design and transformation plays as part of a resilient society and 2) the key principles of greenery, diverse and adaptable, social, and inclusive and equitable infrastructures to maximise their benefits at different scales (i.e., macro, meso, and micro level), while avoiding unintended consequences, such as gentrification, loss of community, unaffordable housing. In summary, living environments need to be adaptable, diverse, inclusive, and co-produced with inhabitants, where green and social infrastructures are prioritised in order to promote resilience and wellbeing (Castaño-Rosa et al. 2022).

Society continues to face many crises, from climate change, loss of biodiversity and air pollution to the pandemic, with associated impacts to human health and wellbeing. The built environment plays an important role in both mitigating and adapting to these impacts and in safe-guarding citizens. The presence and access to green spaces in the built environment plays a fundamental role in citizen’s ability to cope with adversity of different kinds and scale, while in itself supporting biodiversity. This paper aims to (1) synthesize knowledge about the diverse role that green spaces, and by extension the rewilding of our built environment, play as part of a resilient society and built environment and (2) the specific conditions and characteristics of green spaces and the built environments to maximize their benefits, while avoiding unintended consequences. This is done through a systematic literature review to present existing knowledge about the role of green spaces in a resilient built environment and society, followed by a qualitative content analysis that identifies the conditions and characteristics of green spaces as resilient solutions. Findings highlight the importance of the diversity of green space provision in type (e.g., ecological corridors), scale (e.g., community gardens, green roofs and walls), and location (e.g., parks, forests), and that they can support social inclusivity, community resilience and wellbeing. Furthermore, findings highlight that green spaces need to be designed in such a way that they (1) support biodiversity, (2) are interconnected with the context, (3) accessible and (4) appealing for citizens to protect and appreciate them.

The building sector contributes to around 39% of the global carbon emissions, and the operation of buildings, and especially residential buildings, is a large contributor. Hence tackling the efficient operation and maintenance of residential buildings is an effective way to reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions and hence contribute to climate resilience. While the operation and maintenance phases of non-residential buildings generally rely on Building Management Systems (BMS), BMS are typically absent in standard housing; instead, residents manage their own homes individually. Through a scoping literature review, this paper investigates the potential of BMS in promoting energy efficiency, indoor climate comfort and long-term resilience (e.g., managing cold periods and heatwaves), and general suitability for the residential environment. Findings show that promoting resilience in residential buildings through the implementation of BMS is not explicitly investigated in the existing literature, instead the focus is on promoting energy efficiency, innovation and climate change mitigation. Furthermore, main BMS are designed based on solely technical parameters, neglecting social and human factors. This study therefore argues for the need to adopt a human-centred design approach to include key aspects of adaptability, flexibility, equity and inclusivity in the design and implementation of BMS in residential buildings. In the end, this paper contributes key aspects for BMS to promote resilience in residential buildings.

Housing is under increasing pressure to respond to societal changes, e.g., an aging population, an increasing number of single person households, increased working from home, climate change and the green transition, and the covid-19 pandemic. This paper investigated how the apartments of a Finnish social housing provider supported residents’ daily lives and well-being and how this can be improved. From a total of 142 rental and right-of-occupancy apartment blocks in the Tampere and Turku regions, ten were selected for analyses and reporting of results in this paper. The floor plans of two representative blocks were further analysed to evaluate their housing design quality. The aspects investigated included daylight, circulation, furnishability and spatial connections. Findings highlighted that there is room for improvement to create more resilient living environments: daylight conditions were found to be below good practice, especially where balconies shaded the main living space or where the room depth prevented daylight from reaching the back parts. The furnishable floor area was fragmented and reduced by essential circulation areas, which on average took up 40% of the habitable floor area. Only 28% of the habitable room floor area was both well daylit and furnishable. Potential improvements to achieve more resilient living environments include better connection between the design of furnishable and well daylit spaces; better overlapping of essential circulation areas to improve furnishability and creating multiple routes inside the apartment to enable the residents to adjust their level of privacy.

PurposeDespite the increased retrofitting of Finnish residential buildings, there are limited post-retrofit studies on the actual measured indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and occupant satisfaction during summer-time. This paper provides a better understanding of the actual performance of retrofitted residential apartment buildings in Finland, focusing on some aspects of and the risk of summer overheating through post-occupancy evaluation (POE).Design/methodology/approachThe study used both qualitative and quantitative data collection methods, including satisfaction surveys, indoor air temperature and relative humidity measurements, self-reported behaviour forms, open-ended discussions, and site visits in five apartments in different residential buildings in Tampere city, monitored during the summer-time, for at least 2 weeks at a time.FindingsWhile occupants were positive regarding most aspects of IEQ, concerns about indoor air quality (IAQ), summer overheating and acoustic comfort were raised. The summer-time monitoring highlighted that indoor air temperatures could reach as high as 27 degrees C for 2-9 days depending on the monitored apartment. Little cloud cover and warmer outdoor temperatures directly influenced indoor air temperature overheating. For some aspects of the investigated IEQ parameters, it was noted that while occupants' satisfaction was influenced by the length of their residence, their acceptance of the same conditions remained positive over time (i.e. more than one year) as they adapted over time.Research limitations/implicationsThe number of participants and case studies was relatively small due to the well-known difficulty in gaining access to private homes, so the results do not allow generalisation but do provide interesting insights of these specific cases to be validated with future additional research. The short sequential rather than long-term parallel monitoring of the case study apartments was another limitation making comparison between cases and understanding reasons for differences difficult.Practical implicationsFindings highlight the need to maintain the performance of housing in Finland during summer-time. The highlighted subjective issues emphasised in this study underscore the necessity for enhanced pre- and post-retrofit quality processes and the prompt resolution of issues as they arise. The integration of POE studies into all residential construction practices becomes pivotal for the advancement of sustainable homes now, but also in the future, especially when subjected to a warming climate.Originality/valueThis study is among the few POE studies conducted in Finland, offering insights into post-retrofit performance and occupant satisfaction during the summer-time. The study highlights the potential of POE to understand the performance of retrofitted Finnish apartments from a user-centric perspective.