Fluid Adaptation: Redesigning the Porous City in an Age of Extremes

Sinking deltas and extreme climate shifts have exposed the limits of rigid grey infrastructure. Concrete sea walls and channelized canals can no longer withstand the compound threats of intense flooding and severe drought. Landscape architect Kotchakorn Voraakhom proposes a fundamental shift: moving from fighting water to designing for fluid adaptation.

By prioritizing porosity over resistance, urban land can be redesigned to act as a living sponge—absorbing, filtering, storing, and releasing water dynamically. This approach transforms single-use hard infrastructure into multifunctional public space, anchoring local identity within a scalable framework for climate resilience. Drawing from benchmark projects by LANDPROCESS and the Porous City Network in Thailand, this lecture reframes landscape architecture as vital infrastructure—restoring ecological balance while safeguarding human dignity in an unpredictable future.