Next IMCL Conference Set to Share Frontier City Research and Solutions, as Call for Abstracts Enters Final Two Weeks

Submitted abstract topics to date include climate adaptation, ecology, regenerative planning and design, walkability and transportation choice, local identity, neuroscience, pattern languages, and the value of public markets; submissions have come from across the globe

ABOVE: The Call for Abstracts is still open for the 63rd International Making Cities Livable, and the Call will close at the end of February. For more information or to submit, please visit: https://www.imcl.online/cfa26

JELGAVA, LATVIA - The 63rd International Making Cities (IMCL) conference, in Riga and Jelgava, will focus on "Regenerative Architecture and Urbanism: Recovery and Resilience After an Age of Disruption." Participants from across disciplines and national borders will gather to share peer-to-peer findings on the latest solutions to urban challenges, with a focus on the current time of geopolitical change -- and an examination of the lessons of historic disruptions and recoveries in Latvia and beyond.

The abstracts submitted to date for the conference, to be held July 6-10, 2026, include a broad representation of advanced scholars and city leaders from Europe, North America, China, India, Bangladesh, Zambia, and Australia. Topics addressed by abstracts submitted to date include:

• Climate adaptation

• Local identity and architecture

• New urban technology

• Pattern language (“Nested Resilient Patterns”)

• Walkability and street retrofits

• Neuroscience and urban mental health

• Neuroscience for school and healthcare building design

• Ecology, green building and quality of life

• Implementation pathways

• Regenerative zoning

• Regenerative mobility

• Regeneration in the Post-Soviet East Bloc

• Beauty and neuroscience

• Urban design methodologies

• Resilient housing and climate stress

• Transportation choice

• The value of public markets, and how to create them

Submissions are welcome from scholars, practitioners, city and NGO leaders, and may include new research, case studies, or new methodologies and their evaluations. The conference will focus on effective implementation strategies for making a new generation of more livable cities, towns and suburbs.

This year’s focus on “Recovery and Resilience After an Age of Disruption” invites participants to look both backward and forward: to historic precedents of recovery in Europe and elsewhere, and to emerging models for regenerative development. How do cities recover from war, economic collapse, environmental damage, or technological upheaval—and how do they avoid rebuilding the same vulnerabilities? What does that mean today, for climate adaptation, resilience, and quality of life, as we face new disruptions? What does it mean to move beyond mitigation toward true regeneration, where urban systems can restore ecological health, social capital, and economic opportunity?

These are questions with immediate implications for effective policy and practice, and the conference provides a rare forum for sharing ideas in dialogue with scholars, practitioners, and city officials who are working directly on implementation.

For potential attendees and abstract submitters, IMCL offers a distinctive value proposition. Unlike larger trade-oriented conferences, IMCL emphasizes peer-to-peer exchange in a collegial, discussion-rich setting. Sessions are intentionally structured to allow substantive dialogue rather than rapid-fire presentation. This format has historically enabled collaborations that extend well beyond the conference itself—joint research projects, policy initiatives, and long-term professional networks. For emerging scholars, it is an opportunity to engage senior figures in an accessible setting. For practitioners and city leaders, it provides exposure to frontier research that can be translated into actionable policy and design strategies.

The geographic setting adds a further layer of relevance. Riga and Jelgava sit at the crossroads of Northern and Eastern Europe, shaped by centuries of cultural exchange, occupation, independence, and renewal. The Baltic region offers powerful lessons in post-disruption recovery, from post-war reconstruction to post-Soviet transition, and now to contemporary European integration amid new geopolitical pressures. Participants will have the opportunity not only to discuss resilience in abstract terms, but to experience it firsthand in urban form, public space, and civic life.

Riga’s celebrated Art Nouveau district, its UNESCO-listed Old Town, and its contemporary waterfront developments provide case studies in heritage preservation, adaptive reuse, and public realm design. Jelgava, with its historic palace complex and evolving civic center, offers a complementary setting for exploring smaller-city regeneration strategies, particularly relevant to cities navigating economic transition and demographic change. Site visits, workshops, walking discussions, and informal exchanges will allow participants to engage directly with the physical and institutional contexts that shape Baltic urban development.

The July timing further enhances the appeal. Early summer in Latvia offers maximum daylight hours, temperate weather, and vibrant public life in streets, parks, and markets — an ideal setting for experiential learning and study travel. Participants may wish to extend their visit to explore other Baltic cities such as Tallinn or Vilnius, or other parts of Scandinavia and northern Europe. They can examine first-hand the region's innovative and emerging models of mobility, landscape conservation, and heritage-led development. The conference is therefore not only a professional exchange, but a gateway to deeper study of a region that has undergone—and continues to undergo—profound transformation.

The IMCL was founded in 1985 by Henry Lennard, a Viennese medical sociologist, and Suzanne Crowhurst Lennard, a British architectural scholar. The Lennards met at the University of California, Berkeley, and the series they created there over forty years ago has become a premier international gathering of scholars, practitioners and city leaders, coming together across borders, sectors and disciplines to share the latest knowledge on effective solutions to today's urban challenges. The host organization, the non-profit Lennard Institute for Livable Cities, is currently based in the USA but has seen regular conference participants and prominent speakers from every continent except Antarctica.

The Call for Abstracts is open through the end of February. For researchers, practitioners, and civic leaders committed to regenerative urbanism, the coming weeks represent a final opportunity to contribute to what promises to be an especially timely and consequential gathering.

---

For more information about the 63rd IMCL conference, or to submit an abstract, please visit https://www.imcl.online/latvia.