In the recent article from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) News, a design studio course titled “Territory as Interior” is spotlighted for showing how architecture can both arise from and influence regional dynamics.
Taught by lecturer Roi Salgueiro Barrio in MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning, the course tasked students with repurposing an abandoned building on Spain’s Barbanza Peninsula in Galicia. Students researched the region’s material resources, economic activities, and cultural heritage, then designed new functions and structures in dialogue with that context.
For example, one student transformed a former cannery into a community space called “House of Sea,” combining a boat-building workshop, event area, and café to support the local craft economy. Another proposed a “La Nueva Cordelería” facility to manufacture hemp-based rope and hempcrete building blocks, linked to the area forestry and marine needs. A third student designed a biochar-plant project that took post-harvest wood residue and converted it into soil-enhancing material, tying architecture to agriculture, forestry, and the circular economy.
The approach underscores that architecture isn’t just about the form or function of a single building; it’s about territory, economy, society, and material systems at multiple scales. The instructor noted that building design inevitably impacts labor, technology, and local ecosystems.
By moving students between site research, regional economics, and detail models, the course encouraged them to think beyond generic typologies, asking how a building can emerge from its region and likewise define it. One student described it as the core of what architecture is—universal and specific at once.
This article offers a valuable angle: built-environment decisions ripple outward into infrastructure, material flows, regional competitiveness, and sustainable value chains, making architecture a genuine systems challenge rather than an aesthetic afterthought.