The LabCom Online Cafe is an informal meeting between researchers, artists, activists, communities, NGOs and everyone interested in topics that address SOCIAL INCLUSION AND WELL-BEING FOR ALL. Our conversation takes place every Friday at 4 pm via GoogleMeet. The idea is to create a forum for the exchange of ideas and knowledge, a moment inspired by our globalized reality, to promote the inclusion and connection for all. Everybody can propose a theme for the next Cafe (and alternative meeting time to adapt to your time zone), it is just to contact our LabCom. We do not have formal meeting registrations, because the proposal is that you can click on the link of the room if you feel like it and participate without formalities, having a coffee, lying in the hammock, sitting on the beach or under the covers hiding from the cold. It is a blind-date!
Come talk to us, we really want to meet you! To make you want to find us, below we list the meetings that have already taken place.
Schedule 2022
On the 16th of November, WEDNESDAY, at 5 pm we start with music by @aracele_rm and Ana Ortega and some snacks, at 6 pm we start the conversation circle. Our LabCom Cafe along with the 50th birthday celebrations of @faculdadedearquiteturaufpel will bring Architect and Urbanist Miguel Martins to talk about his immersion in the Amazon rainforest. How to sustain chaos if that’s where all the possibility of creation lies? Diving into a creative is far from being a comfortable crossing: it is by aiming at the unknown that we promote the most interesting triggers for our work. Between reports on office projects and experiences with creative immersions, this chat talks about how it can be productive to invent our own creative ecosystem to feed and create generous and abundant systems of possibilities, strength, and courage to experiment with interactions and combinations of ideas.
The Behavioral Studies Laboratory (LabCom) of the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism of the Federal University of Pelotas invites everyone to the lecture with our guest @padrejulio.lancelloti. We will be talking about Aporophobia and Hostile Architecture, extremely important topics for building a city for all. Aporophobia and hostile architecture must be fought by everyone. Our meeting will be in person and the presence of our guest will be on a digital platform. There will be no guest access online. On WEDNESDAY, September 14th, at 6 pm for the @ufpeloficial Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism. Arrive early to guarantee your seats, we will have two screens, coffee, and popcorn for everyone.
The Graduate Program in Social Memory and Cultural Heritage ( in partnership with LabCom Cafe and LabCom of the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism) at UFPEL is proud to offer a cycle of lectures by international academics from Slovenia, Mexico, Argentina and United State in June, July and August 2022. Speakers (virtual and face-to-face) will present on topics such as: Music and Conflict, Culture and Urbanism, Traditional Argentine Music, Restoration, Festive Rituals in the Transatlantic Context. Virtual lecture (in English) “Places Shaped by Memories / Memories Shaped by Places” (“Lugares formados por memórias / Memorias formadas por lugares”) – Dr. Tom Borrup (EUA) – THURSDAY, June 30th at 4 pm.
Participation certificates will be issued. Information: https://wp.ufpel.edu.br/ppgmp/eventos or by email
memoriapatrimonio@ufpel.edu.br
We are waiting for you, this THURSDAY, June 9th, at 4 pm, for a coffee in our online conversation circle. Our guest, architect Dani Amorim, will tell a little about her experience with BioArchitecture and sustainable constructions.
LabCom café this THURSDAY, June 2nd ! Winter is coming and nothing better than a conversation to discuss how to encourage gender equality in the construction of inclusive cities through collaborative actions in the urban space. Our guests are from the TURBA group in Porto Alegre @t.urb.a. Don’t miss it, 4 pm in Brazil. Ask for the room link by message.
This THURSDAY, May 26 th, at 4 pm in Brazil, we will have another LabCom Cafe on NeuroArchitecture with architect Jessica Carbone. Jessica Carbone is an Architect and Urban Planner with a degree in Neuromarketing and Consumer Neuroscience from the Copenhagen Business School, author of Briefing NeuroDesign- Applied Neuroscience in Residential Interior Design (2020) and Applied Neuroscience to Architecture and Urbanism (2021). Ask for the room link by message and don’t miss our meeting.
This THURSDAY, April 7th, at 4 pm, we will be with you in our conversation circle. Let’s talk about Urban Design and Socio-environmental Disasters. Catharina Salvador, our guest, is a teacher at the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism at the University of Alto Vale do Itajaí (UNIDAVI), graduated in Architecture and Urbanism from UEL ( State University of Londrina) and master in Architecture and Urbanism from UFSC. We are waiting for you! Ask for the link by message.
This THURSDAY, March 31 st, at 5 pm, we are waiting for you for our meeting that will bring the architect Marcelo Vila to talk to us about the SOS Cities. Marcelo Vila is Architect FADU-UBA,1986; Owner Vila Sebastian Architects; Vitruvio Prize for Emerging Architecture, CPAU-MNBA; Honorary Director of Planning and Design of Cities, Municipality of Chizou- China; Primer Invitado Latin American the architecture biennal, Beijing 2004- China; Architecture Teacher, FADU-UBA, Taller Sudamerican; Founder and director the of program SOS Cities.
This THURSDAY, March 17, at 4 pm, LabCom Cafe brings us dear Taís Brandelli, who was once our undergraduate and master’s student and is now coordinator of the Univel Architecture course @univeloficial Secure your place by asking for the link access, as the Café will also be the Inaugural Class of the Graduate Program in Architecture and Urbanism FAUrb – UFPel
Dear friends! We are now back on THURSDAYS at 4 pm with LabCom Café. On March 10th at 4 pm we return with our conversation circle, a place where we meet to chat informally, create critical thinking and promote a welcome for everyone. Our Laboratory is a place for friends interested in topics related to social inclusion in the city and in the world, welcoming minority groups and giving them a voice. Our conversations bring up controversial, crude, often difficult, but extremely necessary topics in our discussion. This Thursday we will talk to the Master in Architecture and Urbanism Carolina Oliveira da Silva, graduated from the Federal University of Santa Catarina. Our conversation circles are not about quantity, but quality, come and participate in the construction of critical thinking about the city and society. The meeting will be via Google Meet. Ask for the link by message.
Schedule 2021
The LabCom Cafe on November 12, 2021 was at the Environmental Psychology, Mental Health and Urbanism Workshop. The workshop is held by Professor Cristóbal Bravo Ferretti from the University of Bío-Bío in Chile. He is a Visiting Professor in Brazil at UFPel during the month of November 2021. He came with funding from the CAPES-PRINT UFPel Institutional Project. Dr Ferreti is an environmental psychologist and teaches the workshop on environmental psychology, focusing on studies of the influence of urban space on people’s behavior and mental health, with the aim of training future architects and urban planners, and other interested parties in areas to the best plan, understand and promote the city space in an inclusive and humanitarian way. Objective: Develop critical thinking in future professionals about the responsibility we have when planning the city. Good urban planning can provide better health conditions in a positive behavior of society, while urban planning focused on exclusion and unsustainable can encourage the emergence of diseases and unhealthy behavior on the part of people. Workshop Period: from 11/11 to 11/26/2021.
This week was special and LabCom Cafe took place at the 3rd International Congress on Citizenship, Public Space and Territory. The conversation was with Prof. Dr. Cristóbal Bravo Ferretti from the University of Bío-Bío – Chile. The topic discussed was: ‘Understanding the identity of place in contemporary mobility processes’. Professor Cristóbal is a Visiting Professor at the Federal University of Pelotas, with funding from the Capes Print Institutional Project, of the Federal Government of Brazil.
Friday, October 29, at 4 pm, our meeting was with the architect, urban planner and doctoral student Gabriela Costa da Silva. We talked about the importance of popular participation in removal processes in Brazil, focusing on the right to housing and exclusion in the city. Gabriela holds a master’s degree in architecture and urbanism from the Federal University of Pelotas and a doctoral student in urban and regional planning from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul.
The activity of this Café discussed Mobility and Security from a gender perspective, focusing on methodologies for thinking about gender and cities. The debates were based on the speeches of our three guests: 1. Shirley dos Santos talked to us about a feminist urban cartography, elaborated with an attentive eye on “being on a bus”, a discussion that transits through daily reflections on the margins of urban mobility. 2. Marina Mecabô focused on the methodologies of two works, one that combines cartography with fictional narrative to understand the presence of women in downtown Pelotas and another that uses the digital platform of google questionnaires to investigate the path of UFPel students to the university, bringing the composition of maps of the seizures in these paths. 3. Gabriela Pecantet presented the research on LGBTQIA+ people, security and the making-city focusing, mainly, on the narratives of interlocutions established with researchers from the extension project ‘Mapping the Night’. The activity took place at LabCom Café, on 10/22.
On October 15th at 4 pm in Brazil we had a discussion about walkability and inclusion in public space with the architect and urban planner and doctoral student Lívia Fernandes from the Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil. Lívia brought her reflections on how to promote a city of inclusion for all.
This week’s Café sought to discuss the conservation of structural racism in the city of Pelotas in southern Brazil through time. In order to carry out this action, some sources were crossed so that we can understand the materialization of racism in the material culture that was in circulation in the past and in the present, to pay attention to how the black population was and is mentioned and which discourses were and are produced. about them.
October started with our dear guest Haydee Beatriz Escudero, from the National University of Patagonia San Juan Bosco, Argentina. She brought us to the discussion of city security corpographs, security trails, and electronic surveillance.
The LabCom Cafe on September 24, 2021 brought us the DIY discussion. The term Bricolage means improvised manual work that uses different materials. In the appropriation made by Lévi-Strauss (1976), the concept of bricolage was defined as a method of expression through the selection and synthesis of selected components of a culture. Pablo Grané, from Universidad Nacional de la Patagonia San Juan Bosco in Argentina, came to share with us his experience in a DIY project with children and adolescents and youth collective practices.
Our guest Maria Veronica Machado, PhD, architect and professor at Universidad de la Costa, Colombia, came to talk to us on Friday, September 17, 2021 about the concepts of limits, edges and borders. As in Spanish and Portuguese, limit/border/border is the consequence of the other limit, in a separatist connotation. It starts with the idea of limit as separation, where the separated is assumed as a cut, in which one thing ends and another different begins. It is at the edge where the border is created, two different territories that due to their differences face each other. This is the vision of a divisive politics, when in reality what happens in these spaces is the opposite. We talk about borders in a global world that should be for everyone.
This Friday, September 10th, we had three guests: Nirce Medvedovski, Luana Loureiro and Sara Parlato. We were talking about three issues – decent housing, thermal comfort and milk cartons. Nirce, Luana and Sara presented a project they are developing at the Federal University of Pelotas, where, in the PAC Anglo subdivision, they propose the internal coating of houses with Tetra Pak packaging and participatory workshops with communities.
The Café on Friday, September 3, 2021 brought us the discussion about Architecture and Scenography. Architect Guilherme Larrosa presented some of his experiences. Art director, Guilherme worked in the production of several Brazilian soap operas, films and series. In 2019, the film Bacurau, which Larrosa was part of the artistic production team, was nominated for the Cannes Film Festival, representing Brazilian cinema internationally. Passionate about cinema, he says that cinema always instigated him to the ephemeral side, knowing a new place every two hours fascinated him.
Another bombastic encounter! On August 27th at 4 pm we had another meeting where we discussed the theme ‘Tourism and Race Relations in the City’. Tereza Duarte and Ana Carolina Rosa brought us the debate on inclusion in the city.
Friday, August 20th, the conversation heated up! Uberized work and the fetishization of freedom were topics discussed by Prof. Fabiano Milano Fritzen from UFPel. Have you ever thought about how much an uber driver earns? Are we not contributing to the continued exploitation of work? No rights, nothing. Are we part of the exploratory chain?
After a short academic break we returned with full energy. On August 13, 2021, at 4 pm, via GoogleMeet, we started our first Cafe meeting of the semester 2021/2. Fatphobia and Tourism was the topic discussed by the academic of the Tourism course at the Federal University of Pelotas, Amanda Machado Bonini. Our guest researches the difficulties that women face when traveling due to fatphobia rooted in our society and also to the patterns of the projects we design: is this a problem caused by the body or by prejudice? She brought this question to the debate.
Last LabCom Cafe of the first half of 2021! Professor Emílio Merino talked to us about Mobility & Planning on June 25th at 4 pm in Brazil. It brought us great arguments about how to plan cities for people.
On June 18, at 4 pm in Brazil, we talked to Prof. Dr. Danielle Medeiros from the Federal University of Bahia on the theme HEALTH, CITY and INCLUSION. Danielle introduced us to the work she does in the health area with quilombola families in northeastern Brazil and introduced us to the difficulties they face in fighting hunger.
On Friday, June 11th, we had a meeting with Professor Milena Kanashiro who brought us to the debate on the topic of Walkability and Active Mobility and the Role of the Urban Planner in the Design of Healthier Cities that encourage physical activity.
On June 4th we met some partners from the Habitat for Humanity team who work at the Urban Solutions Office in SP. The theme was The Reality of Housing that we experience in Brazil and we know some arrangements between different sectors that can bring works by ATHIS, such as Obras Wash, to Brazilian families.
On May 28 at 4 pm in Brazil we invite everyone to a discussion on Our Role as Citizens in the City and in the Territories. For this, we invited professors Cláudia Tosso, Helena Callai and Tarcísio de Oliveira from the Regional University of the Northwest of the State of Rio Grande do Sul, in Brazil.
The LabCom on May 21, 2021, at 4 pm in Brazil, brought us a discussion about Tourism, Accessibility and the City. We who experience the city every day are often not aware of the difficulties encountered by people with disabilities, the elderly, pregnant women, people who have suffered temporary injuries, obesity and even parents with baby strollers go through daily.
The LabCom on Friday, May 7, 2021, at 4 pm in Brazil, brought us a controversial Discussion about the Tourist Image of Brazil, which country is this? what ass is this? Do you identify with the tourist image produced in Brazil for many years? Have you a Brazilian woman ever suffered any embarrassment abroad for the simple fact of being Brazilian? The theme discussed all issues with a multidisciplinary group.
On April 30th at 4 pm we discovered a little about As Riches and Histories of Mato Grosso. Architect and urban planner Fernando Birello from the University of the State of Mato Grosso presented a little of this midwestern Brazil covered mostly by the Amazon rainforest, wetlands and savanna plains. The capital, Cuiabá, dates back to the 18th century gold rush and the extensive wetlands of the Pantanal are home to diverse wild species, including macaws, caimans and jaguars.
On Friday April 23, 2021, at 4 pm in Brazil, we talked about The Use of Cardboard as a Construction Technique for Houses. Our guest, Dr. Mirian Sayuri Vaccari, came straight from Sydney, Australia to find us via GoogleMeet.
On April 16th we had another fantastic meeting on Tourism, now talking about topics such as Urbanization and Memory with researchers and professors Sarah Minasi and Pedro Mascarenhas from the Federal University of Pelotas. We meet at 4 pm (Brazil time). The meeting will be via GoogleMeet, ask for the room key to find us :))
On 9th April 2021, at 4 pm in Brazil, we had a conversation about Tourism and Race Relations with Professor Natália Oliveira, from the Federal University of Pelotas. The discussion brought important themes for reflection, such as the lack of representation of the black population in tourism advertising and the places promoted as places of tourism, which intend to erase the true history of Brazil.
On March 26, 2021 the LabCom Cafe took place at 13:30 pm. We had a very interesting conversation about Heritage and Restoration with the Spanish architect from the city of Cadiz, Alberto Jiménez Ruiz. Alberto presented us with a restoration work that he developed for the Santa Isabel de Hungría School, in Spain, in Cadiz.
On 19th March 2021, at 4 pm in Brazil, we talked about the new LabCom Project, PlaceAge-COVID. More information, you can find here: https://wp.ufpel.edu.br/agefriendlycities/
On 12th March 2021, our meeting focuses on the discussion of how international mobility can contribute to teaching in Brazil, bringing to the conversation Professors Dr. Adriane Borda and Dr. Célia Gonsales who spent 1 year in Spain doing post-doctorate with funding from CAPES PRINT of the Federal University of Pelotas in Brazil.
First LabCom Cafe of 2021.
On March 5 at 4 pm we met to set our goals and schedule for the new year.
On 18th December, at 4 pm, we had our last LabCom Cafe in 2020. LabCom participants presented the articles they developed in 2020, talked about the next activities for 2021 and reflected on this pandemic year. LabCom Cafe returns to its activities on 5th March 2021.
The LabCom Cafe of 11th December 2020 brought us the discussion about Cultural Landscape and Architectural Works in a round table format with internationally renowned architects: Xianjun Zhou (from China), Shunichiro Higashi (from Japan) and Sati Fukunaga (from Brazil). Our meeting started at 4 pm (in Brazil) in this new round table format. Each guest presented their own projects developed in Spain, Japan and Brazil.
At the LabCom Cafe on 4th December 2020, we talked about the inclusion of the feminist perspective in academic research. Professor Dr. Ligia Chiarelli brought us this debate, at 4 pm via GoogleMeet. To get in the mood for debate, we suggest that everyone watch the 2015 film ‘As Suffagistas’ (available on the internet and also on Netflix) before our Cafe and bring their feminist vision of this still so macho world.
On Friday, 27th November 2020, at 4 pm, we had a very opportune conversation for this moment that begins the summer and the holiday schedules in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic in Global South. Professor Alice Islabao Lopes, bachelor in Tourism, specialist in Tourism, Environment and Culture, master in Social Policy and doctoral student in Social Memory and Cultural Heritage at UFPel, brought us the debate on Tourism and Hospitality before and now in the pandemic period. Alice comes to add our discussions in the area of interest of Sustainable Tourism.
On 20th November 2020, we had our first LabCom Cafe BREAKFAST :)) Our meeting took place at 10 am in Brazil time and at 1 pm in UK time. Professor Ryan Woolrych, from Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, brought us the debate on population ageing and the right to the city. Ryan has been working with us since 2016 when he led the PlaceAge Project with Professor Adriana Portella in the UK and Brazil. Ryan and Adriana formed this network of ageing studies in 2015 when they were invited to the ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council) WorkShop in London.
The LabCom Cafe on 13th November 2020, at 4 pm (Brazil time) we talked about Environmental Psychology and Pandemic, with Professors Doctors Isolda and Hartmut Gunther from the University of Brasília (UNB). Isolda and Hartmut were the leaders in Brasilia of the study on ageing, Project PlaceAge, coordinated in Brazil by LabCom. The discussion was centred on how the city’s built environment influences people’s behaviour, especially at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic.
This Friday, 6th November 2020, we had our first LabCom Cafe Brunch. Our meeting took place at 2:00 pm (Brazil time) to meet our national and international audience in a comfortable time (Europe is 4 hours ahead of Brazil). We had two guests for this Friday: Professor Eddie Andrew Martínez Alegría of Colombia, from Universidad La Gran Colombia, and architect Alberto Jiménez Ruiz, who has been working for more than 15 years on projects for the restoration and restoration of historic heritage in Spain and in rest of Europe. The debate was around the themes of urban legibility, urban design and historical heritage. Architect Alberto Ruiz presented the fantastic restoration project of Cathedral of Cadiz in Spain, while Professor Eddie brought us a whole debate about the importance of urban legibility in the design of public spaces in the pandemic and post-pandemic periods.
Friday, 30 October 30 2020, we had a LabCom Cafe of international excellence. We discussed how to promote the reception of refugees and migrants beyond the pandemic with professionals who work directly in the area of refuge: João Granja, who works in the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights’ Rapporteurship on the Rights of Migrant People. Guilherme Mansur, associate researcher at the Center for the Study of International Migration (CEMI / Unicamp), is a researcher at the Directorate of High Studies at the National School of Public Administration (ENAP). Cyntia Sampaio, who has been involved with international organizations and non-governmental organizations of reference in the protection of vulnerable population groups, being National Coordinator of the South-South Cooperation Project for the Protection of the Rights of Migrant Workers in the Region of America Latin America and the Caribbean developed by the International Labor Organization in partnership with the Government of Brazil. A Cafe of two hours and 30 minutes with a lot of emotion.
On Friday, 23 October 2020, at 4 pm, we talked about what can be considered historical heritage today and deal with the controversial Casa Kraft. The meeting was led by the architect Letícia Aguilera, who brought us to the debate the architects Ana Lúcia Costa de Oliveira and Ester Gutierrez.
On Friday, October 16, 2020, at 4 pm, we had an extremely important conversation in the current context, Carolina Clasen and Eduardo Rocha presented us the Healthy Schools Manual, developed by the IAB of Sao Paulo. Download the Manual here and learn the basic guidelines for a Healthy School in this pandemic context before sending your child to school.
On Friday 9th October 2020 at 4pm, Emotions and City was our conversation with our colleague Professor Dr Cristóbal Ferretti, directly from Chile, at the University of Bío-Bío, discussing the concepts of Zones of Sacrifice, Containerization of Space, Industrial ‘Corralamiento’, Regressive Narratives and Fear as a Power Device. In the end a great debate between researchers from Brazil, Mexico, Chile and Colombia, and a Happy Birthday to our researcher Kethlyn from Colombia.
Friday, October 2 at 4 pm, we talked to institutions that were part of the “One hand washes the other” Project, an initiative of the NGO Habitat Brasil, which raised funds with large companies so that more than 600 community sinks could be installed in vulnerable communities in Brazil. The guests for our conversation are the company EFICIOBRA (architects Isadora Passeggio and Karina Moura) who inserted the community sinks in the city of Pelotas, the architect Jorge Sanchez who inserted the sinks in the city of Florianópolis and the NGO Engenheiros Sem Fronteiras (civil engineer Gabriel Chiele and lawyer Julia Antunes) who inserted the sinks in the city of Porto Alegre, all institutions in Brazil.
On September 25 at 4 pm our conversation at LabCom Cafe was about the architect Lina Bo Bardi, with her Museum Architecture and Expography. The guest Professor Ricardo Pintado brought us several curiosities about this fabulous Italian woman who chose Brazil as her residence and left so many legacies for the history of architecture.
The LabCom Online Cafe of September 18, 2020, was with Architect Fabrício Gallo Corrêa who brought us the debate on Housing Rights and the importance of the National Rural Housing Program (PNHR) for Brazil.
On September 11, 2020, at LabCom Cafe we talked about milk cartons! Architect Thaise Sebben told us about the use of Tetra Pak packaging (the milk cartons!) as an internal lining for vulnerable homes.
Friday, September 4, 2020, was the day to map our feelings, we talked about Story Maps, from ArcGIS Online. Professor Sinval Xavier brought us a wonderful tool, but still little used in the area of behaviour, with a great capacity for analysis and application in research with communities and the city.
On August 28, 2020, we had an excellent meeting at LabCom Online Cafe on the topic of Co-Housing/Co-Living for Older Adults as a way of inclusion and active healthy ageing. Alternative Inclusion Housing with Professors Celina Britto Corrêa and Eduardo Rocha and Architects Rafaela Otto and Rafaela Scherer.
At the LabCom Online Cafe on August 21, 2020, we talked about the International Research Context with Guest Professors Cristhian Brum from UFPel, Fabio Vinasco from Colombia, Martins Gomeztagle from the University of Tokyo in Japan, and Tarcísio Oliveira from UNIJUI.
On August 14, 2020, LabCom Cafe brought a challenge to everyone: Write and present a research PAPER from a study that has already been done within 30 days! The Articles Workshop led to the creation of study groups that are preparing for our LabCom Cafe on October 9, 2020.
August 7 was the KEY day, the day of the INAUGURATION of our meetings. The First LabCom Online Cafe, presented by Professor Adriana Portella, was about Inclusion and Networking, Research and Development. We started at 2 pm, but now the Cafe has been consolidated for 4 pm, at the time of afternoon coffee or English tea.