Marking the conclusion of the 2026 CCA-WRI Research Fellowship Program research period, join Kent Mundle and Yusuke Yabutani as they discuss how vacancy can be actively engaged with through the tools available to architects working in the distinct—but related—contexts of rural Japan and the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal. They will offer tactics, ranging from modes of urban governance to collective craftmanship, and counter narratives of decline and disappearance associated with decaying rural homes in Toyama Prefecture and neighbourhoods in Kathmandu subject to climate disasters.

This event is free and open to the public, but space is limited, so registration is recommended. Admission to the museum is included with your registration.

Yusuke Yabutani is an architect and practice-based researcher based in Toyama Prefecture, Japan, specializing in renovation and community design. His work explores how architectural thinking—reading the specific qualities of context and reconstructing relationships among people, space, and time—can generate emergent forms of community and value through interaction. Moving between practice and research, he investigates ways to reinterpret existing buildings and local resources through participation, learning, and care. His own house, sansensoubunko, a partially self-renovated farmhouse, received the AIJ Young Architect Award for Selected Architectural Designs and other recognitions.

Kent Mundle is a designer, researcher and educator whose work focuses on the transcalar impacts of architecture, examining how singular interventions can catalyze transformations across economic, social, political, and non-human ecologies. He is currently a lecturer at the University of Hong Kong and a member of District Development Unit (DDU), a research lab and impact enterprise where he leads initiatives in Nepal. Kent is also a co-founding member of Architecture Land Initiative (ALIN), a cooperative society that initiates political action through public space, landscape, and architectural projects. Collaborating with a global network of individuals and institutions, he develops initiatives that bridge theory and practice, encompassing building design, campaigns, exhibitions, films, publications, and teaching.