New Silk Road: The Architecture of the Belt and Road Initiative

Join for this lecture at The Bartlett School of Architecture’s Wicklow Street site for discussion and a book launch.

Based on three-year research undertaken at the Politecnico di Torino and a new publication (New Silk Road. The Architecture of the Belt and Road Initiative – Birkhauser 2025), the lecture reveals lights and shadows of China’s Belt and Road Initiative constructions on the ground. Starting in 2013, the BRI has transformed many places worldwide, such as China. In some cases, it provided crucial infrastructure, such as the General Hospital of Niger in Niamey or the National Library of El Salvador. At the same time, it also generated new urban areas, e.g., the Free Zone in Khorghos, Kazakhstan, with sometimes controversial effects on local communities and the environment.

While many sources discuss the BRI from a geopolitical and economic perspective, this lecture narrates the outcomes of this program in architectural and spatial terms. Discussing them through thematic categories that challenge established dichotomies in the architectural discourse entails a survey of 20 case studies documented with maps, architectural drawings, and photographs created explicitly for this research.

Speaker biographies

Michele Bonino is a Professor of Architecture and Urban Design and the Head of the Department of Architecture and Design at the Politecnico di Torino. He was formerly the Vice-Rector for International Relations with Asian Countries. He is an Honorary Professor at the Harbin Institute of Technology. He has held visiting positions, including Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University (2013–2014) and Visiting Scholar at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (2016). Among his recent publications are New Silk Road: Architecture and the Belt and Road Initiative (Birkhäuser, 2025, co-authored with F. Carota).  

Francesco Carota is an Assistant Professor at the School of Architecture and Design, University of Kansas. He is an Associate Member at the Center for East Asian Studies, University of Kansas, and an Affiliate Researcher at the China Room Research Group, Politecnico di Torino. He is a co-author of various academic publications, including New Silk Road: Architecture and the Belt and Road Initiative (Birkhäuser, 2025, co-authored with M. Bonino). He was the scientific director of an exhibition on Chinese architecture and urbanization held at the Museum of Oriental Art in Turin, Italy, co-curator of the Italian Pavilion at the Shenzhen Design Week – 2018 Edition, and co-curator of the exhibition “Design Assemblies” at the 2023 Singapore Design Week. He is a licensed architect, co-founder, and Principal of the multidisciplinary design firm Calibro Zero.

Christina Leigh Geros is an architect, landscape architect, and urban designer specializing in conducting design-led research that critically engages the production of knowledge infrastructures related to climate- and neuro-ecologies. Christina holds a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Tennessee and two graduate degrees from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design: a Master of Architecture and Urban Design and a Master of Landscape Architecture. Since 2012, she has worked with local community groups, activists, artists, and researchers to engage with environmental and human rights violations across South and Southeast Asia and the eastern Mediterranean. She teaches in the Landscape Architecture MA/MLA at The Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL and the Environmental Architecture MA at the Royal College of Art.

More information

Image: New Silk Road. The Architecture of the Belt and Road Initiative – Birkhauser 2025