ECOWEEK 2026 Romania
Bucharest and Eforie Sud, 6-12 July 2026
Overview
ECOWEEK has organized since 2005 conferences and sustainable design workshops in 18 countries around the world. ECOWEEK 2026 is the second event in Romania. The first, in 2016, successfully addressed the site of the Victor Babes hospital in Bucharest, addressing issues of sustainable design and proposing landscape design schemes for ‘gardens that heal’.
The ECOWEEK 2026 is a cooperation between the Faculty of Urban Planning and Univercity Associations (Romania), the Constanța County Council (Romania), Ecoama/ECOWEEK (Greece), NetHood (Switzerland), and SINCERE Horizon, which will take place in Romania on July 6-12, 2026.
The event will address the relationship between architecture, landscape, health, circular economy and sustainability, and will include a series of interactive conferences with public discussions, lectures and keynote speakers open to the public, intensive architecture and landscape workshops, that will focus on sustainable design, urban planning and landscape design with the central theme of “Gardens and Public Spaces that Heal”. The workshops will also engage with the 'Talking Buildings' tool aiming to redefine the relationship of historic cultural heritage buildings with modern societies and contemporary cities.
ECOWEEK 2026 in Bucharest is a multidisciplinary event that invites the participation of post-doctorate, doctorate, graduate and undergraduate students and young professionals in Architecture, Engineering, Interior Design, Landscape Design, Agronomists, Medicine, History, Communication, and Media.
The site
ECOWEEK 2026 proposes a case study in Eforie Sud, on the site of the Recovery, Physical Medicine and Balneology Department of the “Sf. Apostol Andrei” County Emergency Hospital, Constanța. The site presents a 10-hectare land area, with abundant vegetation developed spontaneously, and an architectural ensemble of significant historical and environmental value, which was created at the beginning of the 20th century.
The workshop theme consists of developing a project outline for a Balneotherapy and Medical Recovery Park, including the premises’ functional organization, volumetric, functional and architectural proposals, accessibility solutions and landscaping with a recreational as well as therapeutic role.
The project benefits from the interest and support of the Constanța County Council, being considered a preliminary study within the implementation of a model project for the modernization of medical rehabilitation and balneology infrastructure, and for the revitalization of the Eforie Sud resort, by recovering its history as the oldest resort on the Romanian Black Sea coast and preserving the local heritage.
Programme and registration
For the detailed programme and registration please visit the main web site of the event
Historical context
The Eforie Sud resort dates back to 1894, when a sanatorium was built in the area, followed in 1899 by the first hotel between the seashore and the lakeshore, by the name Hotel Movila (today, Hotel Parc), and the Movila Baths (Baile Movila) on the shore of Lake Techirghiol. Between 1903 and 1906, around 50 hotels and villas were built between the sea and the lake, on the plot division sold by the Movila family.
The Movila-Techirghiol resort became officially a balneo-climatic resort in 1912, and developed significantly between the two world wars. For instance by 1938, approximately 500 villas, hotels, and residential houses had been built, enabling the resort to accommodate up to 20,000 visitors per season. In 1929 its name was changed to Carmen Sylva, and from 1962 to Eforie Sud.
At present on the Black Sea coast in the area of Lake Techirghiol, there are three spa resorts namely Eforie Sud, Eforie Nord and Techirghiol. On the lakeshore there is an outdoor treatment center for cold mud wraps, lake baths and climatotherapy, adding to the various spa hotels, sanatoria and the Recovery, Physical Medicine and Balneology Department of the “Sf. Apostol Andrei” County Emergency Hospital, Constanța.
Source: Constantin Cheramidoglu - Carmen Sylva, cea mai veche stațiune de pe litoral. Istoria Eforiei Sud Citește mai multThe TalkingBuildings game
Developed by NETHOOD for the SINCERE Horizon program, the TalkingBuildings game will enhance the workshop experience and redefine the relationship of historic buildings to their modern urban contexts.
The main assumption behind the SINCERE's TalkingBuildings game is that the process of giving a voice to buildings can reveal important aspects of their condition and potential future. It produces also very playful and inspiring outcomes that can attract attention and stimulate creative engagement.
The TalkingBuildings game invites participants to 1) Observe carefully a building through all their senses, 2) Choose a specific part of this building, and 3) Narrate a story through its own perspective.
Until today the game has been successfully tried out in Rhodes, Xanthi, Graz, and we will have the chance to further develop it. Our platform talkingbuildings.net collects the voices of all these buildings and provides a good starting point to understand the concept and contribute.
In Bucharest and Eforie Sud we will experiment with different observation prompts, framing scales, and storytelling mediums, and discover all together what the buildings and its parts have to say about the past, the present, and the future.