About 90% of our lives are spend indoors. For many of the buildings we stay in, standards and design guidelines have been set up, but educational buildings are often left out. Around 2009 the project the “Frisse Scholen” was set up in the Netherlands. This project aims to create better indoor climates at primary, secondary, and vocational schools. Universities have not been considered, while university students also need healthy environments. These students also suffer from stress. This can severely impact the academic performance. Healing elements in the design of university buildings could decrease the stress. This research aims to create design guidelines for a new general university education building that improves the physical and mental well-being of students. The research will be anthropological for the most part with interviews, questionnaires, and observation. This will be supported by literature research.

Churches are one of the most important features of the Dutch townscape. They were the cultural hub of the town for a long time. The 20th century marked the start of a societal change: ontkerkelijking. More and more churches are becoming vacant in the Netherlands and Belgium. These buildings can be reused, and the past can help us. The research question is as follows: “How have churches been reused in the past 30 years in the Netherlands and Belgium?”.
This question will be answered by analysing five case studies in the Netherlands and Belgium. First, the history and the new design of the churches will be introduced. Then, a short history of restoration and conservation will be given. The five adaptive reuse approaches, as composed by Plevoets & Van Cleempoel (2019), will be discussed. These approaches will be linked to the case studies. Lastly, a spatial analysis of the case studies will be done. These analyses show that churches with a new social function tend to be designed with a circular approach and have kept more of the spatial qualities of the original church building. However, all case studies have been designed with the history of the building in mind.