business idea for you? Yes, I'm coming completely from a different field. So I studied computer science and management and then also worked in that field for a couple of years, but I decided 10 years ago to found like Restardo, which is a marketplace for reclaimed construction materials and the largest of its kind in Europe.

But then also Concola two years ago, which is like a digital platform for circular construction. It's a personal matter because I think this opportunity not a lot of people can get. And I also believe that like digitalization really can change now a lot of different fields and can make a positive impact to our environment.

And that's why basically what I did was like, which is the sector which is underestimated in terms of climate impact and where can digitalization can do something. This is basically the questions I asked myself way back. And then I realized the construction sector as the least digitized sector in the world

with the agriculture sector. There's an opportunity. And then when I saw like 40% of all GHG mists are coming from that sector, I was directly hooked. And I was like, maybe it's a good combination to combine the knowledge of digitalization impacts and also architecture and engineering together. And let's see what happens. And this is where we are basically now.

You have spoken about making a positive change. As far as we all know, the construction and building field is a very conservative area where a lot of things have to be done. In some of your interviews, you have also spoken about pre demolition audit, how important it is, and how we don't have it here in Germany, but in other countries.

What can simple people do to improve the political climate for new building strategies? For new building strategies? I think the first question you should ask yourself is like, do we even need to build something new? Because basically in Germany and in Europe, everything is already built. We don't need more buildings. So I'm always referring to the circular economy are so refuse, reduce, repair, reuse,

and so on. And we should first refuse to just build something new. We should think like, can we repurpose existing buildings? And what I see that there's more and more also local communities who if there's a

deconstruction or demolition happening that they're really protesting against it. And also if there's something new getting built, they're really trying to ask questions. So there's like local groups, like the Architects for Future, for example, which has a really large presence here in Germany. And I can definitely recommend to join them and then to organize to really ask

critical questions to the politicians, to local politicians, but also to the project developers, building owners, if we really have to do that. And if so, then you should also really try to ask, like, what is the sustainable concept behind the new building? So does it use reclaimed materials?

What is the resource efficiency strategy? What is the energy efficiency strategy, but also what is the social strategy? So what should be the purpose of this building? And so, yeah, I think everyone can do something by joining groups and by also critically ask questions. And I think a lot of people think they are just one small piece in the whole thing.

But like when we are coming together as a group, we have a big lever. And you can see this in, for example, the Fridays for Future movement from which the Architects for Future movement was created. So there is definitely a lot of opportunity to change something. You have spoken also about that we don't need new buildings here in Germany because

we have too much of them. So right now, a lot of people are coming to Germany, the refugees, for example, and they all need a space to live. So why do you think what would be a possibility to found housing for those people?

Should we reuse buildings that we have and which buildings should this be? If there's a situation where there's a huge challenge, we as a human, we get very creative and we find solutions. The problem I think right now is that we are in a kind of prosperous society and we don't really take our time to think about these big challenges.

But like the refugee crisis 2015 was a big challenge. And so they repurpose, for example, malls. I think a good idea is to first start an inventory of buildings which are right now empty. So that is a very good thing. Every city should have an inventory of empty buildings.

And then we know where there's some space. And in there's not a lot of cases where it's not possible to repurpose a building. So giving you the example of like malls. So I mean the concept on like how we buy things changing, like we're buying more on e-commerce. So like these malls are changing and what is happening now, they're repurposing these

malls, for example, as housing, as office, but also as, for example, a home for elderly people. And also in the refugee crisis 2015, there was a lot of these buildings repurposed. It changed and afterwards a bit. But I think that gave us a good push in a direction that we more be thinking about what we already have in our built environment and instead of just demolishing

and building it new. I'm living in Berlin, for example, and there's a lot of buildings which are just empty because of investors wanting to demolish the building and building something new. And I think if we change regulative landscape, we have really the opportunity to build less, to use less resources.

And I think that's the way to go. And we saw in the refugee crisis and a lot of other events that this is not a problem. We are able to do that. We just need the sense of urgency. And actually we have a sense of urgency because climate change is there. Moving to a little bit different field, your first resale platform, Restado. So I took a little look through the platform and I've seen that the materials

that are offered there are placed there by private people. Are they also making their own prices? Because I was a little bit surprised. There are some old doors for about two or three thousand euros. It's a little bit, I think that it's a little bit too much for a door,

especially when we see that not everyone can have the funding to. Maybe I quickly explained the difference between Restado and Conkula. So Restado was founded 10 years ago, and it's basically just a marketplace where people can put on materials and others can buy it. The target group is on the selling side, a lot private, but also

construction companies. And on the buying side, we see a lot of private and small craftsmen, for example, buying that. On the other side, Conkula is only for professional actors in the construction sector. So here we are only focusing on a large amount of materials, large buildings, larger than three thousand square meters. And here we are also offering more than the marketplace.

We are offering transportation, recertification and so on. So this is like a big difference. And with that, we are targeting two groups. And we also think that Conkula has a much bigger impact because like these large buildings, they, of course, have a much higher embodied carbon. And if we are able to recirculate the materials, it's a much bigger impact.

Rosado Marketplace is quite interesting because it has also a variety of materials. It has like the standard materials such as insulation and tiles and so on. And they are quite cheap also to buy. But there are also some special materials, as you just talked about these historical materials. And they have a certain value.

And it's actually quite interesting if you think about it, like it's a material which is very old, but it increased by the price. And because there's not only the material value behind, but there's also nostalgic value behind. And I completely agree that it's not something everyone can afford, but you can find also normal doors for a cheaper price on our

platform. But like these nostalgic materials, they increase by value over time, like an old timer, because there's a history behind. And this is also the concept, basically, what we want to do. We want to not only look at materials as something, but we want to give a material like a value in history.

Because every material was built already in somewhere else. And now putting it into a new building, you can tell a story about every material. And that also increases the value of a building. And the people who are living in that building, they are working or whatever. They are also feeling this value. And they're much more comfortable. So I give you an example. We have our office in Berlin, the circle house, which is a building

completely. Or 80% of it is coming from deconstructed materials. And the employees or the people working in that, they really love that building. Because you can just say, like, ah, OK, these things are coming from that building, and these things come from that building, and so on. So there's a lot of value behind.

So you were speaking about the building in Berlin that you have said had different parts of them. You can actually guess which one is from where. It has some just a little patchwork vibe. The theme of today's conference symposium is rebuild and repeat and also recycle, which means working with old materials, which means also working with materials that are not looking

good, for example. So what do you think? Do we have to establish a new standard for beauty or aesthetics? Do we have to fit into the world? Or do we have to make the world fit for us? Because I think in the past, it was more about making things fit to us, to make them beautiful, which also required big expenses and materials

that are not easy to become, and so on and so on. So what do we have to change in ourself, in our region on beauty and aesthetics? Yes, that's a really good question. I think there will be different streams, in my opinion. One will be availability follows form follows availability. Yes, this way, so that we are much more looking

what materials do we have available, and then are planning a building from that. And we see that already in some architectural competitions. So there's more and more architecture competitions, which are saying like this is a catalog of materials from the existing building. Now create something new out of that.

And on the other side, I think there will be also the stream where materials are going back to manufacturers and the manufacturers are refurbishing these materials and selling them as kind of a new material. So not only recycling, but also reuse or refurbishment. And that's also an interesting stream, because you can't see that these are reclaimed materials.

I would also disagree that materials which are old are not looking good. Of course, they are. But I can also happily recommend everyone who's listening to visit us in the circular house in Berlin, Neukölln, because here you can see that you would not notice that these materials are reclaimed.

And it has an aesthetic, which in my opinion, looks much nicer than a lot of office spaces. But it's also because the architecture office did a really good job. But there will be no new like design language, or it will be more challenging, but in a creative way for architects to build or to use these materials.

But on the other way, it will be also quite normal that if you source the materials that you can just say, I will want to have it as a reclaimed or CO2 or low carbon version, and it will look the same. It's just like that it has 70, 80% less CO2. So there will be these two ways, in my opinion.

What is the hardest part about changing the architecture and construction materials market now? I think it's very important. Politicians have to do an action now, because they're promising. So we are publishing papers on what has to change. There's the Architects of Future, there's German Zero, and so on. Anyway, that is the one thing. And I think when that changes, everything follows very fast.

On the other side, I think the market is very frictionate. So there's a lot of different players. When you look on how is a building built, there's a lot of different stakeholders involved, coming from down to up and up to down to educate people on how to work with such materials. So that starts at like the project developers or building owners and make them clear,

like there's no security issue, warranty issues. It's not more costly and so on. But then also down, the craftsman. You have to explain to the person, how do you use these materials? So even like the deconstruction company, you have to tell them, no, you should not just throw everything away. This is something very valuable.

Please try to deconstruct in a way that it's valuable. And so I think a challenge is education. But what I also see is like education starts, for example, at university. And I see the symposium, but like also in classes, lectures, and so on. It's coming. And it's nice.

And what I see is that students are also really interested in that. It will take some time, but like if these students are going to an architecture office, they will also then ask critical questions and so on. So it's like an effect which will hopefully spread.