Neighborhoods are complex socio-human constructs shaped by interactions between people, built environments, natural elements, cultural identities, and social dynamics. While extensive research exists on urban form, environmental quality, and public health, the lived experience of neighborhoods — sensory, emotional, cognitive, and social — remains under-explored, especially in relation to health and well-being. Recent advances in neuro-architecture, environmental psychology, digital sensing, and participatory mapping offer new opportunities to capture how inhabitants perceive and experience their surroundings. Yet, evidence remains fragmented, context-specific, and rarely linked to actionable strategies for neighborhood transformation. The New European Bauhaus (NEB) calls for integrating beauty, sustainability, and inclusion into the transformation of living environments. This proposal directly responds to the call’s requirement to understand neighborhood experiences in the context of the green transition, nature-positive transformation, and climate resilience. SENSEscapes (Sensory Inclusion and Emotional Mapping for well-being across Green Territorial Transitions) proposes a multi-city research framework that combines neuro-architecture, participatory environmental psychology, and geospatial digital tools using existing open-source EMA (ecological momentary assessments platforms) to evaluate how green transitions. (e.g., climate resilience interventions, nature-positive transformations) are actually felt, perceived, and lived by diverse inhabitants — with an intentional focus on marginalized and vulnerable demographics in the consortium’s widening countries. Moving beyond quantitative environmental metrics (like air quality sensors or decibel counters), the project records inhabitants' subjective, emotional, and physiological reactions combined with qualitative spatial diaries) to neighborhood micro-climates, green spaces, and urban layouts.

Pre-application consortium management coordinator: Sandra Lund, email: info@livinglabsnetwork.com

Deadline: 1 December 2026

• Type: Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Action Lump Sum

• Total topic budget: €15 million

• Expected EU contribution: approximately €5 million per project

• Expected awards: 3 projects

• Funding rate: normally 100% for eligible RIA costs

Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:

• Robust evidence on how inhabitants experience their neighbourhood and the impact of these experiences on their health and well-being.

• The research informs policies, strategies, neighborhood planning and procurement for the green transition of neighborhoods, including their nature-positive transformation and climate resilience.