About
I am a social anthropologist specializing in urban development and sustainable place-based and area development. My research focuses on how considerations for nature, quality of life, well-being, cultural heritage environments, and socially stimulating living and public spaces can be integrated into urban densification processes and climate transitions.
My work explores opportunities for strengthening social sustainability in urban development and examines how diverse stakeholders and civil society actors can co-create and support inclusive urban transformation. I am particularly interested in processes of change and in understanding how sociocultural, environmental, spatial, and temporal dynamics interact to shape cities' capacities for green transition and sustainable development.
I have extensive experience conducting ethnographic research and fieldwork in Norway and internationally, including in Italy and Croatia.
Teaching Experience
Department of Social Anthropology (SAI), University of Oslo, Norway
Centre for Development and the Environment (SUM), University of Oslo, Norway
Department of Media and Communications, University of Dubrovnik, Croatia
Selected Research Projects
FUSILLI – Fostering the Urban Food System Transformation through Innovative Living Labs Implementation (Horizon 2020)
The main objective of FUSILLI is to develop an urban food plan that supports an integrated and secure transition towards healthy, sustainable, safe, inclusive, equitable, and affordable food systems. Through innovative and transferable urban policies, the project promotes the implementation of improved measures across all stages of the food value chain, contributing to systemic urban food transformation.
CONTRA – Conflicts in Transformations (Urban Europe, ERA-NET Cofund Urban Transformation Capacities)
CONTRA explores how the institutionalization of productive conflict can enhance the transformative capacities needed for transitions towards more sustainable cities. Through a comparative study of urban planning law and practice related to climate transition in four countries (Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway, and Poland), the project investigates how urban conflicts are managed and examines their relationship with political and legal institutions. The aim is to determine whether conflicts are suppressed or actively utilized as drivers of sustainable transformation.
SMACREG – Small City Regions: Development, Attractiveness and Sustainability (Research Council of Norway-funded project)
SMACREG aims to generate and disseminate new knowledge about development, attractiveness, and sustainability in small city regions. The project contributes to theoretical development, policy-making, planning practices, and development work at local, regional, and national levels.
Areas of Expertise
Sustainable place-based and area development
Urban development and densification
Social sustainability
Cultural heritage management
Sustainable tourism
Food systems and sustainability
Urban ecology
Political activism and civil society engagement
Co-creation and participatory urban governance
Ethnographic research and fieldwork
Climate transition and green transformation
Research groups
Research projects
Completed research projects
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FUSILLI - Fostering the Urban Food System Transformation through Innovative Living Labs Implementation
Through experimental methods and knowledge sharing, researchers will explore new ways of producing and distributing food in European cities. OsloMet and the municipality of Oslo are Norwegian partners in the project, which has been supported by Horizon 2020, the EU's framework program for research.
Publications and research
Scientific publications
Olsen, Cecilie Sachs
; Janas, Krzysztof; Roeck, Lisa De; Koole, Barbara; Janssen, Cato; Hulst, Merlijn van;
Loades, Celine Motzfeldt
(2025).
Estrangement, embodiment and entanglement: Putting agonistic planning into practice through Urban Drama Labs.
Urban Studies.
https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251361315
Cuomo, Federico; Battisti, Luca; Bruno, Riccardo;
Loades, Celine Motzfeldt
;
Eika, Anders
(2025).
Experimenting with Urban Food Systems. A Comparison of Oslo and Turin.
ReCibo Rivista della Rete Italiana Politiche Locali del Cibo.
Vol. Volume 3 .
https://doi.org/10.13135/3034-834X/11842
Loades, Celine Motzfeldt
(2022).
Walls and Gateways - Contested Heritage in Dubrovnik.
ISBN: 9781800733541.
368 p.
Berghahn Books.
https://hdl.handle.net/11250/4525650
Loades, Celine Motzfeldt
(2019).
Heritage and scale – Challenges to wellbeing and place management in Dubrovnik’s world heritage site.
Journal of Urban Culture Research.
Vol. 19 Jul-Dec 2019.
https://doi.org/10.14456/jucr.2019.7
Loades, Celine Motzfeldt
(2016).
Contested Places and Ambivalent Identities –
Social Change and Development in UNESCO Enlisted Dubrovnik.
Journal of Urban Culture Research.
Vol. Volume 12 .
https://hdl.handle.net/11250/4261595
Loades, Celine Motzfeldt
(2012).
A Beautiful Burden? Identity Constructions in a Post-War Heritage City.
Nielsen, Kenneth Bo; Bjørkdahl, Kristian (Ed.).
Development and Environment: Practices, Theories, Policies. p. 155-171.
Akademisk Forlag.
https://hdl.handle.net/11250/3536862
