Old dwellings usually have shortfalls in insulation, acoustic and thermal, and in security of electrical services in the interior partition walls. A common building solution is to add a wall lining with a laminate base gypsum board that improves both acoustic and thermal insulation and facilitates a new invisible cable layout without demolition. Conventional solutions have had limited success because of time consumption, environmental impact and cost. This research aimed to create an integrated building system to carry out these interior building refurbishment works quickly, cleanly and with low inconvenience and environmental impact. The research specifically focused on incorporating new molded materials that have a low environmental impact and improving the handling and future modification of the wall lining system. In response to the above goals, the product development methodology was applied to the design of an internal panel to be inserted between the existing partition wall and the closure wallboard, which is usually laminated base gypsum board (LGB). The proposed internalpanel is molded with recycled cellulose pulp (Biprocel) and has adequate relief designed to improve cable layout tasks and better join the laminate base gypsum board to the existing wall face. The development resulted from collaboration between the public administration, university researchers and undergraduate students in the co-design process. This research contributes to improving the applications of recycled cellulose fibers in molded panels for the building industry, particularly in refurbishment activities.

Traditionally, students entering architecture studies came mainly from families that were involved in construction. Their practical knowledge of building materials was sufficient to complement the theoretical teaching they received at university on this subject. However, the situation has changed and the family background of students no longer guarantees this prior knowledge. Society, and the university, has fully entered the era of digitalisation. This has had an impact not only on the profile and skills of students, but also on the way they consult the building materials that are prescribed in their academic projects: they have left university libraries behind, in favour of browsers and websites. Thus, this joint initiative arose to create a collection of sample materials within a university library that links the analogue experience of materials with the digital knowledge on these samples that is available in libraries. The digital knowledge associated with each sample is selected in a cooperative way by the architectural students, under the supervision of the academic staff and with the help of an intern. Tradicionalmente, los estudiantes de arquitectura provenían de familias relacionadas con la construcción, lo que les permitía complementar los conocimientos teóricos con su experiencia práctica. Sin embargo, la digitalización ha cambiado esta dinámica, afectando el perfil y las competencias de los estudiantes, así como la forma en que consultan los materiales de construcción, ahora a través de internet en lugar de bibliotecas. Así surge la iniciativa conjunta de crear una colección de muestras de materiales de edificación dentro de nuestra biblioteca universitaria donde se vincule la experiencia analógica de cada material con el conocimiento digital disponible. Este conocimiento digital es seleccionado y editado por los propios estudiantes bajo la supervisión del profesorado y becarios.