Design-Driven Reconfiguration of Spatial Hierarchy in Adaptive Reuse: A Visibility-Based Plan-Level Analysis of an Industrial-to-Hotel Conversion

Adaptive reuse projects frequently entail major plan-level reorganisation, yet the reconfiguration of spatial hierarchy within interior layouts remains underexplored at the building scale. Background: This study investigates how spatial hierarchy is reconfigured during the adaptive reuse of an industrial building converted into a hotel, focusing on the spatial implications of programme-driven design decisions within unchanged architectural boundaries. Methods: Visibility-based Space Syntax analyses were conducted using visual integration, connectivity, and mean depth measures. Rather than relying on floor-level averages, a control-point-based comparative approach was employed to enable targeted before-and-after comparisons directly linked to plan-level architectural interventions. Results: The findings indicate that spatial accessibility and visual integration are selectively intensified at specific nodal locations on the ground floor, while upper floors maintain a more controlled and segregated spatial structure. This pattern reveals a vertical redistribution of spatial hierarchy aligned with programme requirements, rather than a uniform transformation across the building. Conclusions: The results demonstrate that spatial transformation in adaptive reuse cannot be interpreted solely through quantitative accessibility changes, but should be understood as a design-driven reorganisation of spatial priorities. Rather than seeking statistical generalisation, this study offers a transferable, design-oriented analytical framework for interpreting plan-level spatial transformations in adaptive reuse projects involving similar programme changes.