Aesthetics and Sustainable Architecture
Liv Benedicte Brekke
Aesthetics and Sustainable Architecture
Liv Benedicte Brekke
Student number: K0931287 Date: 12. January 2015 Module leader: Alexandra Stara and Cathy Hawley
Contents
Introduction Part 1: The Environment and Architectural Consumption
p. 7 p. 9
Environment Crisis The Consumption of Architectural Aesthetics Policies, legislations, regulations, frameworks and tools
p.10 p. 13 p. 14
Part 2: Defining Sustainability in Architecture
p. 19
Sustainable Awareness Energy, natural resources, waste and technology
p. 20 p. 22
Part 3: The Greening of Architecture
p.27
The Difficult Relationship Between Sustainability and Technology The Relevance of a Vernacular Approach
p. 28 p.32
Part 4: Towards a New Architecture
p. 37
Aesthetics and Ethics Selective Environments in Passive Design The Need for Behavioural Change Beauty and Durability as Tools in Sustainable Design
p. 38 p. 39 p. 42 p. 43
Conclusion
p. 47
Bibliography Image credits
p. 48 p. 50
Caspar David Friedrich Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, 1818
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Introduction Sustainable design has to be the dominant approach to architecture and urban design, not an aesthetic trajectory. In fact, one will find the building industry at the centre of the environmental crisis, along with transportation, consumption
of goods and production of food. In the light of this, one can argue the need for a holistic approach to architecture that consideres the scope of the building industriy’s effect on the environment. It will become clear that architecture’s role and responsibility in this global problem is almost immeasurable. However, it is crucial to examine the current practice of architecture and urban design in order to progress to a sustainable future. While attempting to examine the building industry’s role in the current crisis, this paper will try to evaluate what sustainability in architecture entails today. Furthermore, in an attempt to go beyond the quantifiable measures in sustainable practice, the author intends to explore what the greater ambition of sustainable architecture should be. It will be proposed that aesthetics play a vital role in the development of sustainable architecture, a notion that arguably has been lost in many contemporary design practices. Arguing that aesthetics is not only at fault in the environmental crisis, due to ‘consumption bound to aesthetics’, it will also consider beauty along with durability as key in moving forward towards a new architecture that has a significantly lower impact on the environment. While beauty can certainly be used as a tool in sustainable design to achieve attentiveness from its users, this paper will question if there is a need for a new definition of beauty, one that is not necessarily based on traditional concepts of beauty. It will be argued that beauty can take on an entirely different role than
merely being visually pleasing. By linking ethics to the notion of aesthetics, the author explore beauty’s power in possibly changing peoples behaviour and thus energy use. This hypothesis is certainly difficult to conclude with any definitive answers, and the author will not attempt to do so. Knowingly, the questions posed here will remain unanswered, open to interpretation and wider debate. However, in order to keep some boundaries to this wide scope, this paper is structured in four parts, each dealing with information and theories that seems vital in order to discuss the possibilities of sustainable architecture. Part one will deal with the ‘status quo’, and will try to situate the building industry in the ongoing environmental crisis, while part two will look at the development of sustainable awareness and attempt to define sustainability in architecture. It will go on to consider four key aspects of the environmental crisis that is specifically linked to the building industry: energy, natural resources, waste and technology. In the third part of this paper the ongoing ‘greening’ of architecture will be discussed, as the author tries to decipher the difficult relationship between sustainability and technology. It will also be argued that the adoption of a vernacular language can be argued to be a form of ‘faking’ a sustainable language. However, in part four, the vernacular is also considered key in the development of sustainable design, as passive design is introduced as a possible strategy moving forward in the discourse of architecture. Along with a discussion and clarification of what aesthetics entails, the author tries to argue for beauty as a tool in (sustainable) architecture. 7
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Part 1: The Environment and Architectural Consumption Environment Crisis The Consumption of Architectural Aesthetics Policies, legislations, regulations, frameworks and tools
9
Fig. 1 The Earth’s energy flows
10
Environment in Crisis “As far as the design and construction of the built environment are concerned, we can master almost everything technically. We are capable of erecting buildings that produce just as much energy as they use. We can create wonderful spaces and places where
people enjoy being. We know how to produce materials that in theory will last forever – for instance titanium or glass – and the same applies to materials that degrade if we wish them to. We can fly faster then sound or even stop Brownian motion. And even so – although we can do all these things – we often look into the future nervously and wonder if we are doing everything right.” 1 - Martin Zeumer, 2008 In order to understand and evaluate contemporary sustainable practice, it is important to take a step back from the profession of architecture and look at the scope of the environmental crisis in its entirety. In basic terms, life on earth is possible because the atmosphere of the Earth is like an insulating ‘blanket’, protecting us from extreme temperatures such as the conditions on the moon, where temperatures vary from 100°C to -150°C 2. Earth soaks up most of the heat from the sun and functions as a radiator, while some of the heat is reflected off the atmosphere back into space. Water vapour and carbon dioxide along with a few other gases in the atmosphere will not let all the heat escape into space, allowing the atmosphere to warm up and send that heat back to the ground.3 (Fig. 1). This process is known as the greenhouse effect, and is in fact essential to human life on earth.4 However, the burning of fossil fuels, such as petroleum, coal and gas, has led to an increased greenhouse effect. Sofie Pelsmakers writes: “Human CO2 emissions have exceeded the capacity of natural re-absorption mechanisms and this causes the climate to change.”5 In other
words, the already existing barrier gets too thick to let heat escape, which leads to global warming and climate change. It is now widely known that these issues have led to rising sea levels from the melting of glaciers and a wide range of natural disasters6. Along with this world wide issue of global warming associated with the overuse of energy, the Earth is being threatened by several other human activities at local levels such as waste, water use, material resource depletion, changes in population density and effects on health and biodiversity 7. Considering the scope of these problems, it’s clear why the environmental crisis is dominating political debates and agendas all over the globe.
Needless to say, the impact of providing architecture and infrastructure to the 7 billion people on earth has had a profound impact on the natural environment.8 It has been speculated that by 2020 urbanisation will increase by 50% in less developed areas of the world, posing challenges in parts of the world that already struggle with the development of sustainable infrastructure. By the year 2030 it is suggested that 60% of the world’s population will live in cities, a tendency that Martin Hegger dubs ‘global nomadism’ in his book ‘Energy Manual’ 9. This means that humans have become a predominantly urban-dwelling species. He points out that while more and more of the rural population is migrating to the city, it is also expected that one billion people will be in the 60+ age range, 75% of which will live in industrialised countries.10 These changes in the population create obvious challenges for the building industry, which is responsible for designing products and services, places and surroundings to improve the living quality in growing cities populated increasingly by aging ‘baby boomers’. On the other hand, Kenneth Frampton observes another dimension to these issues, when he points out that “cities in the United 11
Fig. 3 CO2 emission: buildings, industry and transport
Fig. 2 Human CO2 emission
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States continue to lose population in their centres while constantly expanding their suburban hinterlands with little or no provision for public transport. The negative socioecological nature of such settlement patterns is only too familiar”.11 While the population in the world’s cities and suburbs is growing, the need for energy will increase; only emphasising the need to develop an approach to urban
planning that decreases the use of fossil fuels and encourages sustainable urban life styles. The Consumption of Architectural Aesthetics We now know that energy use plays a leading role in today’s global environmental problems. It is linked not only to the construction of buildings, but also to “operational energy”12 required for most buildings and certainly cities to function. Today we rely on fossil-fuel-power to provide us with the systems that we need to operate and inhabit our buildings and cities comfortably. These systems include transportation, space heating, hot water, lighting, ventilation and cooling. It is a fact that “the construction and operation of buildings and cities accounts for 50% of the UK’s CO2 emissions and is thus a significant contributor to global warming” (Fig. 2).13 “Add transportation to and from these buildings, and designers of the built environment have some control over, and responsibility for, 75% of global energy use”. 14 (Fig. 3)
In order to fully understand energy use in relation to architecture, it seems important to consider aesthetics (a complex term that will defined later) in regard to taste, trends and consumption. Over the past 20 years or so, the Western World has come to understand the consequences of global warming, and is taking on the responsibility of trying to change the course we are on. It has become clear that it is
in fact the industrialised consumers societies that has led us to these issues through the extensive burning of fossil fuels. Matthias Sauerbruch and Louisa Hutton reflect on this in their essay ‘What does Sustainability look like?’ , pointing out that “western societies have been leading the way in the establishment of relatively stable, democratic and free political systems but they have also been leading the culture
of excessive consumption that is largely responsible for the ecological damage on the planet. The North has become an ecological debtor to the less developed South”.15 Glen Hill refers back to the shift in housing expectations from the beginning of the 20th century as a critical point in his essay ‘The Aesthetics of Architectural Consumption’. He draws attention to the fact that the floor area of an average home in Australia has more than doubled over the past 100 years.16 Similar statistics apply to most industrialised countries, for instance: “In Norway in 1967, the average residential floor area per person was 29 m2, only three decades later, in 2000, it reached 51 m2 per person”.17 In addition to this, services that used to belong to the public sector, such as pools, gyms and cinemas are now more often made private. As an obvious result of the need for the bigger, the better and the newer, energy use is multiplied. Since the middle of the 20th century the yearning to renovate and replace aesthetics has developed into a linear dead end process of produce, use and discard, a process that will have to change in order to begin to mend the environmental crisis. Hill regards this expenditure related to contemporary architecture as “consumption bound to aesthetics”.18 It can be argued that architecture’s envy of art has19 “opened a path toward an aesthetic economy of architecture in which the need for constant production of the new is matched with the need for its endless consumption”.20
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While in the pre-modern world social ranks were fixed, modernity opened up for a society that allowed most individuals to be socially migratory. Hill points out that today we can not only relocate ourselves physically, but we can change our occupation, or level of education, our spouse, our friends and even our body21. This development is generally regarded as one of the most positive aspects of
Western culture. However, it seems clear that in obliterating the rules binding people to their social rank in pre-modernity we have developed into people that constantly strive to make our mark as individuals. As a result, architecture and design have developed a vast variety of aesthetic trajectories, which facilitates the ongoing building and rebuilding of individuality for both the consumers and producers of architecture.22 Hegger proves that we appear to have reached a “critical and sobering point” in history with his thought-provoking, yet not entirely surprising facts in ‘Energy Manual’. Not only is the population shifting in addition to the energy crisis, “the consumption of fertile land and natural- renewable and nonrenewable- resources could turn out to be a significant global problem, a dilemma of disastrous proportions”.23 However, he also reassures his reader that there is still hope, depending on the future of our decisions and the capability of our designers, architects, engineers and other environmental experts. “Ultimately it will not depend on technology and economics, but on what we – people- decide”.24 Perhaps Zeumer is hinting at the fact that in order for human activity on earth to become truly sustainable we have to make significant changes in our life styles. However, seeing that changing the contemporary life style of consumerist society is not something that will happen overnight, the development of policies, legislation and regulations has been crafted to help 14
designers of the built environment achieve a more sustainable practice. These are some of the biggest steps we have made with regard to dealing with the environmental crisis from an architectural standpoint. Ultimately, these regulations are supposed to help us arrive at a place where human activity won’t impact the environment in any significant way. Whether or not these quantifiable measures are enough to conquer this global crisis are still up for debate.
Policies, legislations, regulations, frameworks and tools Pelsmakers writes: “UK climate change policy is mostly driven by EU targets, which filter down in mandatory targets for energy efficiency and for reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in each member state. For the UK, this means a binding 15% CO2 reduction target for 2020, which is remarkably less than 20% reduction target for EU as a whole. The UK has also set voluntary CO2 reduction targets of 34% and is working towards ‘zero carbon’ new housing by 2016 and all other new buildings by 2019.”25 The UK, as do most countries, has a large amount of general policies, legislation, building standards, frameworks and tools to help develop and enforce sustainable practice in architecture along with most other areas that are linked to global warming. The short descriptions of the following papers are based on Pelsmaker’s research in her book ‘The Environmental Design Handbook’26. Change Act 2008 and Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009 are general pieces of legislation that deal with binding targets such as an 80% CO2 emission reduction for 2050 (based on 1990 levels). Along with this, UK Low Carbon Transition Plan (2009) was created to instruct how to reach the goals set in the Climate Change Acts. Energy White Paper (2007) is
another important document that deals with the promotion of renewable energy. This is particularly interesting in the UK where sustainable energy sources are viable through wind and tidal power. Making more use of these resources many would say is a vital part of the UK’s plans to tackle the energy crisis. From Sustainability of Construction Works (CEN) to National Home Energy Rating (NHER), there
are regulations and guidelines that comply with most aspects of the building industry. The Code for Sustainable Homes (CSH) was initially launched by the multi-disciplinary building science centre, BRE, but is now a governmentregulated code. It is the document that underpins the Building Regulations for residential developments in England, Wales and Northern Ireland (Scotland still uses EcoHomes). “Both CSH and EcoHomes cover more than ‘energy performance’ alone, and act as both a design guide and an assessment tool for new dwellings. The sustainability criteria include: energy, water, waste, pollution, management, ecology, health and materials”.27 Following these, BRE launched BREEAM in 1990.28 This is one of the leading environmental assessment methods in the world today, and has become an important part of the development of sustainable architecture in the UK. In order to receive the stamp of ‘excellence’, architects have to fulfil a vast amount of specified criteria. Many would say it has become an important validation for, not just architects, but developers and organisations as well. Being ‘branded’ as sustainable has become a marketing strategy in these days of ‘ecological correctness’. It is the belief that BREEAM has become an exercise in ‘ticking boxes’ that has led architects to criticise the assessment tool. Bennetts Associates designed Five Pancras Square completed in 2014 (Fig. 4, next page). It is the highest rated BREEAM certified building in the UK at the time of writing, having received the stamp ‘outstanding’
with a score of 93.05%29. Director of Bennetts Associates, Rab Bennet, was quoted in Building Design Online saying, “It’s become a little bit too bureaucratic. The process means people get fixated on ticking all the boxes when there are only a few that are really important. They should have a much stronger hierarchy. If something doesn’t get a credit it doesn’t get pursued even if it’s a good idea.” The critique of the certifying system has led the director of BREEAM Martin Townsend to recognise the “need to transform BREEAM from a scorecard into a design tool”30. The new version of BREEAM went live in May 201431, but it’s too early to note if there is an improved reaction to the system. Architect and environmentalist Jason McLennan argues: “Sustainable design must allow practitioners to continue to push bounders in design meaning and design quality at the same time that environmental concerns are elevated”.32
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Fig. 4 Five Pancras Square, Bennets Associates
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Endnotes (part 1) 1 Martin
Zeumer, Energy Manual, Birkhauser, 2008, p. 10 Thomas, The Environments of Architecture, Taylor and Francis, New York, 2007, p. 197 (appendix) 3 Thomas, Environments of Architecture, p. 197-198 (appendix) 4 Thomas, Environments of Architecture, p. 197-198 (appendix) 5 Sofie Pelsmaker, The Environmental Design Handbook, RIBA Publishing, 2012, p. 9 6 Natural Resources Defence Council (2012), The Consequences of Global Warming, [Online] Available from: http://www.nrdc.org/ globalWarming/fcons.asp [Accessed: 10. October 2014] 7 Pelsmaker, Environmental Handbook, p. 21 8 Daniel Jauslin, Landscape Aesthetics for Sustainable Architecture, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, 101 Publishers, Rotterdam, 2011 9 Zeumer, Energy Manual, p. 11 10 Ibid., p. 11 11 Kenneth Frampton, Urbanization and Discontents: Megaform and Sustainability, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 99 12 Pelsmakers, Environmental Handbook, p. 10 13 Ibid., p. 7 14 Huw Heywood, 101 Rules of Thumb for Low Energy Architecture, RIBA Publishing, 2013, p. 10 15 Matthias Sauerbruch and Louisa Hutton, What does Sustainability look like?, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 41 16 Glen Hill, The Aesthetics of Architectural Consumption, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 26 17 Haral N. Røstvik, The Vernacular, the Iconic and the Fake, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 173 18 Ibid., p. 28 19 Ibid., p. 32 Glen Hill refers to Cynthia Davidson, who argued that architects desire their architecture to be noticed, the way art is. Instead it drifts to the background of human activity, only providing the backdrop for human habit. 20 Ibid., p. 30 21 Ibid., p. 27 22 Glen Hill, The Aesthetics of Architectural Consumption, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 32 23 Zeumer, Energy Manual, p. 13 24 Ibid., p. 13 25 Pelsmakers, Environmental Handbook, p. 17 26 Ibid., p. 17-20 27 Pelsmakers, Environmental Handbook, p. 20 28 BREEAM (2010-2014), What is BREEAM?, [Online] Available from: http://www.breeam.org/about.jsp?id=66 [Accessed: 7. 2 Randal
November 2014] 29 BDOnline (2013), What score do you give BREEAM?, [Online] Available from: http://www.bdonline.co.uk/what-score-do-yougive-breeam?/5056646.article [Accessed: 5. September 2014] 30 Ibid. 31 BREEAM (2014), BREEAM UK New Construction (NC) 2014 FAQs, [Online] Available from: http://www.breeam.org/filelibrary/ BREEAM%20UK%20NC%202014%20Resources/BREEAMUK-New-Construction-2014-FAQs-v1.1.pdf [Accessed: 2. January 2015] 32 Jason F. McLennan, Philosophy of Sustainable Design, Ecotone, 2004, p. 226
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Part 2: Defining Sustainability in Architecture The Development of Sustainable Awareness Energy, natural resources, waste and technology
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The Development of Sustainable Awareness “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. - Gro Harlem Brundtland, 1987 We can view Architecture as Anthropology, the definition of which is “the science of mankind in the widest sense”.1 As this implies, architecture is a practice with many trajectories, dealing with all aspects of human activity. Today it can be argued that many of these trajectories come under another frequently used term: sustainability. This chapter explores the historical development of the popularised term ‘sustainable architecture’ along with some of the critical relationships between architecture and sustainability. When these two complex practices are seen as one, explanations of the topic could be endless. Books like ‘The Sustainable Home’ define a sustainable house at its most basic level to be “one that has a significantly lower impact on the environment than a standard building”2, which most likely is what experts in the field of sustainability would say when asked for a one-sentence definition. However, sustainable architecture becomes complex when one asks how to design a building or development that achieve this. On their own, each term can generate a vast variety of discussions in almost all academic fields, and together they form a complex and rather undefined expression. Architectural author Andrew Blowers, for instance, refers to sustainability as a “concept whose strength lies in its vagueness”.3 However, at the risk of becoming superficial and glossing over crucial issues, it will be argued here that sustainability can be linked to four major aspects: energy, natural resources, waste and technology. This section will deal with these in relation to architecture and the 20
building industry in order to define what a coherent attitude towards sustainable practice in architecture should entail. As ideas of sustainability were gaining momentum in the 1980’s, Gro Harlem Brundtland said: “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future
generations to meet their own needs”4. This definition of sustainability became widely accepted and is still paraphrased today in a spectrum of sustainable practices. Almost a decade earlier, architectural critic Reyner Banham outlined the three main strategies for environmental management as Conservative, Selective and Regenerative.5 Written in the late 1960’s, Banham’s theories on environmentalism still play a huge role in contemporary sustainable practice. In fact, it can be said that “until Banham voiced his concerns, the relationship between energy use and building design had become subject for specialists with their own ethics, values and professional bodies, rather then architects’’.6 In other words, it could be argued that a typical student of architecture during the 1960’s was encouraged to believe that heat, light, comfort and sound were design problems to be handed over to “the emerging profession of mechanical and electrical consultants”.7 However, as professor and bio-climatic design specialist Keith Bothwell points out, Banham wrote before the oil crisis of the 1970’s. He writes: “[Banham] positively celebrates the arrival of mechanical and electrical solutions in the 19th and 20th centuries, as this loosens the constraints imposed on architects and engineers, who previously had to incorporate large voids in section and plan to manage the volumes of air essential for natural ventilation”.8
Fig. 5 Cradle to gate, cradle to grave and cradle to cradle
Fig. 6 Cradle to Cradle Biological and technical cycles
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In a more recent book, ‘Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture’, architect and professor Sang Lee points out that our current market economy model is characterized by “the rapid pace of industrial and technological development”9 in response to which Lee reflects over the need for a change in the current “linear dead-end process of production, use and re-production” (Fig. 6).10 He emphasises the
at a destructive rate, and a shift in our energy use pattern is needed to turn the situation around. This problem has remained at the forefront of environmental and sustainability debates since the oil crisis of the 1970’s.13 As previously stated, the building industry is one of the major contributors to the release of greenhouses gases, meaning energy use is at the center of what architects have to consider when
Energy, natural resources, waste and technology
Some of the most popular construction materials, such as concrete and fired bricks, have exceptionally high-embodied energy, meaning that the production of these materials can be seen as highly unsustainable. Cement alone is responsible for 8% of global carbon dioxide production.15 However, it is not irrelevant to point out that these materials are well known for being remarkably durable and supporters point to their high
importance of theories developed by contemporary thinkers and environmental advocates, such as those of William McDonough and Michael Braungart. The two suggest that the notion of a cyclical system of production, use and reproduction is key in developing a truly sustainable future, a system that they dubbed ‘Cradle to Cradle’ (C2C) and have written extensively on (Fig. 6).11 Lee also remarks that the ‘greening’ of contemporary architecture has produced a new class of experts and professionals, and insists that every architect should “engage sustainability as an integral part of the design process”.12 This response is not far from that of Banham, and seems to be an important notion in most discussions today about what sustainable architecture is and should be. Lee, and arguably most architects engaged in the subject of sustainability today, notes that in order to truly engage with the current environmental problems, architects, designers, engineers, planners and developers have to work together to develop a holistic approach to sustainable design. For this to happen, there are many aspects of the environment that has to be considered. This paper will emphasise four main aspects that are key in order to develop a coherent attitude in sustainable practice.
The question of energy deals with the fact that humans have, since the Industrial Revolution burned fossil fuels 22
designing buildings for the future. Needless to say, the list of energy exhaustive actives in the design of buildings is almost limitless. In his text, Lee poses questions rather than answers when considering the quantifiable measures architects can take in the design process, perhaps to emphasize the scope of this major issue and its effect on the discourse and practice of architecture. “If we were successful in changing our patterns of energy use on a widespread scale, how would this affect the practice of architecture from a design standpoint? What role could architecture play in making these changes come about? And what aesthetic potentials are present in the consideration of sustainable or renewable energy, its use and conservation for the field of architecture?”.14 From the construction to the operation of buildings there are hundreds of processes that use excessive amounts of energy, many of which are well underway to become reasonable solutions. However, one aspect of energy that are believed to be central in the design of sustainable buildings is appropriate material use.
thermal mass. Today materials are often imported from other parts of the world, meaning even sustainable materials can lead to unwanted energy use if they are sourced from a great distance. In regard to this Pelsmakers recommend maximum material sourcing distances (Fig. 7). Another important aspect in the process of selecting materials is their suitability for reuse, which concrete, for instance, is not. If we are
moving towards a cyclical process such as the one described in ‘Cradle to Cradle,’ materials need to be part of a system that encourages reuse and repurposing. Beyond production and transportation of materials, another central issue is the foreseeable scarcity of resources. In
order to act sustainably in the building industry, natural resources such as timber need to be managed and maintained, in order for future generations to enjoy the use of these materials in the way that we have. The use of timber is widely acknowledged as one of the most sustainable building materials as “living trees extract carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and convert it into carbohydrate to sustain themselves, giving out oxygen as a by-product”.16 In fact, even after falling, timber continues to act as a sponge, only releasing the carbon when it’s burnt. Sofie Pelsmakers provides us with some statistics that puts this issue into some context; “The UK uses 350 million tonnes of new building materials each year. The construction industry accounts for
Fig. 7 Recommended maximum material sourcing distances
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60% of the UK’s timber use. Where this is not managed sustainably, it contributes to deforestation. Indeed, 60% of tropical timber imported into the UK may have been illegally logged”.17 Directly linked to the need for a cyclical process of material extraction and production, is the dilemma of waste. It is a fact that the UK produces 30 million tonnes of demolition building waste. This is disposed of through landfills, a process which is a major contributor to pollution. In the UK, 50% of landfill is associated with the building industry.18 Another natural resource that is at the centre of the environmental crisis is water. Although it may seem as if we have enough water, as it covers about 70% of the Earth’s surface, the amount of fresh water available to us is considerably less. 97.5% of the water on earth is salt water, leaving only 2.5% as freshwater, while 70% of this is frozen in the icecaps of Antarctica and Greenland.19 According to Pelsmakers, 40-50% of our water usage is for the operation and construction of buildings.20 In the UK in particular, another problem associated with water is flooding, and will become one of the primary considerations as the climate continues to change. It is expected that the UK will see an increase in flooding, due to predicted extreme levels of rainfall.21 As the author raises these facts in her book, she stresses that “careful consideration is no longer a luxury: where to build, which building typology, how much land to set aside for water storage and which surface finishes are more resilient are now vital decisions for design”.22 The fourth aspect that architects need to consider in relation to the environment and sustainability is technology, a key part of the argument in this paper. Although the advances we have made in technology are no doubt a huge benefit in the 24
process of developing a more sustainable architecture and building process, it is interesting to question how the latest design technologies and tools affect architectural philosophy and approaches. As there are countless books, articles, papers and ongoing debates regarding the quantifiable aspects of the technological advances, this paper argues that there is an issue beyond the quantifiable, one that relates to the changing design process and the discipline’s aesthetic foundation. Although it seems clear that the latest developments in software and hardware engineering have given architects and engineers the opportunity for design simulation, leading to a more rigorous and accurate design process and an increase in economic return, it also appears certain that these tools have “changed the way we conceive the design process and its objectives in a profound way”.23 Endnotes (part 2) 1 Thomas, Environments
of Architecture, p. 1 Strongman, The Sustainable Home: Essential Guide to Eco Building, Renovation and Decoration, Merrel Publishers, London, 2008, p. 9 3 John Brennan, Qualitative and Quantitative Traditions in Sustainable Architecture, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 81 4 Gro Harlem Bruntland and World Commission, Our Common Future, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1987 5 Reyner Banham, Architecture of the Well- Tempered Environment, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1969, p. 22-35 6 Cedric Cullingford, John Blewitt (ed.), The Sustainability Curriculum: The Challenge for Higher Education, Earthscan, 2004, p. 130 7 Dean Hawkes, The Environmental Tradition: Studies in the Architecture of Environment, E. & F.N. Spon, London, 1996, p. 11 8 Keith Bothwell, The Architecture of the Passively Tempered Environment, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 69 9 Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 7 10 Ibid., p. 11 11 Ibid., p. 9 2 Cathy
12 Ibid., p. 8
13 Ibid., p. 69
14 Lee, Aesthetics
of Sustainable Architecture, p. 14 Sustainable Home, p. 17 16 Strongman, The Sustainable Home, p. 14 17 Pelsmakers, Environmental Handbook, p. 22 18 Ibid. 19 The Green Age, Fresh Water as a Precious Resource, [Online] Available from: http://www.thegreenage.co.uk/tech/water-as-afinite-res ource/. [Accessed: 7. November 2014] 20 Pelsmakers, Environmental Handbook, p. 22 21 Pelsmakers, Environmental Handbook, p. 97 22 Ibid. 23 Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 15 15 Strongman, The
Continues on next page
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Part 3: The Greening of Architecture The Difficult Relationship Between Sustainability and Technology The Relevance of a Vernacular Approach
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The Difficult Relationship Between Sustainability and Technology “As the view of nature changes from rational explanations of Newton and others in the 18th century to the chaos theorists of today, so does the excitement and understanding of architects, driven like society by moods altering from euphoria to fear, giving rise to buildings whose forms, colours and textures are subject to the shifting world views about the nature of nature”.
- John Farmer, 1999
This paper takes for granted that most people believe technology in many ways has a positive impact on the design and erection of buildings, and that the development of sustainable technologies is most certainly key in developing a new architecture for the future. Bearing this in mind, one can discuss the less desirable side effects of some of these technologies, or more to the point, how they are applied and used. Sustainability in architecture seems to many to have become a process of merely applying green technologies to a building which perhaps may have been designed differently on a fundamental level. From green roofs and solar panels to above ground cisterns and green houses, the application of these apparent sustainable technologies and tools are present in many contemporary buildings. McLennan points out that “while some of these technologies are in fact positive accompaniments of buildings that do tend to lower environmental impact, their presence alone do not a green building make”2 He argues that true environmental performance of a building is not necessarily visible. Certainly photovoltaic technologies have their place in the future of architecture, as the 21st century is often described as the “age of the sun”3, but as Thomas puts it: “Technology alone is inadequate to provide us with the basis for a sustainable 28
architecture”.4 The emerging need for organisations, companies and individuals to appear ‘ecologically correct’ has lead to a misguided use of some of the technologies associated with sustainability. It could be said that this is an attitude that more often than not derives from a marketing point of view. With regard to this Lee writes: “The greening trend may be attributed to the extremely
rapid commodification of everything green, a development motivated by the kind of economic opportunities that tend to appear with new, desirable technology in the current age that is centered on providing product services rather than production”.5 On a less cynical note, it can be argued that society, including architects, has simply not been able to keep up with the rapid changes in required technology associated with the environmental crisis. If this is true, architects are implementing technologies that they do not fully understand, either because regulation requires it, or on request from the client. It seems clear that this has in many cases led to a disjointed relationship between technology and aesthetics. Today many architects to believe that sustainable, ‘green’ architecture is of a particular style that they perhaps do not identify with. Lance Hosey, author of ’The Shape of Green; Aesthetics, Ecology and Design’, writes: “Many consider great design and green design to be separate pursuits, and in fact much of what is touted as “green” is not easy on the eyes. The ugly truth about sustainable design is that much of it is ugly”.6 This rather passionate statement reflects a view that the practice of sustainable design is primarily a technical matter not concerned with the traditional concepts of aesthetics strongly believed in by many architects. This becomes problematic if architects fundamentally enjoy the creativity in designing a building. As McLennen writes: “If
Fig. 8 (below) Ann Demeulemeester in Seoul Fig. 9 (right) California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco
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sustainable design is going to become the dominant approach to the design process, then it must inspire and motivate people as much as any great architecture has done throughout history”.7 As argued in a previous chapter assessment tools such as BREEAM have led to an exercise in ‘ticking boxes’, and one
can question whether this means that sustainability is not an integrated part of the design process. Perhaps one could say that these regulations and tools came into play before architecture as a discipline had time to adapt to the changes in society. This seems to have led to an aesthetic characterised by an attitude of post-rationalisation. Architect David Briggs reflects in his essay ‘Aesthetic Potentials in an Open Network Inventory System’: “As rating systems developed and clients began to realize the profit potentials of marketing green buildings, the process has become polarized in the sense that brand-name architects are commissioned to design signature buildings which are then subjected to greening by third-party consultants in order to meet the selected rating system”.8 The relatively new environmental criteria that architects have to engage with are comprehensive, which understandably has led to the employment of third-party consultants, as Briggs points out. The architect in this case looses some control over the overall design, leading to obvious problems for the performance of the building once completed. This refers back to what Banham noted about the emerging class of experts in the 1960’s and the obvious issues of handing over crucial aspects of the design to a third-party. It becomes clear that integrating sustainable ideals in the design process are yet to become second nature in many architectural practices. At this point it is important to acknowledge the fact that beautiful buildings with a low impact on the environment can be designed and there are many examples where 30
this has been achieved. More recently, there has been an increasing realisation that using applied green technologies is inadequate in addressing sustainable architecture. Rem Koolhaas confessed in his keynote lecture ‘Sustainability: Advancement vs. Apocalypse’: “Embarrassingly, we have been equating responsibility with literal greening. The boutique of Ann Demeulemeester in Seoul (Fig. 8), for example, covered entirely in green. Even significant buildings by serious architects, such as the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco (Fig. 9), for me almost fall into the same category. What is very difficult about architecture today is that architects themselves are the main commentators, using a language that is either outrageously innocent or deeply calculated – probably both – but in a shocking way”.9
However, it is not the one off examples that are central in this paper, but rather the need to argue for a cohesive position that includes sustainability as a fundamental part of the design process. Randall Thomas argues in his book ‘The Environments of Architecture’ that “architecture is all to often seen primarily either as a technical matter, or one of personal expression and novel form making rather than a cultural concern, as It should be”.10 The author believes in an architecture that is deeply rooted in its environmental, cultural and historic context. He expresses a concern about the ongoing use of technologies, and proposes that science is often confused by technology as he writes: “Science can help us understand the environment and develop solutions to its problems. Technology, which can be seen as the application of science, can have both positive and negative effects in the environment as we know from dams, nuclear power plants, genetically modified crops, plastics [and so on]”.11 Perhaps the unwillingness to fully integrate sustainability
as an integral part of the design process is due to society’s maintenance of the status quo. Lee argues: ”It appears that sustainability is increasingly becoming part of the apparatus that is dedicated to the maintenance of the status quo, ultimately supporting actively the maintenance of a wasteful, consumption-intensive economic superstructure”.12 Here, Lee argues that contemporary sustainable architecture in
general does not take into consideration the complexity of the environmental crisis in its entirety, because it would mean actually changing the way we consume. There are perhaps too many approaches to sustainable design, leaving many gaps in the overall performance of ‘so-called’ ecological buildings and certainly architecture and cities in general. As discussed previously, contemporary architecture does not only include an evolving green practice, there are also styles that exist alongside or within this concept such as high-tech styles, deconstructive, classical revivals, vernacular and so on. Many argue that to achieve some common principles in the design of our built environment we need to approach the environment in a selective manner. To achieve this, many suggest learning from history and the vernacular.
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The Relevance of a Vernacular Approach For many looking at past and present vernacular seems to be significant in the quest for a way forward in the discourse of architecture. John Farmer, author of the book ‘Green Shift: changing attitudes in architecture to the natural world’, writes: “A look backwards into folk ways has been seen as an unavoidable part of renewal. It is a looking back to see what went wrong. It is clearly not enough now to repeat the way that the past two hundred years have mythologized the idea of the noble savage as an image of renewal. Rampant technology can obviously only be controlled by other technology. Nevertheless there has undoubtedly been, and will continue to be, an inspirational quest for simplicity: how to do much with little, how to achieve beauty through utility, how to not be greedy.”13 The author of this paper does not suggest that the future of architecture can be found in “Scandinavian-style cottages”, as some of the critics of Farmer’s book said about the first edition of ‘Green Shift’ in 1996.14 The solution to sustainable architecture can certainly not be found in simply going back to vernacular ways, as the situation we find ourselves in today is much more complex then that of rural architecture 200 years ago. This seems like an obvious statement, but one that is needed in order to progress with the argument in this chapter. As previously stated, this paper will begin to justify the need for a universal approach to sustainable architecture that includes understanding the issues of the environmental crisis on a fundamental level. This approach should embrace technology, but consider it in a selective manner. In selecting the appropriate sustainable technologies to reduce a building’s impact on the environment, it is crucial to understand each site as an individual situation. From 32
that, one can begin to use the appropriate techniques and technologies to achieve a balance with the natural environment. This is where the argument for looking at the vernacular comes in. However, first it seems useful to define what vernacular architecture really is: “We must be clear that there is no fixed generic label for folk building, for what Bernard Rudofsky awkwardly but accurately called ‘Non-
pedigreed Architecture’. Words like vernacular, anonymous, spontaneous, indigenous or rural could be used – as the word traditional often is. The term ‘vernacular’ – meaning originally the everyday architectural language of a particular region – has been adopted by most architects and historians”.15 In order to understand why many argue for a return to the primitive, it can help to draw out the four main principles of the vernacular that are associated with sustainability. Architectural professor Nezar AlSayyad and Architect Gabriel Arboleda do this in their essay ’The Sustainable Indigenous Vernacular: Interrogating a Myth’.16 The first principle deals with material and site appropriateness, pointing out that in vernacular architecture materials were sourced locally. Today we can source materials from anywhere in the world and transport them to any site, which has obvious environmental impact.17 The second principle deals with climate responsiveness, as vernacular architecture often deals with the natural environment in a selective manner, using orientation and simple techniques such as window recesses, wall thickness and roof angle to provide shelter and shading from the climate (Fig. 10).18 This often creates a harmonious relationship between the indoor and outdoor environment. The third principle referred to is socioeconomic advances, as many would argue that traditional building methods often would create a strong communal bond and low construction cost. The fourth principle is the
Hot-dry
Hot-humid
Cold
Temperate
Fig. 10 Principles of vernacular architecture
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idea that the vernacular can easily adapt.19 AlSayyad and Arboleda present these principles of vernacular architecture, but go on to criticise recent architectural literature that has inadvertently been echoing old theories that celebrate the environmental qualities of the vernacular, under the assumption that these theories remain valid, and question if this romanticising of the vernacular has become for the most
goes on to say: “Given the level of technology invested, it is surprising that they express little interest in environmental variables. It is important to ask: is the creation of a sustainable relationship between building and the natural environment best left to the engineer to address as an afterthought? If advanced technology was invested not only to create spectacular designs but also to ensure the sensitivity
As another sceptic of the vernacular as a model for sustainable design, architect and professor Harald N. Røstvik, acknowledges that vernacular architecture is sustainable in its harvesting of natural resources, but questions if the vernacular has become romanticised in these days of environmental panic. He writes: “The romance of the vernacular – be it for prehistoric settlements or for 19th century pastoral landscapes – has always been a detached one, seen from a comfortable distance away from the stench and the soot”.21 This reminds us that we have come extremely far in creating spaces that are comfortable and healthy for people to live in, and that it is unrealistic to think societies of industrialised countries would return to a primitive life style. On the other hand, Røstvik also recognises the contradictions in the current practice of architecture in regard to sustainability. He cites what he calls ‘starchitects’ as having created some of the most iconic buildings of our time, using technologies that produce spectacular forms and spaces, pointing out that it seems that some of the most recognisable buildings today are designed to ‘wow’ us, “no matter what the local situation may be in regard to the cultural and natural climate”. 22 He
It becomes clear that there are many approaches to sustainability in architecture, as this paper aims to point out. In trying to find some common ground, or a balanced centre that most architects can agree with, it seems crucial to re-examine the fundamentals of human need; to strip away the unnecessary and excessive in the current consumption of architecture. For some this means erecting buildings whose form follow performance, as discussed in the previous
part a discussion on aesthetics. They write: “the theoretical sustainability principles of the indigenous vernacular are frequently inapplicable in today’s context, and therefore the generalization that the indigenous vernacular is sustainable is no longer valid”.20
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of those designs in relation to the natural environment, we would be able to admire the starchitects’ designs as examples of seamless symbiosis of form, materials, techniques and the forces of the environment”.23 Many great architects have, however, brought the notion of the vernacular to contemporary architecture in an effort to engage with the environment in the same many traditional buildings does. For instance, the use of timber has become widely popular in the practice of sustainable architecture, as many would argue that it is one of the most sustainable construction materials. Røstvik believes that this can become a form of ‘faking’ the vernacular aesthetic to appear sustainable, yet again pointing out the current need to appear environmentally appropriate. However, this approach seems more rooted in the fundamental values of sustainable practice, as it often stems from a deeper understanding of the context and history of the site. Assuming of course that the timber isn’t illegally sourced from the other side of the globe.
chapter, regarding technology in sustainable architecture; for others it remains a pure return to the primitive. However, there seems to be a clear and happy medium that reincorporates the vernacular principles of building design combined with the use of our ever-evolving scientific knowledge. Thomas writes: “Sustainable design should aim to make a cultural contribution, which entails combining a scientific understanding of environmental principles with a sense of how vernacular buildings made comfortable living conditions before mechanical services�.24
An attitude towards sustainable design that thoroughly consider its natural, cultural and historical context would not only result in buildings that are more sustainable on a constitutional level, but would encourage an aesthetic based on the same principles. One can question if such an approach would attract more architects to be concerned with sustainability beyond the quantifiable. Here it will be argued that aesthetics play a crucial role in not only encouraging architects to integrate sustainability in their practice, but to inspire attentiveness and behavioural change. The following chapters will firstly try to define aesthetics in order to explore its relevance in sustainable architecture. The author will indeed explore aesthetics in sustainable architecture as an ethical matter, posing the question: Can a building be beautiful if it contains a moral value, or in this case, is sustainable? It will go on to illustrate how passive design is rooted in its site context, which should in turn result in meaningful and beautiful buildings.
Endnotes (part 3) 1 John
Farmer, Green Shift: Changing attitudes in architecture in the natural world, Architectural Press, London, 1999, p. 3 2 McLennan, Philosophy of Sustainable Design, p. 230 3 Thomas, The Environments of Architecture, p. 3 4 Thomas, The Environments of Architecture, p. 196 5 Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 8 6 Lance Hosey, The Shape of Green; Aesthetics, Ecology and Design, Iceland Press, Washington, 2012 p. 2 7 Ibid., p. 226 8 David Briggs, Aesthetic Potentials in an Open Network Inventory System, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 278 9 OMA, Sustainability: advancement vs. apocalypse, [Online] Available from: http://www.oma.eu/lectures/sustainabilityadvancement-vs-apocalypse/[Accessed: 18. December 2014] 10 Thomas, The Environments of Architecture, p. 2 11 Thomas, The Environments of Architecture, p. 2 12 Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 8-9 13 Farmer, Green Shift, p. 18 14 THE (1996), A study in Waffle and Daub, [Online] Available from: http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/books/a-study-in-waffleand-daub/162157.article [Accessed: 5. September 2014] 15 Farmer, Green Shift, p. 11 16 Nezar AlSayyad and Gabriel Arboleda, The Sustainable Indigenous Vernacular: Interrogating a Myth, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 139-151 17 Ibid., p. 140 18 Ibid., p. 143 19 Ibid., p. 139 20 Ibid., p. 151 21 Ibid., p. 169 22 Ibid. 23 Ibid. 24 Thomas, Environments of Architecture, p. 2
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Part 4: Towards a New Architecture Aesthetics and Ethics Selective Environments in Passive Design The Need for Behavioural Change Beauty and Durability as Tools in Sustainable Design
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Aesthetics and Ethics Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten (born 1714) first coined the term aesthetics with his publication ‘Aesthetica’ in 1750-58.1 In this work the German philosopher wrote extensively on what he observed as a form of knowledge that was gained
through the senses. Lee writes: “Baumgarten proposes that what we sense and perceive, the ‘exteriority’ of an object, is a manifestation of the invisible or intangible qualities of its ‘interiority’, and therefore, that studying the connection of the two presents a meaningful approach to gain a certain kind of knowledge.”2 He intended to explore six criteria of sensory cognition: greatness, truth, light or brightness, certitude or persuasion and life or vivacity, however only the first five were discussed in the publication.3 “The missing discussion of the sixth criterion (life) would have treated the effects of beautiful cognition and proposition (in the arts) on human affection and would therefore have been of great importance for the ethical aspect of the Aesthetica.”4 In his article ‘Magnitudo aesthetica, Aesthetic Greatness’ Dr. Dagmar Mirbach emphasise the importance of ethics in the philosophers definition of beauty. He writes: “This ethical and theological import of aesthetics for Baumgarten has hitherto not been realized to the extent it deserves. But it opens up a new horizon for the understanding and the evaluation of the complexity of Baumgarten’s aesthetic theory in the history of aesthetics”.5 The observation of the importance of ethics in this definition can be seen as particularly interesting in the notion of sustainable design. Can something be beautiful if it ‘ethically correct’? Of course, Baumgartens theory of aesthetics could provide enough material for a paper all on its own, and the definition presented here would perhaps be insufficient 38
in a wider discussion of beauty. On this note, the need for a contemporary definition of the term seen in relation to architecture seems useful. Lee proposes such definition to be: “Aesthetics of architecture refers to the expressions in built form that closely relate to the way in which the form is not only conceived but also produced in relation to a certain purpose and its context. […] And an aesthetic is supposed
to emerge from, as well as be embodied in, the order that ties them together as an indivisible whole”.6 Following Lees definition of aesthetics in architecture, he suggests what meaning this should have in sustainable practice. “If a building or an environment is designed and built to be sustainable, it should inform how it was conceived and situated, and what makes it so under what conditions. And in the presence of such work, it should be perceivable and/or understandable that is serves and fits such purpose”. 7 With this, does Lee propose that a sustainable building can achieve beauty in simply being sustainable and illustrating how it is that? If so, the future of architecture will not necessarily be based on traditional concepts of beauty, such as symmetry and proportion like Vitruvius insisted, but on the sustainable performance of a building. With this in mind one can begin to question how future architecture will achieve aesthetic value. In response, this paper argues for passive design as the basis of sustainable design, and will explore its aesthetic potential.
Selective Environments in Passive Design ”Passive design is pertinent and important for a number of reasons: it is the basic foundation for sustainable building; it has evolved over time, and continues to evolve, through generations of building practices and self-conscious traditions; it is embodied
in the core principle of the Modern Movement, Form follows function; and it is found in nature, the ultimate repository of functional design, where countless biological systems have been tried and tested over millennia. Like nature, passive design has an inherent beauty, elegance and rightness born from adopting functional forms and the efficient and frugal use of available materials. This brings us full circle, as the characteristics of passive design are also those of sustainable systems”. 8 - Keith Bothwell, 2011 Servicing is not new to architecture, and has in fact been in the forefront of architectural discussion for centuries, even before mechanical engineering. Hawkes writes: “There is no simple, single answer to the question, ‘How do we give services their place?’”.9 Today most buildings are mechanically serviced, but one can argue that a building does not need to be dominated by technology to make a comfortable indoor environment. To this end, Hawkes, who has written several books on the topic of architecture and the environment, presents his reader with two modes of architecture: the ‘exclusive’ mode and the ‘selective’ mode. The exclusive mode can also be described as the mechanical mode, and is defined by mechanical servicing. The idea is that humans can replace all of the elements of the natural environment in a building with mechanical or electrical tools. Regarding this Hawkes writes: “At this moment the essential nature of architecture was fundamentally challenged. The historical struggle of all buildings to connect inside to outside could be replaced by
Architecture
Climate
Comfort
Fig 11 The ‘Vitruvian model’
the flick of a switch”.10 Keith Bothwell recognises Hawkes’ sadness at the “almost universal triumph of the exclusive mode”11. To this end, Hawkes introduces the selective mode, better known as ‘passive design’. He writes: “As a general rule, a selective building needs fewer services than an exclusive design, although it is hardly conceivable that any practical modern building would have no service systems”.12 Hawkes describes the exclusive mode as one that will hugely affect architectural form making, whereas the selective mode should be easier to mould into a desirable form as it works with the nature of the site.13 Architect and pioneer of bioclimatic architecture Victor Olgyay first introduced the selective mode that Hawkes writes about in the 1950’s and 60’s with books like ‘Design with Climate’.14 His bio-climatic approach is rooted in site, climate and human culture, and is more commonly known today as passive design. In this seminal book he writes: “To meet the problem of climate control in an orderly and systematic way requires a pooling of effort by several sciences. The first step is to define the measure and aims 39
Fig. 12 (top) Great Court at the British Museum by architect Lord Foster Fig. 13 (bottom left) Eden Project in Cornwall by Sir Nicholas Grimshaw
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of requirements for comfort. For this the answer lies in biology. The next is to review the existing climatic conditions, and this depends on the science of meteorology. Finally, for the attainment of a rational solution, the engineering sciences must be drawn upon”.15 Olgyay goes on to argue that this system, although heavily reliant on technology and the assistance of engineers, should open for architectural
social interactions enhanced”.19 His ideas have influenced contemporary practitioners, resulting in projects like the Great Court at the British Museum by architect Lord Foster, (Fig. 12) and the Eden Project in Cornwall by Sir Nicholas Grimshaw (Fig. 13). Whether glass envelopes will ever come to commonly shield whole communities as Buckminster Fuller envisioned is arguably unlikely, but his work in the
Even though contemporary sustainable design is often linked to the fundamental ideas of Vitruvius, bio-climatic architecture as a model is much more recent and mostly linked to Banham, Olgyay and also to Buckminster Fuller. Fuller’s thoughts were certainly utopian, as he “took the Vitruvian paradigm of comfort by suggesting enclosing the whole of urban activities in a glass envelope. Beneath a huge glazed embrace, Fuller envisaged that food would be grown, waste recycled as compost, energy demands reduced and
Today the area of passive design is generally recognized as the foundation for genuinely sustainable architecture as it is indeed rooted in a fundamental understanding of nature. “Passive environmental control relates to the way in which the orientation, section, materials and envelope of a building – the form and fabric of the building itself – create comfortable conditions inside, without mechanical devices such as air conditioning or heat pumps”.20 Indeed a passive building would typically shy away from the use of popular green embellishments such as green roofs, solar panels, wind turbines and heat pumps, as they “stand in conflict with the genuine low carbon capabilities of buildings, their passive design characteristics”.21 Thomas Hertzog, who is an example of how widely acknowledged architects have embraced the passive tradition, has said: “It should be possible to meet comfort requirements largely through the design of the building by incorporating passive measures with direct effect. The remaining energy needs in terms of heating, cooling, electricity, ventilation and lighting should be met by active systems powered by ecologically sustainable forms of energy.”22 What is implied here that a hybrid of what Hawkes labels exclusive and selective modes is most often used in contemporary practice. In fact, Randall Thomas
expression. His work was based on that of Vitruvius who wrote about architecture, climate and comfort in ‘The Ten Books on Architecture’ (Fig. 11).16 This architectural treatise plays a huge role in the philosophy of passive design today. In fact, many experts would say that first “environmental design should be founded on the same basic principles as those espoused by Vitruvius and his Renaissance followers”17, and secondly incorporate the advances made in technology. With this in mind, one can certainly argue that passive design is rooted in the principles of vernacular architecture, meaning that it isn’t entirely inappropriate to look at how buildings were designed before the current environmental crisis as some sceptics have suggested. However, Bothwell does not let his reader forget that as these texts were written long before the technologies and environmental issues we have today, the principles often referred to in Vitruvius’ work remain just that: principles.18
field of bioclimatic design was certainly ground-breaking and is referred to as a key moment in the evolution of passive design.
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suggests that the way forward might mean morphology of the vernacular and contemporary design, implying the use of the best of both worlds.23 If this strategy is indeed the way forward, it seems to suggest buildings that operate differently on a constitutional level than the buildings designed in the past 50 years. One can question if they will require behavioural change, or perhaps more importantly, if they can affect such change.
The Need for Behavioural Change Sauerbruch and Hutton have commented that: “Highly developed countries have to research the efficient use of (renewable) energies at every level and they have to reduce energy consumption at the same time. However, the latter will require behavioural change; that is, people will have to review their lifestyles”.24 They go on to argue that such behavioural change would be the easiest way to lower energy use. We would burn less fossil fuel “if we were to walk and use bicycles; if we reduced air travel; if we were happy with one house and one car; if we ate local food and less meat. The chances that these behavioural changes will happen voluntarily are slim, though”.25 If this is true, it can be argued that architects must take on the role of encouraging changes in lifestyle through good design solutions, with not only passive measures to reduce energy use, but intelligent use of sustainable technologies that are easy to use for the average household. An early example of architecture that tried to affect behavioural change was Robert and Brenda Vale’s Autonomous House (Fig. 14).26 The building type required a different lifestyle than people generally had grown accustomed to, which explains why this way of living never 42
became the mainstream approach. Brennan writes: “The autonomous tradition has had a strong influence on the expression and form of the sustainable architecture we see today. One of the strengths of the autonomous tradition is its clear design elements: visible placement of renewables and active power systems, section as the primary design generator, compactness of form and the use of raw materials such as planted roofs and untreated timber. These characteristics of the autonomous tradition have made it easy to dismiss it as being technically deterministic, limiting architects’ freedom in design and aesthetics”.27
It becomes more and more evident that aesthetics plays a vital role in finding an approach to sustainable architecture that excites architects to get involved in the practice. Not only can it be argued that the ‘production of aesthetics’ discussed in the first part of this paper one of the main contributors
Fig. 14 (bottom right) Project for an Autonomous House by Robert and Brenda Vale, 1975, a key design exemplar of the autonomous
to the environmental crisis, meaning that aesthetics plays a negative role in the development of our consumerist society. It can also be argued that aesthetics is part of the solution, as it becomes clear that architects are not ready to give up their own aesthetic perception, as they are letting their visual expression distort original passive design strategies and in the end compromising the performance of completed buildings. Sauerbruch and Hutton suggest using beauty as a tool: “The alternative is to create a carbon-free product that is so attractive that people will want to have it. If something can really be shown to be consuming less, after considering the whole life-cycle, while being highly attractive at the same time, people will accept it. Architecture is a perfect area where one could apply such a combination of reason and seduction. Architecture can literally be an advertisement for these alternative lifestyles and show that reduction in consumption does not necessarily mean a reduction in quality”.28 Here, the two architects suggest that beauty in design and architecture will not only attract people to these products and spaces, but it has the possibility of changing human behaviour which they note is key in reducing energy use. As its been argued in this paper, it could also attract more architects to get involved in the development of beautiful sustainable design, making beauty the catalyst for a positive chain of actions. Beauty and Durability as Tools in Sustainable Design If sustainability can be defined as a process that can be maintained and continued, hypothetically speaking, forever, durability plays a crucial part in this definition. We define something as durable when it is made to last for the duration of its purpose.29 With these definitions in mind, it seems that sustainability is not possible with out durability.
Marie Antoinette Glaser writes in her essay ‘Durability in Housing- The Aesthetics of the Ordinary’: “Architecture consists of phenomena that we perceive consciously and unconsciously through habitual use over time. From this results an aesthetic position that defines the notion of beauty as a process of long-term habituation and use. Durability signifies a specific kind of beauty in architecture that stems from the intimate traces of long-term use: unperturbed, unexceptional and unfaddish.”30 As this suggest, one can argue that a notion of beauty can come from durability, function and can be developed over time. The notion of form that follows function is not new to the field of architecture, as it was introduced with Modernity. One can further discuss the need for durability and performance in beauty in the light of Baumgartens theory that what is perceived as beautiful is “as Aesthetica §14 says, the perfection of sensory cognition because it is also fundamentally dependent on the sensory faculties of the subject, their disposition, and their education”,31 meaning that what is perceived as beautiful will always differ from subject to subject.
The challenge for the future of architecture is to find beauty in what is durable and sustainable. In the words of Sauerbruch and Hutton: “Less really has to be more – variety and beauty have to be found in what is simple”.32 This should arguably be achievable in the practice of passive design if we are to believe Bothwell: ”Like nature, passive design has an inherent beauty, elegance and rightness born from adopting functional forms and the efficient and frugal use of available materials”.33 If we are to believe Bothwell, passive design will continue the use of multiple aesthetics, as a passive design should be rooted in its context. This will almost certainly lead to a variety of regional sustainable aesthetics, an idea that would excite most designers of the built environment. 43
Many have linked beauty to attentiveness, and suggest using aesthetics as a tool. Landscape architect and professor Elizabeth Meyer has written about the need for beauty in landscape architecture in a manifest she entitled ‘Sustaining Beauty. The Performance of Appearance’. Many of her arguments can be applied to architecture, which she did in her lecture ‘Sustaining Beauty/ies’.34 In this lecture she claims to readdress the degree of subjectiveness in her essay. She argues that aesthetic experiences are cognitive and that they can lead to “curiosity, attentiveness and empathy for the environment”, arguing that there are many ways to achieve beauty in sustainable design.35 Hosey would support her in this argument as he writes: “If an object is more likely to be used, it’s more likely to continue being used. Who throws out a thing they find functional, beautiful, and valuable all at once? A more attractive design discourages us from abandoning it: if we want it, we won’t waste it”.36
In her lecture Meyer links aesthetical experiences to knowledge when presenting a photography of a pond (Fig. 15), arguing that most people perceive the photograph as beautiful, before knowing that the title of the piece is ‘Effluent Pond’. Here she directly attaches ethics to beauty. In the light of this observation, one can argue that architects may have the power to affect societies perception of beauty by designing good sustainable buildings. Glen Hill would perhaps disagree; pointing out that this has been tried and tested. He writes: ”For example, in 1974 the first Australian autonomous house, influenced by the early work of Brenda and Robert Vale, was built on marginal land on the University of Sydney campus by students and staff of the faculty of architecture. It was demolished only a few years later. The reason cited by the university administration was its ‘unsightliness’”.38 44
No matter what path we go down, the notion of beauty is dangerous to loose and is closely linked with durability. One has to remember that what is most sustainable is not to build at all, however this is certainly not an option. The second most sustainable approach would be to consider the life span of the structures we erect, meaning that not only durability, but aesthetics has to be considered. McLennan argues a
hidden practical meaning of beauty that directly impacts the performance of buildings. He writes: “Most of the buildings being built today have life spans that are considerably less than their counterparts of on to two hundred years ago. Sustainable buildings must reverse this trend and look at the idea of permanence on the scale of the great buildings of the past. This means creating places that will endure because people want them to”.39 Bearing in mind that one recognises that this means quality of craft as well as beauty, this argument seems crucial in the construction of buildings today. McLennan argues that when a building, or an object, is valued it will be maintained and last (hypothetically) for eternity, given that the construction is durable. 40 In this argument one should also consider that when something is carefully designed and built it is also more likely to be reused, reminding us of another key aspect of sustainability: flexibility. McLennan refers to for example brick warehouses that has been converted to office buildings and high end residential lofts as prime examples of buildings that has been conserved and repurposed due to their aesthetic value.41 While McLennan passionately brings up many valid reasons for beauty as a tool in sustainable design, he fails to discuss what such beauty would be. This is of course unfathomable to define, if not impossible, as the process of developing sustainable architecture is one that is still ongoing. Many still question what this ‘new beauty’ could be. However, one has to wonder: if we took a step back from the quantifiable,
Fig. 15 Effluent Holding Pond, Chemopetrol Mine, Bohemia, Czech Republic, 1992 by Emmet Gowin
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measures, what should sustainability look like in order to become the predominant approach to architecture? Hoesey poses these questions: “What if we created a different approach to aesthetics, one based on intelligence and not intuition? Can we be as smart about how things look as we are about how they work?”42 Endnotes (part 4) 1 Dagmar
Mirbach, (2008/2009), Magnitudo aesthetica, Aesthetic Greatness, In: The Nordic Journal of Aesthetics, (No. 36-67), p. 102104 2 Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 11 3 Ibid., p. 104 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid. p. 120 6 Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 11 7 Ibid. 8 Keith Bothwell, The Architecture of the Passively Tempered Environment, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 66-67 9 Hawkes, The Environmental Tradition, p. 86 10 Ibid., p.15 11 Keith Bothwell, The Architecture of the Passively Tempered Environment, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 67 12 Hawkes, The Environmental Tradition, p. 86 13 Ibid., p. 15-20 14 Keith Bothwell, The Architecture of the Passively Tempered Environment, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 66 15 Ibid. Borthwell writes quotes Olgyay 16 Hawkes, The Environmental Tradition, p. 14 17 Keith Bothwell, The Architecture of the Passively Tempered Environment, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 69 18 Ibid., p. 72 19 Cullingford and Blewitt (ed.), The Sustainability Curriculum, p. 129 20 Ibid., p 67 21 Ibid. p. 67 22 Ibid., 69 23 Thomas, Environments of Architecture, p. 4 24 Matthias Sauerbruch and Louisa Hutton, What does Sustainability look like?, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 41
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25 Ibid., p. 42 26 John
Brennan, Qualitative and Quantitative Traditions in Sustainable Design, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 84 27 John Brennan, Qualitative and Quantitative Traditions in Sustainable Design, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 90 28 Matthias Sauerbruch and Louisa Hutton, What does Sustainability look like?, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 43 29 Ibid., p. 11-12 30 Marie Anoinette Glaser, Durability in Houseing – The Aesthetic of the Ordinary, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 198 31 Dagmar Mirbach, (2008/2009), Magnitudo aesthetica, Aesthetic Greatness, In: The Nordic Journal of Aesthetics, (No. 36-67), p. 112 32 Matthias Sauerbruch and Louisa Hutton, What does Sustainability look like?, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 45 33 Keith Bothwell, The Architecture of the Passively Tempered Environment, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 67 34 Elizabeth Meyer (2011), Sustaining Beauty/ies, Architecture, Landscape and Design, University of Toronto, John H. Daniels Faculty [Online] Available from: https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=Dz9S_xxfGyU [Accessed on: 13. December 2014] 35Meyer, Sustaining Beauty/ies 36 Hosey, The Shape of Green, p. 7 38 Glen Hill, The Aesthetics of Architectural Consumption, In: Sang Lee, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 37 39 McLennan, Philosophy of Sustainable Design, p. 235 40 Ibid. 41 Ibid., p. 236 42 Hosey, The Shape of Green, p. 5 Notes (conclusion) 1 Meyer, Sustaining
Beauty/ies, quoting sociologist Ulrich Beck of Architecture, p. 3 3 Martin Zeumer, Energy Manual, Birkhauser, 2008, p. 10 4 Hawkes, The Environmental Tradition, p. 89 2 Thomas, Environments
Conclusion “We don’t need more policies/technologies, but what we need is attitudes, feelings, images and narratives”.1 -Ulrich Bech Today, sustainable architecture to many appears to be a style rather then a holistic philosophy which it should be. The danger of sustainable architecture is indeed that it can become yet another spectacular aesthetic trajectory competing for attention in the commodified aesthetic economy. In fact, it can be argued that there is no coherence in architecture today, certainly not in sustainable practice. One can ask: does architecture today express a desperateness about the current state of the world? This paper has tried to emphasise the need for a cohesive attitude in sustainable design: what this might entail has merely been touched upon throughout the chapters. As stated in the introduction, the author does not suggest an exact definition to what this would include, in fact, the discussion presented here leave many questions unanswered. However, it has been implied that use of passive design methods could be a step in the right direction. This is because passive design is typically rooted in a deep understanding of the site, which should lead to building design that works in harmony with the natural environment. Sustainable practice has to deal with all the aspects of the building industry. As Randall Thomas notes: “The built environment needs to be designed in the full knowledge of the impact human actions have in a broader context”.2 Designers and engineers have to continue to develop processes and methods of lowering energy use, in fact, technically we can already design buildings that produce as
much energy as they use.3 Furthermore, a conscious attitude towards the whole chain of processes in the building industry is needed. An important part of this cycle is the consideration of what materials to build with; meaning that architects can no longer choose from the ‘global catalogue’ of materials, but consider what is available locally. In addition to this, the possibilities of recycling the selected material has to
be evaluated. As this begins to suggest, a holistic approach should consider all phases in the entire life span of a building, from its conception to its eventual decay. The main purpose of this paper was to argue the need for aesthetics to be acknowledged in this attitude as well. One can argue that we need to sustain an aesthetical approach to architecture, no matter where we are heading with the discipline as a technical matter, because humans need buildings to mean something rather than operate as mere machines. As Thomas writes: “We humans inherit a world where things have significance for us- we find or add meaning and can not live without it”.3 However, whether aesthetics can progress solely in traditional terms, considering proportion, symmetry, balance and colour, is up for debate. One can argue that with the need for a new architecture, the need to reconsider aesthetics has emerged along with it. In this paper it has been insinuated that we need to learn how to do much with little and achieve beauty through utility; less really has to be more. However, the aesthetic dilemma of sustainable architecture can have no simple resolution. What is clear, is the need to look beyond the quantifiable measures and consider the greater ambition of architecture and urban design.
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Bibliography Books: Adam, Robert, The search for a Modern Classicism, Images Publishing Group, Mulgrave, 2010 Banham, Rayner, The architecture of the well-tempered environment, Architectural Press, London. 1st edition, 1969. 2nd edition, 1984. Cullingford ,Cedric and Blewitt, John (ed.), The Sustainability Curriculum: The Challenge for Higher Education, Earthscan, 2004, p. 130 Daniels, Klaus, Low Tech, light-tech, High tech: Building in the information age, Birkhauser, 2000 Farmer, John, Green Shift: Changing attitudes in architecture in the natural world, 2nd edition, Architectural Press, London, 1999. Frampton, Kenneth, Towards a Critical Regionalism: Six points for an architecture of resistance in Postmodern Culture by Hal Foster, Bay Press, London, 1983 Gauzin-M端ller, Dominique, Sustainable Architecture and Urbanism, Birkhauser, Basel, 2002 Giedion, Siegfried, Mechanization Takes Command, W.W. Norton & Co, 1998 Hawkes, Dean, The Environmental Tradition: Studies in the Architecture of Environment, E. & F.N. Spon, London, 1996. Hawkes, Dean, The Environmental Imagination: Technics and poetics of the architectural environment, Routledge, London & New York, 2008. Hawkes, Dean, Architecture and Climate: British environmental history from Smythson to the Smithsons, Routledge, London & New York, to be published 2010. Hertzog, Thomas, Facade Construction Manual, Birkhauser, Basel, 2004 Heywood, Huw, 101 Rules of Thumb for Low Energy Architecture, RIBA Publishing, 2013 Hosey, Lance, The Shape of Green; Aesthetics, Ecology and Design, Iceland Press, Washington, 2012 Lee, Sang, Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, 010 Publishers, Rotterdam, 2011 McDonough, William and Braungart, Michael, Cradle to Cradle, North Point Press, New York, 2002 McLennan, Jason, Philosophy of Sustainable Design, Ecotone, 2004 Pelsmaker, Sofie, The Environmental Design Hanbook, RIBA Publishing, 2012 Sagharchi, Alireza and Steil, Lucien, New Palladians: Modernity and Sustainability for 21st Century Architecture, Artmedia, London, 2010 Schittich, Christian, Building Simply Two, Detail, 2008 Smith, David Lee, Environmental Issues for Architecture, John Wiley & Sons, 2011 Strongman, Cathy, The Sustainable Home: Essential Guide to Eco Building, Renovation and Decoration, Merrel Publishers, London, 2008 Thomas, Randal, The Environments of Architecture, Taylor and Francis, New York, 2007 Yeang, Ken, Dictionary of Eco Design, Routhledge, New York, 2010 Zeumer, Martin, Energy Manual, Birkhauser, 2008
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Articles, essays: Gross, Steffen, The Neglected Programme of Aesthetics, British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 42, No. 4, October 2002 Mirbach, Dagmar, (2008/2009), Magnitudo aesthetica, Aesthetic Greatness, In: The Nordic Journal of Aesthetics, (No. 36-67) Meyer, Elizabeth, Sustaining Beauty. The Performance of Appearance, Journal of Landscape Architecture, 2008 Lectures: Meyer, Elizabeth (2011), Sustaining Beauty/ies, Architecture, Landscape and Design, University of Toronto, John H. Daniels Faculty [Online] Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dz9S_xxfGyU [Accessed on: 13. December 2014] Legislation/reports: BREEAM LEED Code for Sustainable Homes RIBA Green Overlay
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Image credits Introduction Page 4: Caspar David Friedrich, Wanderer above the sea of fog, [Online] Available on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ File:Caspar_David_Friedrich_-_Wanderer_above_the_sea_of_fog.jpg [Accessed on: 09. January 2015] Part 1 Chapter image: Clark Avenue and Clark Avenue bridge, looking east from West 13th Street, obscured by industrial smoke, in Cleveland, Ohio, in July of 1973, [Online] Available on: http://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2011/11/documerica-images-ofamerica-in-crisis-in-the-1970s/100190/ [Accessed on: 07. January 2015] Fig. 1: The Earth’s energy flows, found in Randal Thomas, The Environments of Architecture, p. 197 Fig 2: Human Co2 emissions, found in Huw Heywood, 101 Rules of Thumb for Low Energy Architecture, p. 121 Fig: 3: CO2 emission: buildings, industry and transport , found in Huw Heywood, 101 Rules of Thumb for Low Energy Architecture, p. 11 Fig. 4: Five Pancras Square, Bennets Associates, [Online] Available on: http://www.bennettsassociates.com/portfolio/0918/ [Accessed on: 28. December 2014] Part 2 Chapter image: Illegal logging, [Online] Available on: http://www.greenpeace.org/eastasia/campaigns/forests/work/end-illegallogging/ [Accessed on: 07. January 2015] Fig. 5: Cradle to gate, cradle to grave and cradle to cradle, found in Sofie Pelsmakers, The Environmental Design Handbook, p. 170 Fig 6: Cradle to cradle biological and technical cycles, [Online] Available on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cradle-to-cradle_ design#mediaviewer/File:Biological_and_technical_nutrients_(C2C).jpg [Accessed on: 28. December 2014] Fig. 7:Recommended maximum material sourcing distances, found in Sofie Pelsmakers, The Environmental Design Handbook, p. 174 Part 3 Chapter image: Architectural icons of the last 10 years [Online] Available on: http://www.oma.eu/lectures/sustainabilityadvancement-vs-apocalypse/ [Accessed on: 07. January 2015] Fig. 8: Ann Demeulemeester in Seoul, [Online] Available on: http://www.oma.eu/lectures/sustainability-advancement-vsapocalypse/ [Accessed on: 15. December 2014] Fig. 9: California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco [Online] Available on: http://www.oma.eu/lectures/sustainabilityadvancement-vs-apocalypse/ [Accessed on: 15. December 2014] Fig. 10: Principles of vernacular architecture, found in Huw Heywood, 101 Rules of Thumb for Low Energy Architecture, p. 51
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Part 4 Chapter image: Vitruvius presenting De Architectura to Augustus (25BC) [Online] Available on: http://www.oma.eu/lectures/ sustainability-advancement-vs-apocalypse/ [Accessed on: 07. January 2015] Fig 11: The ‘Vitruvian model’, by author based on drawing in Dean Hawkes, The Environmental Tradition: Studies in the Architecture of Environment, p. 15 Fig. 12: Great Court at the British Museum by architect Lord Foster, [Online] Available on: http://www.fosterandpartners.com/ projects/great-court-at-the-british-museum/ [Accessed on: 22. November 2014] Fig. 13: Eden Project in Cornwall by Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, [Online] Available on: http://grimshaw-architects.com/project/ the-eden-project-the-biomes/ [Accessed on: 22. November 2014] Fig. 14: Project for an Autonomous House by Robert and Brenda Vale, found in Sang Lee, Aesthtics of Sustainable Architecture, p. 85 Fig. 15: ’Effluent Pond’, screenshot from Elizabeth Meyers lecture Sustaining Beauty/ies [Online] https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=Dz9S_xxfGyU [Accessed on: 15. November 2014]
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