You are currently browsing the category archive for the ‘architecture’ category.
Last week Tessa, Henry, Mom, and I drove to Urbino in northern Marche. Urbino is the other cradle of the Renaissance, where in the 15th century Federico da Montefeltro attracted to his court some of the most outstanding scholars, architects, and artists of the period, creating an urban centre that UNESCO describes as the “pinnacle of Renaissance art and architecture.” And so last Thursday afternoon we piled into the metallic peat family truckster and hit the road.
(Spotted by Mel at Elemental) Cyril Sweett have published their research into the potential for improving energy performance of existing building stock. The importance of greening existing buildings is brought home by two facts:
- 44% of all CO2 emissions in the UK comes from energy use in buildings
- According to one of the report’s authors, in 2050 60% of Britain’s buildings will still pre-date the 2006 revisions to Part L
So we can look forward to the carbon reductions required by Part L being ratcheted up in future, but the overall effect will be modest, even in the long term. If we want to save carbon NOW then energy consumption in existing buildings is too important to ignore.
Predictably, the report’s top recommendation is for “brave decisions” by the government. But in a political climate where politicians would rather engage in creative accounting than be decisive on climate change, it’s hard to be hopeful.
The stultifying heat has finally let up, so yesterday afternoon I strapped on the kneepads and laid clay tiles on the terrace. It got me thinking about how much time I’ve spent on the floor in the last year.
Even at the beginning of this restoration project, when there was still so much to be decided, we knew we wanted terra cotta floors. The price seemed reasonable, the clay is quarried and fired locally, and they look fantastic – nothing would be more appropriate to the house. But the reality was much more complex and it involved a hell of a lot more time, expense, and stress than we imagined.
Following our recent blog conversation about the energy consumption of Portcullis House, Phil at the Sustainability Blog has pointed out the recently published consumption figures for another Hopkins scheme – this time the Gibbs Building owned by the Wellcome Trust. Like Portcullis House, it’s an office building kitted out with plenty of green gear. And like its cousin, the Gibbs Building is consuming more energy than predicted at design stage. So is the green office building just a myth?
Via zerochampion, the Guardian’s architecture commentator suggests that buildings
…should only really be offered prizes 20 years after their completion. While we can comment on the merit of the design, look and feel of a particular building when new, and celebrate the intentions of its designers, there is no guarantee that it might not prove to be a failure.
I know we ought to be happy that architecture is being discussed on TV at all. Having said that, if I were in charge of the Stirling Prize I’d consider actual measured energy use and give occupants a vote on whether they think the building is a success.
Client (on seeing the staircase dominating his hall): But I didn’t want a black marble staircase, I wanted an oak one!
Lutyens: What a pity.
This is driving me nuts. There’s now a huge emphasis on sustainability in architecture but some architects still don’t get it. Aflame with good intentions at the start of projects, they enthusiastically buy into sustainability concepts. But later in the design when there’s a perceived conflict between the energy performance and the architecture, the energy performance is chucked out the window.
Next year we reach a milestone unprecedented in history when more than half of all people will live in cities. This comes from the UN’s new State of the World Population report, which strikes an interesting tone. The authors acknowledge the huge risks of increasing rates of urbanisation, particularly for the poor, but also maintain that if we get our urban planning and public administration right, we can design out the worst of our environmental and social problems. And anyway, urbanisation is inevitable because you can’t have economic growth without it.
You could argue that here in the developed world, we’ve got enough urban planning experience under our belts to allow us to meet the challenge. Except that the developed world is not where the real expansion is set to take place. Most of the shift will occur in Asia and Africa where “the accumulated urban growth of these two regions during the whole span of history will be duplicated in a single generation.” So to describe the pace of expansion as breakneck is putting it mildly.
With it’s symmetrical façade and double bank of arches, this house is an aberration in the local countryside, nothing like the traditional Marchigiano farmhouse. We keep meaning to look into its origins but the investigation continues to slip down the to-do list (below paint the bedrooms and install shower surround, for example).
At Lino’s request, today I went to see Nunzio, the ex-owner of our house who lives in a straight-edged 1970′s palazzo just outside Loro Piceno. We sat at a table outside and he recounted to me what he knew about its history.
Phil Clark at Zero Champion sent a request under the Freedom of Information Act for figures on CO2 emissions for Portcullis House, the office building for Members of Parliament across the road from Big Ben. When he received a response he wasn’t sure if performance was good or bad. It’s bad:
There was an article in the Guardian last Saturday (thanks to Tessa for spotting it) by Alex James, the bassist from Blur, about having an architect come to his home to give green advice. It’s a scheme run by the RIBA where architects provide green advice in exchange for a donation to charity. At first glance this sounds positive. Certainly it’s a great channel to spread information on energy efficiency.
But things get a little weird when the article states that thick rubble walls keep the house warm in winter – which they don’t. Then architect George Stowell suggests that Alex installs a biomass CHP unit to generate his own electricity on site from wood chips. But there aren’t any commercially available biomass CHP units on a single house scale (or even twenty times that big). He may have meant biomass heating, but it’s a hell of a mistake to make, recommending something that doesn’t exist.
It might be better to send a services engineer. CIBSE should consider something similar to the RIBA programme.
Recent Comments