Biomimicry and Architectural Furniture

 As part of my research for my Platform project, I decided to explore the idea of creating a new space that has been inspired by the dome shape created by the branches of willow trees. My models expand on this idea:

Sustainable Urbanism: 'Defining Sustainable Urbanism'

After exploring the idea of 'Sustainable Building', I wanted to expand on the idea of sustainability and have started researching into the idea of 'Sustainable Urbanism', which I briefly touched upon in the previous post. Whilst undertaking this research I came across several interesting papers addressing this issue of sustainability and urbanism and why sustainability is so important for an urban environment.

Sustainable Urbanism explores the idea of imagining a grand unification of architecture, city planning,and environmental design for a better way of life.
[Defining Sustainable Urbanism: Towards a Responsive Urban Design]

Sustainable Urbanism draws attention to the enormous opportunity to redesign the built environment in a  manner that supports a higher quality of life and promotes a healthy and sustainable...lifestyle.

Sustainable Urbanism grows out of three late 20th century reform movements that...highlight the benefits of intergrating human and natural systems. The smart growth, new urbanism and green building movements provide the philosophical and pratical bones of sustainable urbanism.
Sustainable Urbanism represents a generational shift in how human settlements are designed and developed.
[Sustainable Urbanism: Urban Design With Nature]

Sustainability Integrated within the design process:'...buildings based on timeless fundamentals, such as the human experience of space...leads to the assumption that sustainability in architecture is about an attitude of making place and space'
[Sustainability on the Urban Scale: ‘Green Urbanism’]

Sources: Defining Sustainable Urbanism; Sustainability on the Urban Scale; UN Habitat; Sustainable Urbanism: Urban Design With Nature

Design For Ethical Production: Architecture For Humanity

During the seminar on Ethical Production I was particularly interested in the charitable oragnaisation 'Architecture for Humanity'.

One of their many projects that captured my interest was the Biloxi Model Home Program which focused on the repair and rebuild family homes belonging to those who were affected by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Through this program the rehabilitation of hundreds of partially destroyed housing stock provided a start for long-term reconstruction that addresses the way building are constructed in hurricane prone communities.

The goal of the Biloxi Model Home program is to provide design services and financial assistance for the construction of homes that for families in Biloxi, Mississippi whose houses were destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. Families are paired with a team of professional designers who work with them one-on-one to design a new home for their property that is not only affordable but is also sustainable and meets the area's new building requirements.

Using the latest in materials research, disaster mitigation and sustainable building techniques, these designs address sustainability not only from a material and energy use stand point but in a community development sense as well. By rebuilding responsible homes in a devastated community families have a real base for contributing to the re-establishment of their community, rather than just getting by until the next disaster. 

This program approaches reconstruction in a mode that facilitates good design solutions by standardising processes and partnership strategies as opposed to standardising design. By this method disaster response programs may be established prior to disaster to allow effective relief in the critical time necessary.

Sources: ArchitectureForHumanity

TED'S TEN 8. Design for Ethical Production.

Today we explored the notion of 'ethical production' in response to our own design disciplines, this means that we explored the social impacts designers and sustainable development can have on a human level; we also examined existing companies:

Fair Trade:

Fair trade is a social and economic movement which promotes international standards of ethical production, labour and environmental policies in the trading of goods or commodities such as cotton. It includes principles such as payment at a fair price and gender equality.  

Where fair trade is a way of doing business, ethical production refers to the production of a textile product and encompasses the whole life cycle of the product from the raw materials, through the finishing processes, to the construction

Unilever:

Architecture For Humanity:

Design is important to every aspect of our lives. It informs the places in which we live, work, learn, heal and gather. We engage all stakeholders in the design process. We believe our clients are designers in their own right.Thoughtful, inclusive design creates lasting change in communities by: 

• Alleviating poverty and providing access to water, sanitation, power and essential services
• Bringing safe shelter to communities prone to disaster and displaced populations
• Rebuilding community and creating neutral spaces for dialogue in post-conflict areas
• Mitigating the effects of rapid urbanization in unplanned settlements
• Creating spaces to meet the needs of those with disabilities and other at-risk populations
• Reducing the footprint of the built environment and addressing climate change

TED'S TEN 7. Design to Replace the Need to Consume.

This Design Strategy addressed the idea that products can adapt and change with age and explored alternative forms of design and consumption such as co-design and collaborative consumption. We discussed the durability of a product and how the value of the material effects how we use it, i.e. our emotional relationship with the product.

“Most products create a small amount of empathy at the point of purchase , from that point on the length of the product’s lifespan depends upon how well the product can maintain empathy with the user. Waste, therefore, can be seen as expired empathy.”
Jonathan Chapman (2006)

Biomimicry Explored: Bringing Nature Into Architecture

From my research it is evident that the original understanding of biomimicry was to take inspiration from nature in its most literal sense, by making the buildings reflect the visuals of its original natural form. Today, designers are reproducing the functional systems that are found in nature in order to provide cooling, generate energy and even to desalinate water.

I have been really inspired by the idea of biomimicry and I am interested in incorporating this interesting idea of design into the work I am doing as part of my Platform which is to create a piece of 'Architectural Furniture for a small site'...

Sources: Archiscene; ArtNet

Biomimicry Explored.

I am really interested in the idea of biomimicry and came across an interesting paper:

BIOMIMETIC APPROACHES TO ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN FOR INCREASED SUSTAINABILITY

By Maibritt Pedersen Zari

This paper explore the use of Biomimicry and the way ecosystems are emulated as a basis for design as a result of the potential it offers as a way to create a more sustainable and even regenerative built environment for both the present and the future.

From this table we can see the Biomimicry is split into three levels of application; the organism, behaviour and ecosystem.

Within each of these levels, a further five possible dimensions to the mimicry exist. The design may be biomimetic for example in terms of what it looks like (form), what it is made out of (material), how it is made (construction), how it works (process) or what it is able to do (function).

The organism level:  refers to a specific organism like a plant or animal and may involve mimicking part of or the whole organism. 

Example:

Waterloo International Terminal designed by Nicholas Grimshaw and Partners is able to respond to changes in air pressure as trains more through the terminal. It's glass panel fixings mimic the flexible, scaly Pangolin so they are able to move in response to imposed forces.

The behaviour level: refers to the mimicking behaviour, and may include translating an aspect of how an organism behaves, or relates to a larger context. In behaviour level biomimicry, it is not the organism itself that is mimicked, but its behaviour. 

Example:

An architectural example of biomimicry at the behaviour level is demonstrated by the CH2 Building in Melbourne, Australia. The design basis of this building is in part on techniques of passive ventilation and temperature regulation observed in termite mounds, in order to create a thermally stable interior environment. Water which is mined (and cleaned) from the sewers beneath the CH2 Building is used in a similar manner to how certain termite species will use the proximity of aquifer water as an evaporative cooling mechanism.

The ecosystem level: is the mimicking of whole ecosystems and the common principles that allow them to successfully function. 

Example:

An advantage of designing at this level of biomimicry is that it can be used in conjunction with other levels of biomimicry (organism and behaviour). It is also possible to incorporate existing established sustainable building methods that are not specifically biomimetic such as interfaced or bio-assisted systems, where human and non-human systems are merged to the mutual benefit of both.

An example is John and Nancy Todd’s Living or Eco Machines where the process of waste water treatment in ecosystems is mimicked and also integrated with plants. Eco-Machines offer unsurpassed environmental, technological, and economic advantages over conventional wastewater treatment options by mimicking the water purification processes found in wetlands and marshes.