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Inspired by the natural beauty of his homeland of Catalonia, Antoni Gaudi became a celebrated and innovative architect through the unique structures he designed in Barcelona, having a significant impact on architecture as it was known.
Building with Nature is a proven, innovative approach to create water-related Nature-based Solutions for societal challenges, that harnesses the forces of nature to benefit the environment, economy and society.00EcoShape, a unique collaboration between scientists, engineers, builders, designers and not-for-profits, has in the past decade designed, realized, monitored and researched multiple Building with Nature projects in Europe (especially in the Netherlands) and South East Asia. These projects demonstrate the capacity to build Nature-Based Solutions at scale to create safe and sustainable flood protection as well as ecologically rich and resilient environments that provide great places to live, work, and visit. These characteristics make Building with Nature the go-to method to adapt to and mitigate climate change.00In this book, EcoShape brings the authors into dialogue with experts and stakeholders to discuss methodologies and lessons learned about Building with Nature as well as potential barriers and enablers for implementation. It describes and illustrates key concepts, linking them to a range of landscape types and their underlying ecological, economic, and social systems. As such, the book is more than a manual; it captures the imaginative and inspirational potential of Building with Nature.
Nature Based Strategies for Urban and Building Sustainability reviews the current state-of-the-art on the topic. In the introduction, the editors review the fundamental concepts of nature elements in the built environment, along with the strategies that are necessary for their inclusion in buildings and cities. Part One describes strategies for the urban environment, discussing urban ecosystems and ecosystem services, while Part Two covers strategies and technologies, including vertical greening systems, green roofs and green streets. Part Three covers the quantitative benefits, results, and issues and challenges, including energy performances and outdoor comfort, air quality improvement, acoustic performance, water management and biodiversity. - Provides an overview of the different strategies available to integrate nature in the built environment - Presents the current state of technology concerning systems and methodologies on how to incorporate nature in buildings and cities - Features the latest research results on operation and ecosystem services - Covers both established and new designs, including those still in the experimental stage
Shows how architect Richard Neutra tried to provide through his architecture a link with the natural world and an environment to enrich the lives of its users.
A lavish monograph celebrating one of the most respected and admired American architects, known for his sensitivity to the nature and traditions of the Pacific Northwest
In Book Oneof this four-volume work, Alexander describes a scientific view of the world in which all space-matter has perceptible degrees of life, and establishes this understanding of living structures as an intellectual basis for a new architecture. He identifies fifteen geometric properties which tend to accompany the presence of life in nature, and also in the buildings and cities we make. These properties are seen over and over in nature and in the cities and streets of the past, but they have almost disappeared in the impersonal developments and buildings of the last hundred years. This book shows that living structures depend on features which make a close connection with the human self, and that only living structure has the capacity to support human well-being.
Winner of the 2012 George Perkins Marsh Prize for Best Book in Environmental History In the twentieth century, the Mekong Delta has emerged as one of Vietnam’s most important economic regions. Its swamps, marshes, creeks, and canals have played a major role in Vietnam’s turbulent past, from the struggles of colonialism to the Cold War and the present day. Quagmire considers these struggles, their antecedents, and their legacies through the lens of environmental history. Beginning with the French conquest in the 1860s, colonial reclamation schemes and pacification efforts centered on the development of a dense network of new canals to open land for agriculture. These projects helped precipitate economic and environmental crises in the 1930s, and subsequent struggles after 1945 led to the balkanization of the delta into a patchwork of regions controlled by the Viet Minh, paramilitary religious sects, and the struggling Franco-Vietnamese government. After 1954, new settlements were built with American funds and equipment in a crash program intended to solve continuing economic and environmental problems. Finally, the American military collapse in Vietnam is revealed as not simply a failure of policy makers but also a failure to understand the historical, political, and environmental complexity of the spaces American troops attempted to occupy and control. By exploring the delta as a quagmire in both natural and political terms, Biggs shows how engineered transformations of the Mekong Delta landscape - channelized rivers, a complex canal system, hydropower development, deforestation - have interacted with equally complex transformations in the geopolitics of the region. Quagmire delves beyond common stereotypes to present an intricate, rich history that shows how closely political and ecological issues are intertwined in the human interactions with the water environment in the Mekong Delta. Watch the book trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gp1-UItZqsk
A career-spanning monograph in two volumes presenting the work of one of Asia’s most progressive and innovative architects Vo Trong Nghia. The work of Vo Trong Nghia is a call for architecture to transform itself from a source of pollution to a reason for hope. The World Green Building Council estimates that thirty-nine percent of energy-related carbon emissions can be attributed to buildings. An awareness of architecture’s responsibilities has permeated the profession and new ideas and solutions are coming from places where these issues are most acute. Following a long recovery from decades of war, Vietnam has emerged as one of the most exciting centers of design in Asia—led largely by the work of architect Vo Trong Nghia, whose work has gained an international following. The buildings of Vo Trong Nghia Architects, established in Ho Chi Minh City in 2006, make clear reference to the past, and to Vo’s own adherence to the Five Precepts of Buddhist teaching. The architect’s two main themes—green architecture and bamboo as a building material—form the basis of this two-volume celebration of his work. From the Wind and Water Bar, his first foray into bamboo as a building material, to resort complexes, art installations, and his game-changing series of residences, House for Trees, Vo Trong Nighia: Building Nature proves that green architecture creates local relevance, beauty, and elegance in its own right.
A new history of modern Japanese architecture, from an environmental perspective Joachim Nijs' Japan: Nation Building Natureis the first book to map out the views of nature that have shaped the widely acclaimed but often misunderstood modern architecture of Japan. By connecting the dots between philosophy, design, geopolitics and an earnest quest for a greener tomorrow, this book explains how Japanese culture can shed new light on our understanding of ecology, and vice versa. Using a distinctive blend of academic research and personal experience, Nijs draws on architectural history to navigate Japan's complex and unique ecological ethic through the lens of four typological phenomena: earthquakes, monsoon climates, nuclear erasure of life and insularity. This imaginative and refreshing book offers key insights and references for anyone wishing to deepen their knowledge of Japan and its architecture.
The Berkeley hills offer great natural beauty and sensitive landscape design that skillfully incorporates the architecture into the natural environment. In the early 20th century, architects inspired by the Arts and Crafts movement worked to integrate the hills' large outcrops of rock (known to geologists as Northbrae rhyolite) into the city's development. At once a historical architectural reference and a captivating art book, BERKELEY ROCKS documents the unique harmony between Berkeley's distinctive geography, homes, and local ideals.Reviews"The book is indeed rife with gorgeous images, but it'¬'s also much more."-San Jose Mercury News and Oakland Tribune
