The 2005-06 competition for the design of Absolute Towers in Mississagua just outside Toronto in Canada was a privately-run competition open to anyone interested in entering. The following jury shortlisted six proposals from 92 entries. Ed Sajecki, civil engineer and professional planner, founding partner of LinkedIn Larry Beasley, urban planner, formerly Co-Director of Planning for […]
Prompted by this empty space outside a mall, I asked a few posts back if invisible design was an oxymoron. Despite having no obvious indicators of design, this empty space enables all the feelgood benefits we like to think more visible design can provide. It enables so much for so little obvious design input and […]
If I were a tree I’d be starting to get very worried. There was no need to worry back when roof “gardens” were first proposed as they didn’t seem concerned about plants. Besides, there was still significant garden at ground level. However, the idea that Nature was something to be looked at rather than experienced […]
Nature has been synonymous with Beauty for some time now. Despite what it’s about to do to us, we continue to have an image of Nature as something beautiful beyond bounds and an endless source of inspiration and PR blather for architects. That inspiration is without end because, try as one may, it’s simply not possible for […]
Learning From Nature introduced aspects of the troubled and confused history of architecture’s relationship with the natural world. The concept of biomimesis was never going to make it any clearer. On reading this, I did bristle at contemporary philosophy and wonder what was meant by sustainability in nature but the rest was good. I approved of the bit about not by replicating […]
I hinted at zoomorphic architecture briefly in a recent post. If Art Nouveau took advantage of plants for novel architectural stylings, then ZA did it with animals. The V&A exhibition is long gone, but the website lingers. Here’s that splash text again. Zoomorphic presents a startling new trend in architecture – buildings that look like animals. Animal resemblances […]
So what’s left then to ‘learn’ from Nature? We’re still very quick to want to do it but what have we ‘learned’ so far? It’s time for a quick roundup. In the not-so-dark ages before Architecture was invented, people managed to work out how to build buildings that suited how they wanted to live, using […]
Stealth is about staying undetected until your mission is accomplished. Many animals, for example, are stealth hunters. The polar bear, for example, walks to within 90 m of a seal and then crouches. If the seal doesn’t notice, it then creeps to within 9 to 12m of the seal and then uses a short burst of speed to attack. […]
But I don’t think we do it for all the right reasons. Reason No.1: WE CAN’T HELP IT Biophilia is the innate affiliation people seek with other organisms, and especially with the living natural world. Studies have shown that given freedom to choose the setting of their homes or offices, people across cultures gravitate toward […]
A recent burst of pre-completion publicity for the Bosco Verticale in Milan came with a strong sense of seen-beforeness. This image is from the website of the architect, Stefano Boeri. The following press release can be seen on florafocuseu, inhabitat, jetsongreen, earthtechling, etc. etc. Bosco is Italian for forest. The Bosco Verticale consist of two towers covered in trees and shrubs. From […]
The primitive hut has been a standard of architectural theory since Vitruvius. He concluded that the different forms resulted from people using what they had available to use, rather than because they wanted to build things having those particular shapes. Perhaps he was the first misfit? – after all, this is how we here at misfits think things […]
