A Blurring of Ecology and Urbanism
One of my favorite statements from Mostafavi in Ecological Urbanism was "Ecological Urbanism - Is that not an oxymoron in the same way that a hybrid SUV is an oxymoron?"
While architects can say how sustainable a building is all day long, the reality is the most sustainable building is no building and the most sustainable city is no city. However, since that is not a possibility and would function in the opposite way of supporting and promoting human life, his question is how do we think of ecology and urbanism?
In his opinion, "The city, for all its importance, can no longer be thought of only as a physical artifact; instead, we must be aware of the dynamic relationships, both visible and invisible, that exist among the various domains of a larger terrain of urban as well as rural ecologies."
In my interpretation, he's suggested a sort of blur of the boundaries. A city becomes less of a contrast to nature and more so begins to blend. First of all, I think of some examples of how we think of this now. One of the first things that comes to mind are the Singapore "Supertrees". I think this is what architects think of when they think of a "green city". In reality, the trees contain solar panels to power a light show. I'm not really sure how this promotes biodiversity besides it looks how people expect it to look.
While architects can say how sustainable a building is all day long, the reality is the most sustainable building is no building and the most sustainable city is no city. However, since that is not a possibility and would function in the opposite way of supporting and promoting human life, his question is how do we think of ecology and urbanism?
In his opinion, "The city, for all its importance, can no longer be thought of only as a physical artifact; instead, we must be aware of the dynamic relationships, both visible and invisible, that exist among the various domains of a larger terrain of urban as well as rural ecologies."
In my interpretation, he's suggested a sort of blur of the boundaries. A city becomes less of a contrast to nature and more so begins to blend. First of all, I think of some examples of how we think of this now. One of the first things that comes to mind are the Singapore "Supertrees". I think this is what architects think of when they think of a "green city". In reality, the trees contain solar panels to power a light show. I'm not really sure how this promotes biodiversity besides it looks how people expect it to look.
Instead of green plants being all over buildings, I think we should think of this blurring of ecology and urbanism in patches. Where nature is fully allowed to take over designated parts of a city in the form of urban parks and greenways and the buildings are a separate entity between the patches whose focus is on using the least amount of material as possible. I think "green architecture" of the present is actually a lot more wasteful utilizing many more systems and products than architecture used to.
An example of this is I think of cemeteries, specifically one in Cincinnati. Spring Grove is a 730 acre cemetery located right outside of downtown. While one of its purposes is a cemetery, its also known for its diversity of plant life and a nice place to go be in nature. In fact, in a horticulture class I took at University of Cincinnati, we would visit the cemetery often to look at its diverse plant species. What I really like about it is the designation of green space inside an urban city. It's not trying to be both but rather acts with and in contrast to the city. I think giving parts of a city back to nature would be an interesting approach to this "blurring" between city and ecology.
Spring Grove Cemetery
I agree completely with our role as designers should be to give back nature within a city. The industrial boom has led to concrete jungles that support only life that wants to evolve to our standards. Taking a step back might be to late for us, but I feel there is room for vastly improving upon the expansion of cities. Simply by giving nature what it deserves is a great way, but I also really enjoy your analysis of biomimicry to blur these lines. It is a process that is quickly evolving that has opened our eyes to how more complex the world then us. Organic beings and biomes survive longer and stronger than we do, in less than ideal situations. Giving back to nature might help humanity understand and learn more from the world we live in before we create one that is of steel.
ReplyDeleteI agree with that opening quote from Mostavi as well. I would add that even the term sustainable architecture can be interpreted as an oxymoron, or at the very least, overly generous. Until we are capable of defying the laws of physics, we cannot create matter or energy. Therefore, all construction is derived from anteceding destruction. There is no way to build, without extracting resources and disrupting the environment elsewhere. Sustainable architecture would imply, at a minimum, a state of equilibrium: resources extracted = resources replaced. We are far from reaching that goal, however. Sustainable architecture is still a lofty and worthwhile goal, rather than an existing category of construction, hence the misnomer.
ReplyDeleteI think giving parts of the city back to nature is a great idea, but is this not what Mostafavi refers to as the pragmatic approach that we traditionally tend to take when trying to integrate nature and the built environment, simply by adding more green space or a new park? I agree with Cody that this idea of biomimicry that you brought up seems to be a more interesting approach in trying to blur the lines between the city and ecology as it entails that we’re attempting to be more environmentally conscious and aware as we design new structures.
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