Contemporary Venerability

We have been practicing architecture since we first walked out of the caves and until recently, people built sustainably. Not because they were concerned with man's effects on the planet, but out of necessity. Local materials were all that was available, scarce resources were conserved, etc. People have inhabited virtually all corners of the earth and because of this many different ways to deal with the climates and resources came about.

Then came the industrial revolution and many of lessons learned over the past tens of thousands of years were forgotten by most. We fell in love with drywall, stucco and air conditioners. These things made it easy to build the wasteland that is sprawling across much of the industrialized world. These things have contributed to climate change more than anything else we've done.

Today's post here is intended to remind us of some of the ways we were able to manage before we stopped thinking. This is not a comprehensive compendium by any means, but it hopefully makes some of us start to think again.

The house above was imagined by Terunobu Fujimori, architectural historian and architect. The charred cedar siding is an ancient Japanese method of protecting the wood. Craftsmen burn the cedar for 7 minutes before dousing with water. This creates a layer of charring that resists insects and rot. It also helps to prevent fire; burnt wood doesn't burn again. It also looks pretty cool with that silver-black sheen. Beats stucco if you ask me.
Most of us have grown accustomed to air conditioning and for good reason sometimes, but our current method of cooling is quite wasteful and has led to some very unimaginative behavior in the practice of designing the built environment. I know that many think that people used to just suffer through the heat before the magical AC unit came into existence, but the examples below tell a different story.
The picture above is of a cabin on the boat Cheops. Ancient Egyptian boat Cheops. The ribs over the cabin would have been covered with a wet canvas thousands of years ago. This is a simple and easy way to use the effects of evaporative cooling. We still use evaporative cooling today, but we tend to mechanize the process instead of finding a simple passive way of doing so.

These towers here are examples of Persian wind catchers. They bring cooler air from outside in while allowing warmer air to escape. Used to keep buildings cool in the middle east for centuries, these towers and variants like solar chimneys and evaporative cooling towers can work almost anywhere in the world where AC is needed. In a place like Southern California where we have such a mild climate, systems like these could eliminate the need for mechanical devices.


The image above is of one of the first examples of a rammed earth building in the world. It is in the Gansu province of China and was built over 2000 years ago. Rammed earth is one of the most sustainable methods of building; the material(dirt) is readily available, unlimited and is found in every climate and region on the planet. It's also quite durable (I'd like to see what an Irvine home looks like in 2000 years). This method also is incredibly insulating, keeping the interior cool in the summer and warm in the winter. The example below is a rammed earth house built in BC by Terra Firma builders.
Building the future is going to require looking to the past.

photos:
galchonok on Flickr; wikipedia; lighthousesbc