British council Nairobi
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A new council office, designed by Squire and Partners, opened in Nairobi in November 2004. The design utilises the local climate and orientation to passively control the building’s environment and has evolved from Squire and Partners’ ethos of contextual modernism. The practice works hard with site locations, aspect and orientation to develop proposals that are both(...)
British council Nairobi
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A new council office, designed by Squire and Partners, opened in Nairobi in November 2004. The design utilises the local climate and orientation to passively control the building’s environment and has evolved from Squire and Partners’ ethos of contextual modernism. The practice works hard with site locations, aspect and orientation to develop proposals that are both appropriate and culturally of their 'place’. The design responds specifically to both the culture of the British council in East Africa and the site context of central Nairobi to create a dramatic, beautiful space. The British Council’s Visual Arts Department commissioned a site specific work for the new building from artist David Tremlett who was invited to contribute wall drawings to the front and back elevations and to the main corridors leading to the teaching areas within the building. The drawings of rubbed pigment and varnish highlight accentuate the flat planes of the building and the colours harmonise with the vibrant richness of the Kenyan soil, vegetation and sky.
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The Mycenaeans
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For almost three thousand years, the Mycenaeans, ancestors of the classical Greeks, lay lost and forgotten beneath the soil of Greece. In 1876, however, a German businessman, Heinrich Schliemann, in his search for the great Mycenaean king Agamemnon and other heroes of the Trojan War, made an astounding discovery in Mycenae: inside the monumental Lion Gate he discovered(...)
The Mycenaeans
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For almost three thousand years, the Mycenaeans, ancestors of the classical Greeks, lay lost and forgotten beneath the soil of Greece. In 1876, however, a German businessman, Heinrich Schliemann, in his search for the great Mycenaean king Agamemnon and other heroes of the Trojan War, made an astounding discovery in Mycenae: inside the monumental Lion Gate he discovered shaft graves belonging to a warrior elite, many of whom were buried wearing striking gold funerary masks and armor. In this authoritative new survey, Schofield examines these initial discoveries and other material evidence from Mycenaean culture, including painted pottery, documents in Linear B script, and the remains of fortress-palaces, all of which have yielded important information about the social hierarchies, religion, and military and trading activities of this wealthy and sophisticated culture. The author also considers the factual basis for the Mycenaeans' legendary links with the Trojan War and the various explanations for the eventual decline of their civilization.
Architectural Theory
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The term "guerrilla" may bring to mind a small band of armed soldiers, moving in the dead of night on a stealth mission. In the case of guerrilla gardening, the soldiers are planters, the weapons are shovels, and the mission is to transform an abandoned lot into a thing of beauty. Once an environmentalist's nonviolent direct action for inner-city renewal, this approach to(...)
Guerrilla gardening : a manualfesto
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The term "guerrilla" may bring to mind a small band of armed soldiers, moving in the dead of night on a stealth mission. In the case of guerrilla gardening, the soldiers are planters, the weapons are shovels, and the mission is to transform an abandoned lot into a thing of beauty. Once an environmentalist's nonviolent direct action for inner-city renewal, this approach to urban beautification is spreading to all types of people in cities around the world. These modern-day Johnny Appleseeds perform random acts of gardening, often without the property owner's prior knowledge or permission. Typical targets are vacant lots, railway land, underused public squares, and back alleys. The concept is simple, whimsical and has the cheeky appeal of being a not-quite-legal call to action. Dig in some soil, plant a few seeds, or mend a sagging fence - one good deed inspiring another, with win-win results all around.
Urban Landscapes
A forest in the city
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''A forest in the city'' looks at the urban forest, starting with a bird’s-eye view of the tree canopy, then swooping down to street level, digging deep into the ground, then moving up through a tree’s trunk, back into the leaves and branches. Trees make our cities more beautiful and provide shade but they also fight climate change and pollution, benefit our health and(...)
A forest in the city
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''A forest in the city'' looks at the urban forest, starting with a bird’s-eye view of the tree canopy, then swooping down to street level, digging deep into the ground, then moving up through a tree’s trunk, back into the leaves and branches. Trees make our cities more beautiful and provide shade but they also fight climate change and pollution, benefit our health and connections to one another, provide food and shelter for wildlife, and much more. Yet city trees face an abundance of problems, such as the abundance of concrete, poor soil and challenging light conditions. So how can we create a healthy environment for city trees? Urban foresters are trying to create better growing conditions, plant diverse species, and maintain trees as they age. These strategies, and more, reveal that the urban forest is a complex system—''A forest in the city'' shows readers we are a part of it. Includes a list of activities to help the urban forest and a glossary.
Children's Books
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The exhilarating and at times unsettling work featured in this book suggests an alternative view of natural processes and ecosystems and their relationships to human society and architecture. R's Mosquito Bottleneck house in Trinidad uses a skin that actually attracts mosquitoes and moves them through the building, while keeping them separate from the occupants. In his(...)
Subnature, architecture's other environments
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The exhilarating and at times unsettling work featured in this book suggests an alternative view of natural processes and ecosystems and their relationships to human society and architecture. R's Mosquito Bottleneck house in Trinidad uses a skin that actually attracts mosquitoes and moves them through the building, while keeping them separate from the occupants. In his building designs the architect Philippe Rahm draws the dank air from the earth and the gasses and moisture from our breath to define new forms of spatial experience. In his Underground House, Mollier House, and Omnisport Hall, Rahm forces us to consider the odor of soil and the emissions from our body as the natural context of a future architecture. [Cero 9]'s design for the Magic Mountain captures excess heat emitted from a power generator in Ames, Iowa, to fuel a rose garden that embellishes the industrial site and creates a natural mountain rising above the city's skyline. Subnature looks beyond leed ratings, green roofs, and solar panels toward a progressive architecture based on a radical new conception of nature.
Green Architecture
Ant architecture
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Walter Tschinkel has spent much of his career investigating the hidden subterranean realm of ant nests. This wonderfully illustrated book takes you inside an unseen world where thousands of ants build intricate homes in the soil beneath our feet. Tschinkel describes the ingenious methods he has devised to study ant nests, showing how he fills a nest with plaster,(...)
Ant architecture
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Walter Tschinkel has spent much of his career investigating the hidden subterranean realm of ant nests. This wonderfully illustrated book takes you inside an unseen world where thousands of ants build intricate homes in the soil beneath our feet. Tschinkel describes the ingenious methods he has devised to study ant nests, showing how he fills a nest with plaster, molten metal, or wax and painstakingly excavates the cast. He guides you through living ant nests chamber by chamber, revealing how nests are created and how colonies function. How does nest architecture vary across species? Do ants have "architectural plans"? How do nests affect our environment? As he delves into these and other questions, Tschinkel provides a one-of-a-kind natural history of the planet's most successful creatures and a compelling firsthand account of a life of scientific discovery. Offering a unique look at how simple methods can lead to pioneering science, "Ant architecture" addresses the unsolved mysteries of underground ant nests while charting new directions for tomorrow’s research, and reflects on the role of beauty in nature and the joys of shoestring science.
Landscape Theory
Dead cities and other tales
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For the late great Mike Davis, the ravaging of the climate by capital—and his prescient analysis of its consequences for those of us left to deal with the resulting crises—was always a central part of his urban geography. In these wide ranging, incisive, and hauntingly relevant essays, Davis asks us to consider what we would find if we put a microscope to the ruins of(...)
Dead cities and other tales
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For the late great Mike Davis, the ravaging of the climate by capital—and his prescient analysis of its consequences for those of us left to deal with the resulting crises—was always a central part of his urban geography. In these wide ranging, incisive, and hauntingly relevant essays, Davis asks us to consider what we would find if we put a microscope to the ruins of Metropolis, and provides a riveting account of the disasters—natural, man-made, and those (as in the case of climate calamity) where the distinction is impossible to make—that he finds on the other end. He begins his examination by sifting through the rubble of the twin towers in the wake of 9/11, presciently identifying the seeds of war already germinating in the scorched soil of ground zero, and closes by considering how little prepared our hollowed out urban infrastructure is to deal with shocks of any kind, be they from car bombs or ice storms. In between we are treated to tours of blasted wastelands where American generals built and destroyed replicas of Berlin, glimpses of Las Vegas’s penchant for annihilating its own best-known landmarks, and other riveting tales of the dialectic between nature and the city.
Urban Theory
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Landscape ecology focuses on spatial heterogeneity, or the idea that where things are and where they are in relation to other things can have important consequences for a wide range of phenomena. Landscape ecology integrates humans with natural ecosystems and brings a spatial perspective to such fields as natural resource management, conservation, and urban planning.(...)
Landscape Theory
September 2006, New York / Chichester
Foundation papers in landscape ecology
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Landscape ecology focuses on spatial heterogeneity, or the idea that where things are and where they are in relation to other things can have important consequences for a wide range of phenomena. Landscape ecology integrates humans with natural ecosystems and brings a spatial perspective to such fields as natural resource management, conservation, and urban planning. The thirty-seven papers included in this volume present the origins and development of landscape ecology and encompass a variety of perspectives, approaches, and geographies. The editors begin with articles that illuminate the discipline's diverse scientific foundations, such as L. S. Berg's keystone paper outlining a geoecological analysis based on soil science, physical geography, and geology. Next they include selections exemplifying landscape ecologists' growing awareness of spatial pattern, the different ways they incorporated scale into their work, the progression of landscape ecology from a qualitative to a quantitative discipline, and how concepts from landscape ecology have come to permeate ecological research and influence land-use policy, conservation practices, landscape architecture, and geography. Together these articles provide a solid introduction to what is now widely recognized as an important area of research and application that encourages new ways of thinking about natural and human-dominated ecosystems.
Landscape Theory
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Twenty-five years ago, kister scheithauer gross completed its first brick building, the Institute for Biology in Halle. The replicated used brick of the façade is situated in the city centre in a self-evident way, and stands there today, still untouched by time. This is the starting point for the exhibition, which presents earlier brick buildings by the firm anew, along(...)
Kister Scheithauer Gross. Working title : BRICK
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Twenty-five years ago, kister scheithauer gross completed its first brick building, the Institute for Biology in Halle. The replicated used brick of the façade is situated in the city centre in a self-evident way, and stands there today, still untouched by time. This is the starting point for the exhibition, which presents earlier brick buildings by the firm anew, along with current projects and buildings. Building in brick implies an ability to adapt to a location and its atmosphere as well as social structures. The regional identity and character of cities are often associated with a specific type of brick. At a time of digital production, brick factories today are almost anachronistic places, where elementary work processes with lots of manual work take place and the brick is given its specific sand-coloured, reddish-orange, or sometimes greenish shade through the firing of the minerals in the clay soil. Each stone is thus a unique specimen and as a haptically rich product also helps the architectural project tell its own story. On the basis of filigree paper models set on brick bases, the exhibition presents eight projects by kister scheithauer gross, which has been designing and working with the sustainable and sensual material for a quarter of a century.
Materials and Lighting
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The town of Schlins in Vorarlberg has long been a Mecca for all those with an interest in clay construction. On the steep southern slope, the clay builder Martin Rauch worked together with Zurich architect Roger Boltshauser to erect his new artist’s residence. From its foundation all the way to its fl at roof, it is made entirely of excavated soil from the site on which(...)
Haus Rauch / The Rauch House : a model of avanced clay architecture
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The town of Schlins in Vorarlberg has long been a Mecca for all those with an interest in clay construction. On the steep southern slope, the clay builder Martin Rauch worked together with Zurich architect Roger Boltshauser to erect his new artist’s residence. From its foundation all the way to its fl at roof, it is made entirely of excavated soil from the site on which it is built: the floors and arched ceilings, the plasterwork on ceiling and walls, the washstands, tiles, and stairs – all are made from the single material clay in its various forms. The house is a show house as well as the document of a unique collaboration. At the same time, it is a striking example of how, with the structural and design limitations of this «soft» and massive building technique, a spatially and tectonically adequate design can be achieved – and how an archaic building technique can be used in a contemporary manner. With today’s renewed focus on energetic and ecological consequences, clay construction, with its special ecological, organic, and aesthetic qualities, is again becoming a subject of widespread interest. The structure presented in this book has received national and international awards and represents a milestone in the field.
Architecture Monographs