Eric Hunting: Shelter - Literature

The Green House

Thu, 23 Nov 2006 02:17:41 GMT

Sustainable archiecture has long been stereotyped by its typical choice of low-tech materials, energy-efficiency utilitarianism, and predominate organic design themes, driving some designers away from the field because of what they percieve as far too limited a potential design repertoire. But for some time a different branch of sustainable design, sometimes referred to as Eco-Tech, has been emerging among the community of New Modernists, picking up a trail first blazed by the likes of Buckminster Fuller. This alternative approach to sustainability is based on a very different paradigm where the way a building performs as a system and a consumer or producer of energy and other resources is far more important to its ultimate sustainability than the materials it's made out of. This is an approach which embraces new technology rather than turning away from it, seeing its smarter, more responsible, use as a path to a greener future. Eco-Tech is a movement that has developed mostly among designers in Europe, Asia, and Australia, where Modernism in general has seen less cultural resistance than in America. In the US the theory of Eco-Tech has been the province primarily of a few futurist writers and alternative energy tinkerers. But there are some designers here -still mostly Modernists- now cluing in to this movement as a means to expanding the sustainable design repertoire. With The Green House we get a nice introduction to this very different take on sustainability through a large selection of sample buildings from around the world. Predominately Modernist and European, these examples offers an intriguing look at how new technology is affording some very radical design a level of sustainability that even earth and straw bale would be hard pressed to match. Perhaps one of the most dramatic examples in this book is the R128 house designed by Werner Sobek in Stuttgart Germany. Here we see the ultimate sustainability non-sequitur; the Modernist metal framed glass box which -in the dead cold of a German winter- produces more energy than it consumes! There is also a nod to the issue of housing toxicity among the examples in this book. While few of these homes might qualify as truly non-toxic housing, and few could qualify as 'affordable' by any fancifully creative accountant's interpretation of the word, there are some interesting elements in some of these homes that could well apply to any non-toxic home design, though often due to the basic nature of Modernist Minimalism to employ materials in their natural state rather than adultrate them with the usual finishings. One excellent example of this is the Tuscon Mountain House by designer Rick Joy. Here is a home design which, though probably never actively attempting low toxicity, has nontheless probably come as clost being low toxic as any home specifically designed for it, simply as a consequence of its design aesthetic and Modernst preference for simple spaces and unadulterated materials. Altogether, this book is an excellent look at sustainability from a very different point of vie and should open some eyes to possibilities never imagined before.

EcoNest - Creating Sustainable Sancuaries of Clay, Straw, and Timber

Tue, 13 Jun 2006 01:48:30 GMT

This recent book by Paula Baker-Laporte and Robert Laporte details these architects' current focus of work, the 'EcoNest' sustainable and non-toxic cottage based on their revival and improvement of the clay, straw, and post & beam 'wattle and daub' construction techniques common to traditional archiecture of Europe and Japan. Paula Baker-Laporte is one of US's few non-toxic housing specialist archiects and has been known largely for her work in the US Southwest using pumicecrete construction. She is also author of the book Prescriptions for a Healthy House, one of the important textbooks and sourcebooks for non-toxic housing. (mentioned previously on this site) With EcoNest the Laportes present a detailed and lavishly photographed introduction to a method of construction and style of design that are not only sustainable and non-toxic but also exceptionally graceful and comforting in its organic aesthetic. More strongly inspired by the Japanese tradition of this construction method than by the European tradition, the homes showcased in this book seamlessly blend the sensibilities of traditional Japanese homes with those of contemporary sustainable design as well as the traditions of Southwestern design. Quite often I have observed that there is an interesting complimentary aspect to both Asian styles of design and indigenous Pueblo design which seems rooted in their mutual minimalism and veneration for organic materials. The few but growing number of designers devoted to what I call the 'organic by composition' aesthetic seem to have noticed this as well and in the more contemporary of sustainable home designs we often see hints of an Asian influence. But in these showcase EcoNest homes the Laportes' offer the most sophisticated expression of this to date. There is no mere mimicry and transplanting of the stylistic artifacts of Asian design -no sense of the 'Mikado stage set' that many attempts to employ Asian influence in contemporary design are reduced to- but rather a true integration of essential aesthetic in combination with the integration of fabrication technique, the result being a comfortable new pragmatic design sensibility well adapted to the particular mix of environments these homes have been placed in. Indeed, 'comfort' rather than 'luxury' seems to be the essence of these homes. Unfortunately, those looking to this book for a detailed system of instructions for this clay and straw building technique and the design of homes based on it will be disappointed. This book is quite the light read and ultimately comes across as a very elaborate sales brochure for the Laportes' EcoNest-specific design practice. But then, these homes -as much as the Laportes give lip-service to their economy- are dependent on very skill and labor intensive techniques. These are homes crafted like art objects and it is highly unlikely that they could be produced by mainstream contract labor, be affordable to the mainstream homeowner, or be possible for the owner-builder without exceptional talent. Even as modest in size as they are, I doubt they could be produced within half a million dollars in the US at current rates for this sort of skill and labor. Thus, as beautiful as they are, they fail to offer any realistic solution to the needs of the vast majority of people with a practical need for non-toxic housing -a complaint I have had with other work by the Laportes' and the rest of the very small community of non-toxic housing designers. Still, there is no question that these homes offer something very profound to the emerging culture of sustainable home design. There are few better demonstrations of the essence of the organic aesthetic.

Who Killed The Electric Car?

Mon, 12 Jun 2006 21:51:09 GMT

A new movie has appeared recently which may be of particular interest to those concerned about a healthier habitat. Who Killed The Electric Car? is a documentary concerning the curious appearance and disappearance of the GM EV1, one of the most advanced and eminently practical of all electric cars produced by American auto makers. Having long been in need of lower-toxic transportation as well as being keen on the technology for environmental and aesthetic reasons, I have long wondered about what happened to this extremely promising high-tech vehicle which supposedly cost a billion to develop and performed outstandingly but was given only a half-assed marketing effort by its manufacturer, offered only by lease through a few Saturn dealers, and quickly obsolesced without explanation, countless new units being sent for destruction. GM is not the only US company to have pulled this same peculiar stunt. Around the year 2000 Ford Corp. briefly hyped their own electric car program called Think based on a compact car developed by a Norwegian company with a form-factor similar to today's popular 'Smart' cars. The storied development of the car was even featured in a science and technology documentary. Reports at the time were that the company had imported some large quantity of the vehicles but their marketing consisted almost entirely of a single web site which targeted a youth market with a style of graphics that parroted the ad design style of Apple Computer. Test marketed in a couple of dealerships given no education about it, it was quickly deemed a 'failure' and this massive number of vehicles were sent to the shredders just like the EV1. I actually wrote to Ford Corp. when I learned of this impending atrocity and begged to be donated two of the vehicles for my own use as non-toxic transportation. (one to drive, one to store for replacement parts) Of course, this request was denied with the usual executive excuse of 'corporate policy'. I could just imagine the soul-less middle-management drones giggling over my naivety. I wonder if this film will feature this car's story as well, though I suppose I'll have to wait until it's available on DVD to find out. (movie theaters being intolerable due to their chronically toxic interiors and perfumed patrons) Today the only immediate hope of low-toxic transportation is the MDI Air Car developed in France. It functions identically to an electric car, only it uses compressed air to store energy resulting in a much lighter vehicle and much lower cost. It's engine, developed by a Formula 1 racing legend- is even lubricated with vegetable oils. But the company's plans to establish a manufacturing plant for it in New York state apparently fizzled-out after political tensions arose between Europe and the US and right-wing politicians started their childish 'Freedom Fries' campaign. Yet another opportunity squandered by hubris...

Cohousing

Tue, 30 Aug 2005 23:03:20 GMT

Cohousing - Cohousing - A Contemporary Approach to Housing Ourselves - Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett Having read much of late on the subject of cohousing, this book appears to be one of the most definitive as an introduction to the concept and an overview of cohousing history. It begins with a look at cohousing in Denmark where the movement for this style of living seems to have originated and we are offered a collection of community examples detailing both the general architecture and the development history with emphasis on the personal experiences of the people setting up and living in these communities. Later, the book moves on to American examples which illustrate some interesting differences. Americans seem to have a much greater difficulty in comprehending and adapting to the cohousing paradigm and with working together as a group, apparently because of our culture's focus on the autonomy of the nuclear family -even though such autonomy is a very recent cultural invention. There is also more reluctance in America to explore novel architecture. So while in Denmark we see cohousing communities based on glass covered streets and large adapted factory buildings, here most -with the one exception of an urban based 'loft' style conversion- cohousing projects use a style of architecture virtually indistinguishable from conventional suburbs except for the spacing of homes and the lack of cars. Of course, this perspective may be due to the age of the text as this author is aware of a number of American cohousing projects which have employed much more sophisticated architecture and community layouts closer to the Danish model. This book is an important read for anyone thinking seriously and rationally about the future and the prospects of family life in it. As we now depart the age of cheap fuel, suburbs as they have existed to date are becoming increasingly unsustainable. And that's not in an environmental sense but rather in terms of simple domestic practicality. The suburbs of today, because of their ad-hoc dispersed organization and disconnection from venues of work and commerce, are only livable in an economy of cheap transportation. Take that away and they are no more practical for the average middle-class family than a cabin in the wilderness. Meanwhile, cities face a similar crisis as their similarly ad-hoc organization is similarly dependent upon cheap energy to compensate for their inefficiency. They will likewise become unlivable as their antiquated infrastructures fail under the strain of rising costs. The obvious solution -as many futurists have been predicting since the 1960s- is a reinvention of the village, the creation of more self-contained micro-urban environments where reliance on the automobile is minimized or eliminated and transportation among key subsistence resources is confined to a few efficient routes. Those in the cohousing communities are already ahead of the curve in adapting to the practical realities of this new age. They are living the lifestyle we may all soon be compelled to share, and from the looks of it, we may be quite pleasantly surprised. This author has often considered the possibility of cohousing as a means to meet the steadily growing need for non-toxic MCS patient housing, allowing the possibility of MCS patients on fixed disability incomes to pool resources to reduce housing costs. This has been tried in the past but with mixed results -HUD's own attempts at this in California becoming something of a fiasco. There are complications with this notion which have been difficult to overcome. First, in the experience of most cohousing communities, savings on the usual cost of housing has only been realized with government subsidy or by the even more difficult prospect of large volumes of sweat equity from prospective residents. Cohousing projects typically have a hard time keeping budgets low because participating families often customize their individual home designs too much and they must work with architects whose 'custom' designs are an excuse for contractors to charge more than usual. Consequently, most current people adopting cohousing do so for the lifestyle, not for economy. MCS patients, of course, are familiar with a similar situation, having to spend much more on homes to meet their needs because contractors normally overcharge for anything which is new, different, or 'custom'. This has compelled some people to go one step beyond cohousing into cohabitation; multiple people sharing a common house. This is very tricky to do if MCS patient tolerances are not complimentary. Which brings us to the second key complication with this idea; MCS patients all have different tolerances and sensitivities and these sensitivities relate to quality of life. The average person's quality of life is often related to the use of a lot of products which often rely on chemicals in some form and may have latent toxicity or simply a latent odor people normally aren't aware of. When someone succumbs to MCS they are compelled to give up a lot of things they used to casually use everyday because they've become intolerable; soaps and cleaners, perfumes, cosmetics, hair sprays, synthetic fiber clothing or bedding, types of food, types of appliances, books, magazines, newspapers, the list goes on forever. This sacrifice incurs a lot of change in lifestyle and often means a great loss in quality of life. This has broken up families or forced MCS suffers to live in leper-like seclusion from their families as it becomes very difficult for healthy family members to give up these things for the sake of another -especially in the contemporary American culture where marriage and the nuclear family are held together by increasingly tenuous bonds. Since every MCS patient tends to have different tolerances, this translates to a different spectrum of industrial goods they can or can't use or have near them and thus a different level of quality of life. None will sacrifice any more than their tolerance limits dictate. The cost in quality of life is too high. This also means different kinds of architecture as one type of 'healthy home' composition will not suit all MCS patients even if they are ostensibly fully non-toxic. For example, one can use all natural chemical free lumber to make a non-toxic home but some of that lumber may be aromatic wood species which some MCS patients cannot stand the slightest odor of. Put two MCS patients together in the same house and they must negotiate with each other over most every detail of the goods and products they use everyday in order to work out a mutually acceptable level of quality of life relative to their individual tolerances. This makes it very difficult to put large groups of MCS patients together in a closely-spaced community. Indeed, some planned MCS communities have specified minimum parcels of over 10 acres per home just to minimize the potential drift from pollution from one home to the next. All this would seem to suggest that MCS cohousing is fundamentally infeasible or impossible. But it may be that, in the emerging economic reality of the 21st century, none but the very rich will even have the option of living outside of a cohousing situation. So is there any way to actually make MCS cohousing work? Through my own research on this, I suspect that the answer lies in seeking the absolute maximum in non-toxicity of habitat with the least compromise in quality of life by seeking out and cultivating the maximum number of chemical-free alternatives to the goods quality of life depends on. In other words, you eliminate the sacrifice in quality of life by eliminating the need to sacrifice those goods when those goods can be made -pretty much the same or better- in a chemical free form. As I've learned in my research of non-toxic housing, it is simply society's ignorance of and indifference to the alternatives which tends to drive the MCS patient to homelessness. Even MCS specialist physicians know virtually nothing about non-toxic housing or non-toxic alternative goods and do little research into that because they -foolishly in my opinion- don't think that's part of their job. They just tell their patents to stay away from stuff that makes them sick and if those patients can't find the alternatives on their own they can -in our better living through chemistry culture- quickly be left with nothing they can live with! But there are a lot of alternatives and their number is growing steadily and so, with careful and comprehensive planning and the cultivation of a community not just as housing but as a marketplace and source for these alternative products, it may be possible to make MCS cohousing work. Even this, though, will not be a complete solution. At best it can only be a 'one size fits most' option. And because of the first complication, without government support it probably would not be cheap. But it would still be better than what the housing market has to offer today.

How To Survive Without A Salary

Wed, 13 Jul 2005 23:23:47 GMT

The unfortunately named How To Survive Without A Salary by Charles Long is a book that should be required reading in every school on the planet Earth, and at the very least required reading for every disabled person who must cope with the limitations of a fixed income. I say 'unfortunately named' because this title implies to many people that it is just another of the innumerable get-rich-quick scam books flooding the market today. Nothing could be further from the truth, however, as this book is really about how to avoid the negative effects of the biggest scam there is; the contemporary consumer culture. How To Survive Without A Salary is a guide to a frugal and efficient way of living that seeks to make the most of every dollar and every minute and a reality check on the way consumerism exploits our ignorance, laziness, and compulsive nature. While the lifestyle it describes is definitely not practical for all, the insight, tips, and advice it offers is of very practical use to just about everyone. This author has lost copies of this book lending them to acquaintances. People who borrow it often find it too useful to return...

The New Natural House Book and The Natural House Catalog

Wed, 13 Jul 2005 22:59:17 GMT

Both of these books are by David Pearson and I include them together as they deserve to be treated as a set. The New Natural House Book is essentially an overview of the issue of housing health and common means of abatement and non-toxic home design. It does not get into much technical detail, focusing instead on a discussion of healthy materials and extensively photographed examples of housing. The book goes far to create a visual impression suggesting the true squalor in the non-healthy homes common to American suburbs. Many of the homes featured here were also featured in the Sydney and Joan Baggs book The Healthy House. The Natural House Catalog was originally written as a companion to the earlier edition of The Natural House Book and features an extensive catalog of sources for non-toxic and natural building materials and home products. It was long this author's chief sourcebook for non-toxic products. Some of this material may now be incorporated into the newer edition and there has been a great expansion in the availability of non-toxic products as public awareness has grown. This book definitely deserves a new edition of its own.

The Healthy House

Wed, 13 Jul 2005 22:39:27 GMT

One of the first books this author found specific to the subject of non-toxic housing The Healthy House remains an excellent introduction to the subject. Written by Australians Sydney and Joan Baggs, The Healthy House is a light overview of a broad selection of building techniques and materials mixing both a technical or clinical notion of house healthfulness or 'baubiologie' with a more aesthetic or 'spiritual' sensibility more typical of organic designers as well as the usual strong doze of eco-sensibility common to texts on sustainable architecture. The book is also interesting in that it features a number of eco-village projects -though alas some of these have already become defunct before being built. Altogether, a good introduction to the subject of low toxic architecture, though with few examples from the US.

Prescriptions for a Healthy House

Wed, 13 Jul 2005 22:22:48 GMT

Written by New Mexico architect Paula Baker-Laporte, Prescriptions for a Healthy House is an in-depth guide to non-toxic home construction, materials, and products intended to meet the needs of both prospectic home buyers and the people involved in building them. The book is very useful as a sourcebook for techniques and products. There are a number of interesting products that I have not seen noted elsewhere, such as the enzyme based earth treatments used as a non-toxic alternative to asphalt for driveway construction. Baker-Laporte favors the use of pumicecrete construction for non-toxic housing as well as it's logical pueblo style of design. She has frequently used this material and it features in homes she's designed for The Commons cohousing community in Santa Fe. However, she also employs a contemporary version of wattle and daub construction for a line of homes she calls EcoNests which are not noted in this book. Altogether a very useful sourcebook and guide to the issues and subject of healthy housing but without very specific information on building techique.

Healthy House Building for the New Millennium

Wed, 13 Jul 2005 21:59:54 GMT

One of the more recent healthy architecture books this author has read, Healthy House Building for the New Millennium by John Bower details the full construction process for a model non-toxic home based on a unique approach. Bower Advocates the use of a method called ADA or Airtight Drywall Approach along with a super-insulated double-wall system which allows fairly conventional building materials to be employed for non-toxic housing including that specific to the needs of people with environmental sensitivity. The model Healthy House featured in the book is built using light gauge steel framing fiberglass batt insulation, and conventional drywall products. Using careful drywall finishing techniques, an airtight enclosure is created. This would normally present a number of potential problems for indoor air quality but these have been overcome by virtue of the ADA approach which locks out the latent contaminants in the wall materials and by careful choice of low-toxic interior finishing products and furnishings. The approach is similar to the abatement techniques some healthy home contractors have employed to make existing homes more tolerable for MCS patients. My only concern with it is that Bower presumes a much higher degree of skill and care than is probably typical of the average building contractor. While the model Healthy House is cost-effective, extremely energy efficient, and has apparently worked well for sensitive individuals, it seems unlikely that the majority of contractors would be able to duplicate the skill and diligence Bower himself has demonstrated. So duplication of this home design seems challenging. Bower's other texts on the healthy housing subject, offered through the Healthy Housing Institute and via Amazon.com, look very promising and I hope to review them in the future.