Paper Example: Sustainability and Material Re-use in Architectural Design

TOC \o "1-3" \h \z \u A. Context of Practice PAGEREF _Toc503737006 \h 4B. Exploration of Themes PAGEREF _Toc503737007 \h 7Theme of Sustainability PAGEREF _Toc503737008 \h 8Theme of material re-use PAGEREF _Toc503737009 \h 10C. Reflective Summary PAGEREF _Toc503737010 \h 17List of figures PAGEREF _Toc503737011 \h 20Figure 1: The Commons Building in Australia PAGEREF _Toc503737012 \h 20Figure 2: Sketches PAGEREF _Toc503737013 \h 20Bibliography PAGEREF _Toc503737014 \h 21

00Table of Contents

TOC \o "1-3" \h \z \u A. Context of Practice PAGEREF _Toc503737006 \h 4B. Exploration of Themes PAGEREF _Toc503737007 \h 7Theme of Sustainability PAGEREF _Toc503737008 \h 8Theme of material re-use PAGEREF _Toc503737009 \h 10C. Reflective Summary PAGEREF _Toc503737010 \h 17List of figures PAGEREF _Toc503737011 \h 20Figure 1: The Commons Building in Australia PAGEREF _Toc503737012 \h 20Figure 2: Sketches PAGEREF _Toc503737013 \h 20Bibliography PAGEREF _Toc503737014 \h 21

A. Context of Practice

The global architectural community is in the middle of the green building revolution where the main focus of architectural design is to enhance sustainability and material re-use as the key themes in addressing negative social and environmental consequences. A common architectural debate at present is the achievement of sustainability in urban architectural designs. The context of practice is an architectural design where there is an exploration of The Commons building in Australia as the case study in examining development spaces, energy, materials and design methods in green building. Experimental spatial practice in contemporary architecture uses the philosophy that architects must take action today to avoid passing down the negative impacts of poor design to future generations (Meeus et al. 2012, p. 35). Therefore, architectural design and planning as the key areas the determine sustainability of a building must conform to doctrines of ecological, economic and social sustainability. In the field of architecture, the outcomes of design blueprint can be challenging to develop and execute unless there are adequate planning and consideration of all themes suitable for a green building. The architecture design, as the main context of practice, explores the theme of sustainability mainly, the essay aims at demonstrating the need to consider site conditions and feasible natural resources to achieve sustainability and efficient use of materials. The Commons as the key architecture under study aids in the demonstration of how architectural design should use materials that reduce the buildings environmental footprint even for energy-intensive architectural processes. The project, therefore, tries to show the sustainability aspect contextualizing and elucidating just some of the few components of the urban building (Arney, 2012). Through the exploration of the making of present-day architecture, it aids in self-reflection among builders and architects regarding how they will comply with the principle of sustainability and efficient use of resources by employing systems in their designs with the capability of harnessing materials reuse and minimum waste.

B. Exploration of Themes

The case study considers Australias building called The Commons, which is one of the most sustainable architectural designs in the country. Breathe Architecture is responsible for the planning and design of the green building which is also a home to a cafe, two studios, and 24 apartments. Social and economic architectural challenges surrounding its design was the need to capitalize on the nearness to the Melbourne central business district and to encourage biking instead of driving. The building has about 65 spaces for bikes and no car parking lot. Since the building is situated along the train line, space is narrow calling for the spatial design to enable the architectures to merge landscape and building architecture as required in the contemporary design specialism. The theme of material re-use is well-factored in the building as there is a recycling of concrete ceiling and timber flow with the added element of sustainability through the utilization of insulated ceiling and thermal mass fans which cancels the need for air conditioning. A row of 46 flower and vegetable boxes on the buildings rooftop enables its occupants to practice gardening. Recyclable timber flows and the use of low VOC painting contributes to overall sustainability. The narrowness of the location due to the train line was a structural limitation solved through spatial design.

Theme of Sustainability

A key aspect of architectural planning and design is the inclusion of the concept of sustainability in structures. According to Korzun et al. (2017, p. 73), renewable materials have long been considered to be sustainable in architecture thus the popularity of the use of building materials such as bamboo. Some of the sustainable materials in modern buildings include sorghum and wheat straw pressed to form panels in buildings. Energy efficiency also contributes to sustainability. According to Simon, Fischbach and Schoder (2013, p. 1) architectural design that focuses on sustainability utilize materials that are readily available within the building to reduce the demand for energy-intensive manufacture or transportation of additional raw materials. Spatial design is necessary for achieving sustainability in that the planning phase utilizes sketch drawings (Figure 2) for explaining the proposed design and detailing preliminary finishes and material selection. At the planning stage, it is possible to expand the sketches to form detailed constructional systems and designs. Economic aspect comes into play during the planning stage in that the sketches provide a blueprint of the site constraints and project budget. As evident in The Commons, the use of computer-generated design of the building assisted in the fusion of sustainability and the economic aspects in architecture by enabling 3D visualization of the structure (Meeus et al. 2012, p. 54).

Theme of material re-use

The consideration of material re-use is important during the design and planning phases of an architecture in an attempt to achieve green-star attributes. The Commons satisfy the requirement of tiling low-impact and recyclable building materials such as milk-based paints, cellulose, and denim which are volatile organic compounds (VOCs). According to Martin et al. (2015, p. 1017), VOCs that are naturally occurring are green products with low intensity hence the suitability of the building. The planning phase of an architecture to achieve efficient on material usage should consider the low-impact handling of the building materials. In the Commons, the rooftop design is such that it accommodates harvesting of gray water to sustain garden beds. Furthermore, its drainage is such that it allows on-site composting of food wastes, a feature that assists in reducing water and sewage usage.

It is evident from The Commons that urban design modeling concept lies at the merge of architecture and planning tradition and methods, its responsiveness, and nature of sustainability and material usage aided by spatial design which engages geography, economics, sociology, politics, and property studies among other disciplines of study. Moreover, as both a process and a product, it incorporates the involvement of architectural components into a built geological surrounding, commencing at the precinct level but not stopping at that point by going further and expanding to have several neighbourhoods, suburbs, towns, and cities on board (Schneekloth 1998, p. 23). In all these environments, the sole purpose is to satisfy all participants needs and desires by turning undifferentiated space into a something beautiful meaningful scene to be through the attribution of local, national, global, cultural, and other (Dino, 2012).

In designing period of a residential building, the risk of failure always juxtaposes certainty both visually and functionally in the creation of bespoke, large, highly observable, and long-lasting structures buildings (Pathak et al. 2017). As the design of Th Commons shows, consideration of sustainability during the planning and design phase of a structure has the benefits of improving the environment. Not much can be done about past endeavor, but planners can certainly mediate the insertion of new among existing facilities. Even so, appraisal of such efforts remains problematic (Dino, 2012). As relevant to the present research, architectural propriety has two senses. The micro one refers to the appropriateness of a buildings design and the eloquence of its embrace of purpose and audiences. According to Rose et al. (2012, p. 79), the macro interpretation is explained simply in that we expect an architect to build in accordance with a sense of place, and not to design his building as many a modern building is designed so that it could be placed just anywhere (Gorbet et al. 2015, p. 51). Design intervention can thus reduce the possibility of adverse outcomes (Gursoy & Ozkar 2015, p. 29). Within the broad context of urban design, this project sought to investigate the treatment of visual appropriateness in planning schemes. The products of architecture are bulky, prominent, and capable of creating externalities. Peoples perceptual and visual capacities can lead to early judgments at least of the form if not also function. Since buildings produce local visual monopolies, design intervention can serve to protect the public interest from private excesses (Masud & Huang 2012, p. 226).

Idreos, Papaemmanouil, and Chaudhuri (2015, p. 277) explain that in order to overcome a lack of prior research into the character of externalities, ways were devised to measure recognition of sustainability appropriateness in current planning schemes. A focus was adopted in residential apartments, representing sizeable architectural products in and around which the population spends a good deal of its time. Based on a structured literature review, the inquiry proposed a well-grounded methodology encompassing.

Figure 1: The Commons Building in Australia

C. Reflective Summary

Hence, in answering the projects research question within the sampled jurisdictions, it emerges that design measures can, to a considerable extent and with varying degrees of force, continue to influence architectural expression within existing built environments so as to achieve visual appropriateness for their inhabitants and visitors. Some parties might, with the benefit of hindsight, contend that these graduated outcomes from the metropolitan core to its peripheries are predictable given the residential pattern of contemporary western cities. Findings from The Commons could indeed reflect a common urban thread in liberal, decentralized market economies and, at the same time, underscore the sometimes overlooked contribution of urban planning in promoting sustainable and quality built environments. The parametric method consumes longer time than conventional ones. Writing a formula is not easy, and the process of troubleshooting often demands formula revision. The discrete method of problem-solving can reduce the inefficient and unpredictable time in writing the formula. (Simon, Fischbach & Schoder 2013, 91). However, the method needs higher skill in logical thinking that demands more time. The simultaneous analysis introduced by this method enabled the designer to monitor changes during the design process, which in turn...