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EPISODE 103 FEATURES ARCHITECT JASON MCLENNAN
What if our buildings weren't just a little bit more energy efficient or decorated with a few extra plants? What if they gave back to the environment instead of taking away from it? Biophilic design is a buzz phrase, and we're on board!
Meet visionary US-based Canadian architect Jason McLennan, founder of the Living Building Challenge and the Living Future Institute, on a mission to “create a world that is socially rich, culturally just and ecologically restorative”.
How might we truly live in harmony with nature? And as Jason puts it: “Create places that are not only lovely but express the love we have for people, for animals and for the environment.” This Episode is all about how we can rethink our built environment so that it’s regenerative, and provides havens for other species too. '
Further listening: Love this? Try Episodes 94 with Joost Bakker, and 22 with Patagonia’s Vincent Stanley. The Episode with Cradle to Cradle’s William McDonough is here.
NOTES
The INTERNATIONAL LIVING FUTURE INSTITUTE is an environmental NGO focused in the built environment. Find the Living Future Institute of Australia here.
REGENERATIVE DESIGN Jason calls it an idea that’s time has come. “We need to move towards solutions that are not just less bad but are actually good,” he says, with a focus on regeneration and bringing life back to the planet. “It’s not enough to recycle or reduce. We have to be agents of positive change.”
LEED or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, is the most widely used green building rating system in the world. Available for virtually all building, community and home project types, LEED provides a framework to create healthy, highly efficient and cost-saving green buildings.
BIOPHILIC Defined by E. O. Wilson as “the innate tendency to focus on life and lifelike processes”, the biophilia hypothesis is the idea that humans have an inherited need to connect to nature and other biotic forms.
The VANDUSEN BOTANICAL GARDEN VISITOR CENTRE in Vancouver was “was inspired by the White Bog Orchid, a small and lovely flower that thrives in streamside and wetland settings across much of Canada. Undulating vegetated roof “petals” seem to float above glass windows and curving walls made from rammed earth and concrete. The petals converge to a central skylight oculus, which washes the space in natural light and facilitates natural ventilation. Land ramps link the roof petals to the ground plane, inviting local fauna to access the habitat.” Read more here.
According to Metropolis: “BIOPHILIC DESIGN seeks to connect our inherent need to affiliate with nature in the modern built environment … [It] recognises that our species has evolved for more than 99% of its history in adaptive response to the natural world, and not to human-created or artificial forces. We became biologically encoded to associate with natural features and processes. Rather than being vestigial – or relevant to a world that no longer exists – this need is thought to remain instrumental to people’s physical and mental health, fitness, and wellbeing.
Since today’s ‘natural habitat’ is largely the built environment, where we now spend 90% of our time, biophilic design seeks to satisfy our innate need to affiliate with nature in modern buildings and cities. Thus, the fundamental goal of biophilic design is to create good habitat for people as biological organisms inhabiting modern structures, landscapes, and communities. “ Read in full here.
Biophilic plant destination - Greenery NYC
“We’ve done a good job of excluding Nature from our lives …We’ve crowded [it] out and sterilised our environments.” - JASON MCLENNAN
DECLARE is McLennan’s nutrition label for the ingredients used in buildings.
JUST is the LFI’s voluntary disclosure tool. It seeks to improve organisations’ social equity and enhance employee engagement. More info here.
RED LIST contains the worst-in-class materials prevalent in the building industry. Says the LFI: “The commonly-used chemicals on the Red List are polluting the environment, bio-accumulating and harming construction and factory workers.” They include things like antimicrobials and creosote as well as more obvious things like asbestos. Find the full list here.
BUCKMINSTER FULLER was an American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor, and futurist. This Wired story sums up why people get obsessed.
The LIVING BUILDING CHALLENGE is a green building certification program and sustainable design framework that “visualises the ideal for the built environment”. It uses the metaphor of a flower because the ideal built environment should function as cleanly and efficiently as a flower.
THE BUILDINGS
Read all about them all here.
The Bullit Centre, Seattle, USA
Te Kura Whare, Tāneatua, New Zealand
The Sustainable Buildings Research Centre (SBRC), Wollongong, Australia
The Brock Environmental Center, Chesapeake Bay, USA
BILL GATES is also obsessed with toilets.
See Jason’s house, Heron Hall…
WHO’S NEXT? The new Burwood Brickworks development (below) near Melbourne, which opens in December is seeking Living Building Challenge accreditation. Imagine a world where all new developments were designed on these principles!
MUSIC is by Montaigne, who sang this special acoustic version of “Because I love You” from her album Glorious Heights, just for us.
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Clare & the Wardrobe Crisis team x