REI Round Rock Second Gen Green Store To Use 48% Less Energy

by Preston Koerner

Mounting on the green building success of their previous stores, including the green Boulder REI we wrote about previously, REI today opens the doors to its second generation of green prototype store in Round Rock, Texas. The Texas store is projected to consume 48% less energy than a typical store and generate a portion of its power from a solar panel installation, building integrated photovoltaics, and a solar hot water system. After that, Round Rock will rely on Solatubes to displace a portion of articifial lighting and the purchase of green power generated from biomass digesters.

This second gen green store was built with highly efficient building insulation, efficient mechanical equipment and controls, a cool roof designed to reflect the sun’s heat, and water-efficient plumbing that reduces water usage by 30 percent.

Designed in partnership with Gensler, Round Rock incorporates extensive sustainable and recycled materials, including sunflower seed husks and recycled tennis shoes. It’s the second company store to be built under the USGBC’s LEED Retail pilot program. After studying both the Boulder and this store, REI will use the research for a third prototype and for application in other stores nationwide.

Research and Development centre in Istanbul

Design for sustainable Research and Development centre
Located on the outskirts of Istanbul in the Tübitak Marmara Research Center Zone, this building serves as the research & development and technological centre for a private telecommunications company. Taking the site context, views and orientation into consideration the building offers a single storey entry, rising to four storeys on the office side. Owing to the fact that it is the technological center, the building exhibits the highest technological standards. Special attention has been given in the building’s design to ensure a low energy, ecologically friendly, sustainable outcome was achieved

School of Art Singapore

This amazing architecture is situated in Singapore at the School of Art, Design and Media at Nanyang Technological University. It's a 5 story facility with an all glass facade to provide a high performance building envelope that reduces solar gain and heat load while allowing the benefits of natural views and daylight into creative spaces.Finishes are intentionally raw to act as a backdrop for the art, media and design projects. Concrete walls and columns, cement-sand screeded floors, timber railings and a neutral palette define the interior spaces which vary in shape and size. This amazing design seems to offer a new experience at every elevation or perspective fulfilling the intent that a school for art should inspire creativity.

Mile High Eco Tower

This is a concept tower by Popular Architecture envisioned for Tower Hamlets in East London. The design is a reaction, at least in part, to sprawl issues. London is expected to need housing for 100,000 new people per year until 2016, and currently, most of housing that's being built is low-density projects in commuter towns. Popular Architecture' s Super Tower could house up to about 100,000 people with a seriously low site requirement (considering the number of people within the structure).

The 1,500 meter tall tower would have about 500 floors. You'd find floors or sections for needs such as a university, farmer's market, pubs, a town hall, sky gardens, etc. Anything and everything would be in the building. There's even a fire station on the 419th floor! Which raises the question: what do you do if there is a fire above or below the 419th floor?

If built, Popular Architecture' s concept would be three times larger than anything in London. Construction would occur in 20-floor phases, with the final height of 1,500 meters subject to completion of the entire phased construction program.I must admit, however, when I first saw this skyscraper design, I thought to myself, maybe mile high is too tall. I mean, do we reach a point where there is a diminishing margin of returns in terms of ecological, financial, or community benefits? There must be a highway system of elevators for all the back and forth needs of 100,000 people. I can't even comprehend the extent of the safety issues that might be presented as well. So, how on earth do you contain all that in one building?

Ballard Library

(image via: Woodschool)

Seattle has a thing for cool libraries, it seems. The Ballard Library is a public project that stresses green design features without compromising convenience and accessibility for book readers.

(image via: Greenroofs.org)

Built in 2005 at a cost of just under $11 million, the Ballard Library features an innovative “green roof” consisting of native grasses and sedums planted 4 to 6 inches deep in a custom growing medium topped with a biodegradable coconut fiber mat.

Consortium Library

The Consortium Library at the University of Alaska Anchorage is designed to take the heat off students sitting next to its windows. Yes, even in Alaska! The washtub shape reflects direct sunlight downward while still admitting ambient light.

ECO•LABORATORY: Seattle’s Exemplary Eco Community

The Eco•Laboratory is an exemplary green complex designed around a vibrant community garden In Seattle’s Belltown neighborhood. Conceived by Weber Thompson, the project recently won the Natural Design Talent Competition at Greenbuild. The innovative design focuses upon energy systems, natural ventilation, community aspects, renewable energy, and indoor air quality, resulting in a spectacular example of what green building is about - interdisciplinary teams designing living buildings.Situated on an infill lot in downtown Seattle, the Eco•Laboratory will house a neighborhood market, residential, office space, vocational training center and a sustainability education center. The project is planned for a 7,200 sq ft plot of land known as the P-Patch, and the development offers local residents plots of land for gardening and features three historic cottages that house local writers-in-residenc e. The goal was to not only make the space more usable for the community, but also to make it financially viable. The designers of the Eco•Laboratory concentrated on the six petals of the Natural Living Building Challenge in order to create this design.

Site:
The project incorporates the current buildings and community aspect into a more functional space that benefits a greater number of local residents. Additionally, since the community garden is so important, the design team highlighted the outdoor landscape and extended it into the building with indoor vegetation.
Materials:
The designers sought to minimize the introduction of new materials while carefully considering the resources required. All demolition waste is used on-site during construction. Concrete walls are composed of a fiber-optic aggregate that helps reveal the systems within the building and pulls light into interior spaces. Additionally, the main living modules in the building are composed of repurposed shipping containers.

Energy:
The project makes excellent use of both passive and active systems to reduce energy consumption. The passive ventilation system uses Earth Tubes to pull outside air in, creating a stack-effect thermal control system. To generate energy, solar, wind, biofuels and hydrogen fuels will be used.Indoor Quality of LIfe:
The Eco Laboratory promotes healthy indoors, and brings nature inside. Again, the Earth Tubes play a huge role in natural ventilation, while occupants have direct control over air flow, and lighting. Solar passive design promotes the stack effect and natural lighting. Vegetation, both indoors and in the gardens, enhances occupants’ indoor environmental quality and health.

Water:
Conservation of water is a very important aspect of this project. Water is collected through impervious surfaces and sent through a living machine filtration system, which converts black and gray water to usable resources. This water is used for building’s residents, indoor vegetation and outdoor gardens.

Beauty & Inspiration:
The structure and design are definitely aesthetically pleasing, but as the design team says: “Beauty and Inspiration are not only found in aesthetic form, but in the aesthetics of performance, through the experience of place and lasting value for visitors and residents, with the satisfaction of a site’s potential brought to fruition.”

A Low Impact Woodland Home

The house was built with maximum regard for the environment and by reciprocation gives a unique opportunity to live close to nature. Building from natural materials does away with producers profits and the cocktail of carcinogenic poisons that fill most modern buildings.
(see full article: simondale house

Rødovre Tower

Rødovre, an independent municipality of Denmark, was looking for a new residential tower and MVRDV, with co-architect ADEPT, rose to the challenge. On Monday, it was announced that their “Sky Village” concept won a design challenge to create the next Rødovre skyscraper. The 116 meter (~381 foot) tower will feature apartments, retail, offices, an hotel, as well as a public park and plaza. The architects’ contemporary design is based on a flexible grid of boxes, or “pixels,” which are ~646 square feet each and arranged around the building’s central core.
Rødovre Skyscraper was designed with sustainable features in mind, such as a greywater circuit, use of 40% recycled concrete in the foundation, and energy producing devices in the facade. It’ll also follow Danish environmental standards and implement various green technologies to meet those standards.
The bottom of the tower is slim to make room for the plaza, retail, and restaurants. As you move up the building, the residential units jut out to the north and create open spaces for sky gardens. The top portion of the building is reserved for the hotel where guests enjoy views of the center of Copenhagen.
Because the building is built in pixels, it can be modified to conform to market and economic realities (see model above). Barring any of those type of changes, however, the initial plans call for 10,500 sf retail, 170,000 sf offices, 39,300 sf housing, 21,500 sf hotel, and a basement of 146,000 sf containing parking and storage.

Masdar Headquarters

MASDAR HEADQUARTERS
MASDAR CITY, ABU DHABI, UAE

Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture has won an international competition to design the Masdar Headquarters, the first building in the zero waste, zero carbon emission Masdar City outside of Abu Dhabi in United Arab Emirates. The Masdar Headquarters will be the first mixed-use positive energy building in the world. AS+GG worked with MEP engineers Environmental Systems Design and structural engineers Thornton Tomasetti on the design.

Mona Vale House by Choi Ropiha

Architects: Choi Ropiha

Location: Mona Vale, NSW, Australia
Client: Graeme Jessup & Barbara Elkan
Environmental Systems: Graeme Jessup
Landscape: ExParrot
Engineering: Simpson Design Associates - Northrop Engineers
Construction: Graybuilt
Photographs: Brett Boardman

The client for the project has a long standing interest in building sustainability developed through working at the Sustainable Energy Development Authority, a government agency in sustainability.

With this interest in mind, the client approached Choi Ropiha to design a house that would demonstrate and test a number of active and passive sustainable initiatives whilst accommodating a contemporary coastal lifestyle.

The project is sited on the south side of Mona Vale Headland and has expansive views over Mona Vale Beach to the south. This south facing aspect and the narrow site proportions combine to limit the passive design potential and accordingly establish the key design challenge for the project.

Our response orients the house toward the view to the south, but opens up the roof at the centre of the house with a large north-facing skylight to admit winter sun to the south facing living areas and to trap and hold the warmth of the winter sun using the thermal mass of the structure.

The building is of reverse veneer construction. It utilizes low embodied energy and low thermal mass timber cladding to the outside and heavier thermal mass of concrete and blockwork to the inside.

The house is able to be ‘zoned’ to 3 separate areas; the sunroom at the back, the bedroom and hallway, and the living area to the front. This assists in the retention of heat in the winter months.

Cross ventilation is carefully considered through the whole house. The front living area ventilates through a series of louvres in a bank of high level clerestory. The bedrooms also have cross ventilation via fanlight windows above doors.

Other sustainability measures include a 15,000 L rainwater storage tank combined with grey water recycling to minimise water usage, the use of evacuated tubes for in floor hydronic heating and hot water supply, and photovoltaic solar panels to provide electricity back to the grid.

The house is a ‘test-bed’ for these and other sustainability initiatives and the performance of these will be measured after occupancy.

Green Machine for Living

Joel Sanders completes eco-friendly NYC penthouse

This Noho loft for real estate developer Matthew Blesso offers a fresh take on green architecture, demonstrating that you don’t have to forgo high style in the interest of saving the planet.

Designed by New York architect Joel Sanders with associate architect Andrea Steele and landscape designer, Balmori Associates, the design of this 3200 sq ft loft is predicated on the notion that if you merge building and landscape, by bringing nature in and pushing living space to the outdoors, unexpected things can happen.

The loft’s interior is awash in lush vegetation, sustainable woods and natural fibers. Exterior wood decking and plants flow into the heart of the penthouse forming a “planted core” that separates the private and public realms. A glass wall separates the bathroom from the planted zone, allowing the owner to bathe surrounded by vegetation. This “living wall” links the interior to the roof. An open staircase provides access to a rooftop garden planted with grasses and sedum, which has been transformed into a veritable “living” room furnished with a mini-kitchen, a large movie screen, and an outdoor shower surrounded by lush vegetation.

The Eyelid House

Turning this tight and difficult inner city site into a home for a family of five is an important contribution to contemporary and sustainable design practice, where issues of energy efficiency and waste loom large in society.

The starting point for this project was a typical single fronted Victorian terrace, pokey and dark. Transforming it into a generous, light-filled open plan, three-bedroom, two-bathroom house was the challenge.

An important aspect of the design is how it responds to the difficult site conditions, in particular:

• The heritage overlay

• A super-tight site with restricted access

• A domineering three storey apartment block on one side

• A three storey hotel at the rear

Clearly, the lack of space and privacy were major issues. To resolve them, a key feature of the design is the roof form of the extension. Its shape has been manipulated like an eyelid, to screen off the three-storey neighbouring giant, and to provide shade and weather protection to the rear glass façade. The unusual internal spaces that result are emphasised with tessellated plywood panelling and translucent materials.

Program and Client Needs

The clients’ lack of pretension and relaxed lifestyle meant that a pristine white box with designer furniture was not something that would work for them. With young children, they wanted spaces to be informal, warm and functional. The design used a layering of ideas to respond to the brief, but mainly the result was achieved by:

• Stitching the original part of the house to the new with a smooth flowing transition that maximised the available space

• Combining rough and smooth materials with random and ordered elements for informality and definition of spaces

• Creating a sense of the familiar by imbuing the work with the clients’ memories of special places, for example, memories of a family house in the country with its great, functional kitchen, and memories of a sister’s house at Byron Bay

• Incorporating decorative elements, including contemporary designs for stained glass and routed ply screens, that complement the collection of old Turkish rugs and rustic furniture

The resultant design is contemporary, but one that simultaneously creates an ambiance of romance and the rustic.

Sustainability and Cost effectiveness

Generally energy usage is reduced by passive design features, including:

• Deep roof overhangs

• Fenestrations that minimise heat gain during summer and facilitate natural cooling and ventilation with cross-breezes

• Gas boosted solar hot water and gas heating

• Timbers and veneers from renewable forests

• The option to collect water from the old roof of the house

• Toilets and shower heads that have water saving functions

The cost effectiveness results from:

• Keeping the palette of materials consistent

• Using Australian made products

• Repeating wall and ceiling panelling details with standard colours

• Maximising energy efficiency and minimising the use of air conditioning

• Using mid-range fittings and fixtures from a single supplier (Reece)

Menzis Office Building

The new construction for the Menzis health insurance company is situated on the edge of the Europapark urban expansion of the city of Groningen. At city scale level, the construction expresses its iconographic character toward the urban circular and the A7 motorway, the Europaweg. At ground floor level, the street alignment is determinated by the Europapark, where the building, as it rises, gradually leans over into the street space.

The 12-storey building is divided into three identical prismatic segments, rotatred 90º in relation to each other. With dimensions of 43 x 43 m, the segment is characterized by functional yet aesthetic compactness. Each segment contains four storeys, intersected vertically by an atrium. As a consequence, a spiral of atria is generated, forming an internal response to the dynamic exterior.

The foot accommodates the public functions, which are orientated toward the atrium and include service desks, an insurance shop and a healthcare service center. A doctor’s room and several consulting rooms are situated in themore private area. A practical system of partitioning divides the third and fourth floors into meeting rooms, a library, training areas, an auditorium, and a restaurant. The restaurant area can also be deployed flexibly as extra meeting space if required. The spacious staircase, which allow easy public flow though the atrium to the restaurant and meeting centre above, offer an unimpeded view of both the inner area and the water of the Winschoterdiep (canal).

The middle and upper segments are generic. The specific presence of the atrium, which allows the incidence of daylight into the building, contrasts with the neutral character of each storey. The atrium divides each storey into a series of working areas with distinct qualities: peripheral or secluded, light or well-shaded, open or closed. The variation in spatial conditions enables the application of diverse office concepts, geared to the different work processes within Menzis, such as the call center, administrative functions, and stuff functions. The atrium stairs facilitate informal contact between the floors. In combination with the use of natural materials, the magnolia garden around the building with its diverse terraces, water features and illuminations, contributes to creating a pleasant and relaxed ambience.

The Floating Aerohotel

The Floating Aerohotel: A Modern Aquatecture Marvel
As fears of global warming induced population displacement are steadily realized, the allure of waterborne aquatecture becomes more and more enticing. Designed by Alexander Asadov, this incredible floating Aerohotel features a lighter-than- air aesthetic that sits serenely atop an elegant system of supports. Conceived as an elevated aquatic structure replete with hanging gardens, the space-age floating island preserves the entire extent of the ecosystem beneath it, contrasting with man-made islands that disrupt their immediate environment with tons of gravel fill.

Asadov’s Aerohotel consists of a 200 meter wide circular hub lofted by an interlacing network of supports anchored by three arms that stretch to the bottom of its site. The structure’s body will contain cafés, restaurants, and winter gardens in addition to a hotel. The Aerohotel can be installed in any body of water, and the plans include docking arrangements for boats as well as a landing strip for a zeppelin - how slick is that?

Asadov Architectural Studio states that one of the benefits of the floating island is that it has “significantly less costs for construction against the gravel works. At this almost all the basin area under the construction is still untouched, thus improving the project’s ecological value.” If the current tides of global warming aren’t stemmed, we’ll certainly be looking towards more floating architectural solutions such as this.

+ A.Asadov Architectural Studio

Via World Architecture News

Solar Building

The Devonshire Building is a very green building, that automatically opens and closes banks of shades on it's south facing façade. The "intelligent" system tracks the amount of sunlight entering the windows, and takes into account the time of day and season. The key architectural aim was to design a building that would incorporate as much natural daylight as physically possible. The blinds help manage overheating, and they are backed up by a geothermal cooling system.. To top it all off, the building has solar modules on it's roof that generate 25 kW of power.
The building's large roof area also allowed the construction of a rainwater harvest system. The rain is collected via a symphonic rainwater system and then fed into a 20,000 liter underground tank. If the rainwater tank overfills, it overflows to a 40,000 liter geothermal tank to replenish the water for a heat sink that acts as a cooling source for the building and services' systems.
The Devonshire Building was designed by the Dewjoc architecture firm. It is home to the Institute for Research and Sustainability at the University of Newcastle.

Budapest City Hall

Erick van Egeraat mixed use programme selected

Dutch architect Erick van Egeraat has won the international competition to design the City Hall in the centre of Budapest. From a field of 18 participants, an international professional jury selected his proposal, which combines restoration of the existing large 18th century baroque building and new, futuristic wings to create a contemporary Main Square.

In accordance with the objectives of the competition, this new City Hall, with its open courtyards and flexibility of use, will reflect transparency and democracy, will act as a Forum for the people of Budapest and will attract tourists. It will at once re-introduce pedestrian flow from the boulevard to the river Danube and offer a spectacular view of the city from the platform on top of the entrance gate.

The entire façade reflects the transition between old and new, between closed and open by forming a visual wall along the boulevard. The existing building with its closed, baroque façade is continued in a semi-open structure of organic columns, which in turn open up into a gate-like structure defining the entrance to the new complex.

The Cultural Forum is the most public space within the program and is strategically located in the centre of the complex. It incorporates a multifunctional theatre, which can be used for conference and exhibition purposes. Erick van Egeraat explains :“The Forum acts as the connector between the past and the future, between the historical chapel space and the new building, and between the historic and the contemporary baroque to complement and emphasize each other. At the same time it interlinks all forms of culture, education, entertainment and politics.”

The new City Hall will comprise 118.000 square metres of gross floor area, 40.000 square meters of which will be newly built. The project is set to enter the design phase in January 2009 and start construction in September 2011 to last for 24 months.

The LM Project

Copenhagen, Denmark: Friday 31st October, 2008 It was announced today at a press conference in Copenhagen, Denmark that Steven Holl Architects has won the international design competition “The LM Project”. With a program that connects office towers and civic spaces with a public walkway 65 meters above the harbor, the new design is intended to form an iconic landmark for Copenhagen’s waterfront. The competition was organized by CPH City and Port Development and ATP Ejendomme; the CEO’s for both companies were among the jury members selecting the winner. The Chairman of the Jury is administrative director of the development company City / Harbor and Copenhagen’s former mayor Jens Karmer Mikkelsen.

Mr. Mikkelsen said “The project combines the esthetical, the functional and the business minded. This winning proposal is architecture in high, high class.” The current mayor of Copenhagen, Ritt Bjerregaard, praised the design, saying “With the winning project, we get a great high-rise building, which will bind the city better together and function as a landmark in the harbor.”

Steven Holl Architects’ design for the dramatic new harbor entrance to the great city of Copenhagen is based on a concept of two towers carrying two bridges at two orientations all connecting back to the unique aspects of the site’s history. The Langenlinie site, a berth for ocean ships for decades, is expressed in the Langenlinie tower with geometry taken from the site’s shape. A prow-like public deck thrusts out to the sea horizon. This deck is the level of public entry to the bridge elevators and has public amenities such as cafes and galleries. It can be reached by a wide public stair as well as escalators. The Marmormolen tower connects back to the City with a main terrace that thrusts out towards the city horizon shaped by a public auditorium below. It can also be reached by escalators and is adjacent to the public bridge elevator lobby..

Each tower carries its own cable-stay bridge that is a public passageway between the two piers. Due to the site geometry, these bridges meet at an angle, joining like a handshake over the harbor. The soffits below the bridges and under the cantilevers pick up the bright colors of the harbor; container orange on the undersides of the Langenlinie, bright yellow on the undersides of the Marmormolen. At night the uplights washing the colored aluminum reflect like paintings in the water.

Regarding the winning design proposal, the competition Jury cited the following: ‘The jury has unanimously decided to nominate Steven Holl Architects entry as the winner of the competition. The reason being the special importance placed on creating two buildings each adapted to the site, and the overall idea of how to connect these buildings and ensure that they form a whole across the harbor basin. The project involves a sense of place which is essential for a project on this prominent site.”

The project utilizes a variety of progressive sustainable solutions to ensure this important international landmark is rooted in Denmark’s identity as one of the world leaders in alternative energy. Both towers have high performance glass curtain walls with a veil of solar screen made of photovoltaic; collecting the sun’s energy while shading. They are connected to a seawater heating/cooling system with radiant heating in the floor slabs and radiant cooling in the ceiling. Natural ventilation is provided on every floor with windows opening at the floor level and ceiling level for maximum air circulation. Optimum natural light is provided to all offices due to the reflective light performance of the screens. Wind turbines line the top of the pedestrian bridge roof; providing all electricity for lighting the public spaces. Due to wind power, this inviting harbor front gateway is always glowing.

Ziggurat

Dubai's latest offering is a carbon-neutral 'pyramid' city

“Ziggurat” is the name of the temple towers of the ancient Mesopotamian valley with the characteristic form of a terraced pyramid with successively receding stories. Now the name is about to enter a new phase. Timelinks, a Dubai-based pioneering environmental design company, has chosen it to describe a sustainable city of the future.

The city, in the shape of a futuristic pyramid, will be exhibited at Cityscape Dubai and according to Timelinks, could support an entire community of up to one million people by harnessing the power of nature.

Ridas Matonis, Managing Director of Timelinks, said: “Ziggurat communities can be almost totally self-sufficient energy-wise. Apart from using steam power in the building we will also employ wind turbine technology to harness natural energy resources.”

Timelinks stress that the project is not just about reducing the carbon footprint. The 2.3 sq km pyramid has many other benefits. They propose that whole cities can be accommodated in complexes which take up less than 10% of the original land surface. Public and private landscaping will be used for leisure pursuits or irrigated as agricultural land.

The concept will also aim at a better quality of life for the inhabitants. Transport throughout the complex would be connected by an integrated 360 degree network (horizontally and vertically) so cars would be redundant. Biometrics would provide security with facial recognition technology.

Martijn Kramer, managing director of The International Institute for the Urban Environment told WAN: “As a general reaction the Ziggurat Project is viable from a technical point of view. However reflecting from a more sustainable holistic approach we do wonder if the food supply and waste system are taken care for, as the concept seems rather based upon carbon neutrality and energy saving.” Kramer’s initial reaction to “Ziggurat” also raises a very important issue: are people willing to live in a mega building of 2.3 sq km? Will the thought of living in a machine comfort people?

Timelinks has already patented the design and technology incorporated into the project and has applied to the European Union for a grant for technical projects. The intriguing mixed use concept will be unveiled at Cityscape Dubai which takes place at the Dubai International Exhibition Centre from 6-9 October 2008.

Source:

http://www.worldarchitecturenews.com/index.php?fuseaction=wanappln.projectview&upload_id=10224

Inside Out Outside In

Boston- and Hong Kong-based Rocker-Lange Architects have designed a villa called Inside Out - Outside In for the Ordos 100 project in Inner Mongolia, China.

The house is one of 100 private residences, all designed by different architects selected by architects Herzog & de Meuron for the Ordos 100 project, which is master planned by artist Ai Wei Wei.
“Especially in the widely varying Mongolian climate, seasonal usages of living areas may change dramatically between the cold winters and warm summers,” say Rocker-Lange

“By creating an architecture which is interwoven with its surroundings, we allow the climate to work with the inhabitants, rather than against them.”

Rocker-lange architects are releasing their design of a 1000 square meter Villa in Ordos Inner Mongolia, P.R. China.

The project called “Inside Out|Outside In” is part of the Ordos 100 project and discusses the relationship and fusion of interior and exterior space. Rocker – Lange calls for an architecture of milieu – that an architecture of the circumstances and conditions by which it is surrounded.

An “Architecture of Milieu” no longer strictly distinguishes between its inside and outside – it rather considers itself as always at once on multiple scales inside and outside, as architecture and environment.

Consequently architecture and its environment are thought of not only as “inside” and “outside” of one another, but as zones of possible relationships, in which “inside” and “outside” vary and shift to accommodate changing seasons and usage patterns.

The “Architecture of Milieu” is an architecture of situation rather than site: an indefinitely expandable and differentiable ribbon serves as the continuous organizational strategy, inscribing zones of different degrees of interior and exterior space vanishing the separation between them.

rocker-lange architects where invited to take part in the Ordos 100 project, an urban development of 100 unique villas in the cultural district of the city of Ordos in Inner Mongolia, China. The project was initiated by the Client, Jiang Yuan Water Engineering Ltd, the curator FAKE Design, Ai Wei Wei studio, Beijing and architects Herzog & de Meuron, Basel.

While FAKE Design, Ai Wei Wei studio developed the masterplan for the 100 parcels of land, Herzog & de Meuron selected 100 young architects from 27 countries around the globe. The project started in early April of 2008 with an architects’ symposium in Ordos. First villas are expected to be finished in late 2009.

Architect David Fisher has proposed a plan for rotating towers that produce all of their own energy through wind power. The Rotating Tower would be built by stacking platters on a central concrete core with wind turbines located between each of them. Each floor will rotate 360 degrees about once every 90 minutes; as the floors will rotate independently, they will create a constantly changing silhouette in the sky. Inside the concrete core will be elevators, emergency stairs and lobbies. The Rotating Tower will be built in Dubai in the next six months.

Teatro del Agua

As water becomes an even hotter commodity in the future, engineers are looking for ways to ensure a continued supply of fresh water to meet the needs of the world’s growing population. Charles Patton is tackling this problem with his Seawater Greenhouse, a carbon-neutral desalination method which is being incorporated into the design of the Teatro del Agua. This Theater of Water will be a performing arts center in Spain’s Canary Islands. It works by coupling a series of evaporators and condensers such that the airborne moisture from the evaporators is then collected from the condensers, which are cooled by deep seawater.? The center will operate almost entirely on renewable energy.

Dice House

The Dice House is a zero carbon home, which can either stand alone or function as attached multiple dwellings. Designed by Sybarite, a British architecture firm, the Dice House is a 9 x 9 meter cube that sits on an octagonal plinth. Three levels inside the cube have large, plentiful windows to maximize views. A large thermoplastic umbrella on the garden roof of the house shades and insulates the house and collects solar energy.

Soft House

Passive House Museum

The world’s first passive house museum is set to be built in Ulricehamn, Sweden, functioning as a visitor’s center. The building’s heat will be supplied entirely by the body heat of visitors and the equipment located inside. Solar cells on the roof will provide part of the energy used to run electrical equipment and heat water. The circular design of the structure will allow efficient circulation of air to enhance the passive heating and cooling of the building.

Transbay Transit Center in San Francisco

Pelli Clark Pelli architects recently got approval for their design for a new green Transbay Transit Center in San Francisco. The transit center will consist of a glass tower and a five-and-a-half acre public park, and will be packed with sustainable features like green roofs, passive solar shading, wind turbines, a rain and graywater recycling system and geothermal heating and cooling. The aim of the building is to centralize the region’s transportation system while also providing a community space. The center will be completed by 2014.