Design Museum- Sustainable Futures

New Sustainable Futures exhibition at the Design Museum from 31st March
'From the world’s first carbon neutral city to a refrigerator which doubles as an aquarium, this exhibition explores a range of products, concepts and projects that address issues of sustainability in their design. Through prototypes, samples, products and film, you can find out more about your impact on the world and how to change it.
Presented around five themes: Cities, Energy and Economics, Food, Materiality and Creative Citizens, this overview shows the changing role of the designer and reveals how design can make a difference.' Design Museum

Design Museum link

Lebbeus Woods - Storm Watch

Very interesting piece by Lebbeus Woods dealing with change and interconnectedness.

'Change is inevitable, as the materials age or tire, or as they are affected by disturbances within or around them. The forces are, in effect, at war with the materials; they want to overcome them; they want to be free of materiality, to flow into the world’s vast oceans of energy, from which they will be reborn again and again, in countless cycles of transformation. Such an understanding of architecture conditions our outlook on the world and leads to the construction of a knowledge-system based on concepts and processes of transformation.... Because the structure acted as a field and not as collection of independently stable, ‘classical’ objects, the failure of any element reduces the tension in the entire structure. The idea of transformation in a tension field is linked with inter-dependence of the elements in the field, and, more accurately, to their inter-connectedness. The field changes as an integrated whole, whatever its size or scale.' Lebbeus Woods

more here

Anti-Smog Tower

Vincent Callebaut has designed an anti-smog tower for Paris. The 3D's are far more successful than the elevations, but well worth a look for the techniques used.
'to filter air particles and harvest wind and solar power... The project is divided in two; a “Solar Drop” located on top of abandoned railway tracks and a “Wind tower”. The Solar Drop is designed to transform polluted into clean air through a system of filters covered with titanium dioxide which break the pollutant particles...The Wind Tower equipped with turbines in its entire façade produces enough energy for the neighborhood and houses a museum and learning center on renewable energies.'
anti-smog tower

eVolo Skyscraper Competition

'The Nested Skyscraper adapts to climatic, urban, and programmatic conditions with the use of advanced materials and robotic construction. Its form and building method derive from the carbon sleeves and fiber-laced concrete performance. It is a composition of multiple layers of louvers which thicken and rotate according to solar and wind exposure.' Ryohei Koike, Jarod Poenisch's proposal for the Nested Skyscraper took third place in the eVolo Skyscraper Competition. The winner was a proposal for a vertical prison and second place went to a proposal for a water purification tower.
Nested Skyscraper - third place See the links below for further projects.


Elena Batueva's Wind Tower: 'The module consists of vertical-axis wind turbines and uses rotors that run vertically. It is a sort of wind power station, a clean and sustainable fuel source that does not run out and brings no harm to environment. In comparison with widely-spread horizontal-axis wind turbines, vertical-axis turbines can continue to produce power even in high wind conditions without risk of getting damaged and they do not need to be pointed into the wind to be effective – these are the essential qualities for the climatic zone taken up by Moscow.'
Wind Tower

Vertical Prison - first place
water purification skyscraper - second place
Nested Skyscraper - third place

eVolo Competition -scroll down the page to see the entries

Ackroyd & Harvey

Heather Ackroyd will be giving a lecture on Tuesday 16 March 12.15pm in Willow 10, Headington Hill Hall Campus

'Sculpture, photography, architecture and ecology are some of the disciplines that intersect in the work of Ackroyd and Harvey. Nature and structure, control and randomness are juxtaposed in their work to reveal a time-based practice with intrinsic bias towards process and event.'
web site

There is also a 1 day ART-CULTURE-SUSTAINABILITY SYMPOSIUM on Tuesday 23 March with BETH CARRUTHERS -from Canada and ALEX ARTEAGA -from Berlin and Barcelona
11-1 Beth Carruthers, 2-4 Alex Arteaga, 5 -7 Beth and Alex in dialogue with each other and the audience. Buckley Building, BG01, Gipsey Lane Campus, Headington Road, Headinton, Oxford.