Archinect - News

NYC due to adopt 'bird-friendly' glass to decrease death toll

2019-12-09T11:02:00-05:00

New York City lawmakers are poised to adopt legislation requiring “bird-friendly” glass on all new construction in an effort to cut down on the tens of thousands of birds who die flying into the city's buildings every year. New York will be the largest city in the nation to require glass that is visible to birds if the measure passes. Several California cities including San Francisco and Oakland have adopted similar rules

According to ABC News, the NYC Audubon estimates that 90,000 to 230,000 birds are killed annually from flying into buildings in New York City a number only a fraction of the 1 billion that die each year around the country. The cause of death comes from the reflective glass on taller buildings, ultimately rendering the high-flyers blind from the presence of these mirrored extrusions.

The legislation proposed would require that at least 90 percent of the exterior of the first 75 feet of all new buildings or major renovations be constructed with materials that are visible to birds, such as glass with a pattern, ABC News reports.

North American bird populations are in crisis

2019-09-20T18:19:00-04:00

new research published Thursday in Science shows bird populations have continued to plummet in the past five decades, dropping by nearly three billion across North America—an overall decline of 29 percent from 1970.

Reflective, glass-skinned buildings are responsible for the deaths of over 1 billion birds each year in the United States. According to the American Bird Conservancy (ABC), buildings are the second-deadliest human-linked cause of death for birds; Only domestic cats kill a higher number of birds every year.

ABC bird experts recommend minimizing the amount of reflective glass used along building facades, avoiding the use of glass handrails and balustrades along balconies, and limiting artificial lighting at night to not confuse nocturnal migrating birds. When glass is necessary, the group recommends specifying architectural glass marked with fritted patterns and designing screens to break up expanses of glass, among many other approaches.

AIA embraces a pro-climate agenda

2019-09-05T13:00:00-04:00

The leadership of the American Institute of Architects organization has officially signed off on an ambitious climate agenda that was proposed during the organization's annual meeting in Las Vegas.

The so-called "Resolution for Urgent and Sustained Climate Action," introduced at the meeting by Betsy del Monte, an architect with Dallas-based Cameron MacAlister, aims to "prioritize and support urgent climate action to exponentially accelerate the 'decarbonization' of buildings, the building sector, and the built environment."

In addition, del Monte's resolution aims to craft new revisions to the AIA's collection of Public Policies and Position Statements in an effort to "engage its full membership, clients, lawmakers, and communities in a multi-year education, practice, and advocacy strategy."

Remarking on the organization's official ratification of the climate resolution, 2019 AIA President William Bates, wrote in a press release, “This is a defining moment for the Institute,” addi...

Terreform's ONE designs Monarch Butterfly sanctuary tower

2019-06-24T14:15:00-04:00

The visionary team at Terreform ONE in New York City have unveiled designs for an eight-story Monarch Butterfly sanctuary tower that promises to enliven the facade of a forthcoming commercial building with a vertical terrarium.

The diagrid structure will be made out of 3D-printed carbon-sequestering concrete components infilled with a dual-skin facade wrapped with glass and "pillows" of ETFE foil. The design will create a three-foot by 70-foot "vertical meadow" filled with "suspended milkweed vines and flowering plants to nourish the butterflies at each stage of their life cycle," according to a project website.

Rendering depicting the building interior, including butterfly atrium and facade terrarium. Image courtesy of Mitchell Joachim, Terreform ONE.

Facade detail. Image courtesy of Mitchell Joachim, Terreform ONE.

The performative facade will also be coated with "hydrogel bubbles" and small algae-filled sacs that will serve to purify air and building wastewater, while also mainta...

"Poissy Galore" artfully frames green public space on the banks of the Seine

2017-01-05T13:27:00-05:00

Situated in Carrière-Sous-Poissy in France along the River Seine, "Poissy Galore" by Armengaud Armengaud Cianchetta (AAC) and Herlach Hartmann Frommenwiler (HHF) is designed primarily as an ecological public space for both Parisian residents and far-flung visitors. Consisting of an observatory, an insect museum and a visitor center, the project title is an apt play on the James Bond film, both in terms of its expansiveness and playfulness. The inventive timber construction and visually arresting angular framing is as much a part of the project's allure as its nuanced integration into its 113 hectare site.

As the architects explain, "With the exception of the observatory, which is a steel construction, the collection of pavilions and small 'follies' is based on a modular wood system, repeating and combining different sized and angled timber frames."

In addition to the public spaces, the project also has private offices and storage, including facilities to raise insects.

The latest in F...

Madrid is about to get a lot more green

2016-01-26T15:31:00-05:00

Nature is poised to reconquer Madrid. Faced with rising summer temperatures, Spain’s capital has announced plans, reported in today’s El Pais, to seam the city so thoroughly with new green patches that its face could be quite transformed. City parks will be expanded and restored, and 22 new urban gardens created. Vacant public land will be freed up to create community gardens while the banks of the city’s scrappy Manzanares River will be thickly planted with trees...

According to the report, other components of the initiative include funding and encouragement for green roofs and façades. Plants beds would be added to paved squares and ponds may be created to catch excess stormwater like in Copenhagen.

Madrid's location – perched high on a plateau that receives little rain – has always brought harsh winters and grueling summers. But according to a study made by Arup, rainfall could drop by 25% by the midcentury. When it does arrive, it's probably going to be in massive summer storms that can have more averse effects than positive.

If put into action, this plan could greatly improve the city today – and save it from tomorrow.

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Book review: Designed for the Future: 80 Practical Ideas for a Sustainable Future

2015-04-22T18:40:00-04:00

I have to admit to a degree of wariness when I first opened Designed for the Future: 80 Practical Ideas for a Sustainable World, a new book edited by Jared Green and published by Princeton Architectural Press. The introduction makes some bold claims for a rather slim book with little text. “We have the answers. We are both the cause of the problems and the solution to them,” Green writes with supreme optimism. The book is a collection of eighty projects that leading architects, urban planners, artists, critics and thinkers chose as a response to the question: “What gives you hope for the future?” The criteria for their responses stipulated that they must discuss a project they admire, not their own. And the results are as varied as one might imagine for a question that is both vague and expansive.

More than anything else, the responses highlighted the mutability of the term “sustainable” within contemporary architecture discourse. Some of the responses, such as that of Katrin Kling...

What if we could rebuild New York City?

2014-04-02T14:37:00-04:00

Mitchell Joachim; New York has, over the last few centuries, become one of the world’s most densely packed cities. But what if you could redraw the city’s map – and build it from scratch?

The article features both the High and Low lines, Brooklyn Navy Yard, Vision 42, Million Trees NYC, and Vertical Farms.

Harvard Graduate School of Design: Ecological Urbanism App

2012-11-09T13:10:00-05:00

The Ecological Urbanism app adapts content from the GSD’s book of the same name for a tablet. Much more than an ebook, it’s an entirely new way of looking at the information interactively. With the majority of the world’s population expected to live in cities by the year 2050, Ecological Urbanism addresses the expanding practice of sustainable design. A timely evolution of the book, this iPad app visualizes the growing body of discourse surrounding the design and management of cities