Redistribute Neighbourhoods Instead of Wealth
People hate taxes despite the fact that basically every person who studies economics knows they are needed and a great way to spur economic success. Despite the fact taxes are…
shelter
Why Urban Areas Are More Efficient Than Suburban Areas
It’s been known for years that urban centres have a lower carbon footprint than the lands of urban sprawl. This is a for a variety of reasons and it’s rather…
Berlin’s New Rent Laws Helping People Faster than Predicted
In cities all over the world housing people is an issue and some cities have it worse than others. In Berlin, where things weren’t awful they decided they waned to…
Using Bacteria to Make Buildings Healthier
A new field of research, that doesn’t even have a proper name yet, is looking into ways we can incorporate biology into our built environment. It turns out the bacteria…
Urban Living Cheaper, More Sustainable Than Suburban
Years of car-focused suburban designs have unleashed problems in the 21st century that we will have to deal with and accommodate. The years of the suburbs are coming to an…
Copenhagen Designed a Neighbourhood to Cope With Climate Change
Climate change is happening faster than projected and this means that cities need to react sooner than anticipated. We’ve seen efforts in New York that will create barriers against rising…
Painting Neighbourhoods
Artists Jeroen Koolhaas and Dre Urhahn create community art by painting entire neighborhoods, and involving those who live there — from the favelas of Rio to the streets of North…
This Classroom Makes More Energy Than it Consumes
Anderson Anderson Architecture has built a classroom in Hawaii that generates more energy than it consumes, making what they call a “energy positive” building. The term “energy positive” is being…
A Rebel Architect in Vietnam Creates Green Space
Al Jazeera has a series on rebel architects who are improving the world around them. In the documentary they released today they look at award-winning architect Vo Trong Nghia’s work…
Emergency Shelter Packaged Like a Coffee Cup
Reaction Call to Action from Reaction on Vimeo. Reaction is a new company which recently crowd funded enough money to send a boatload of housing to help refugees fleeing the…
Better Urban Design Can Increase Happiness and Sexiness
Obesity is a growing problem in North America and it looks like this health issue will continue to grow. There are many contributing factors to what’s referred to as an…
Building Better Homes for Refugees
Ikea’s charitable arm has used the expertise of the cheap furniture manufacturer to design a better housing unit for refugees with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). Hopefully these designs will…
Save the Environment, Live in a City
The IEEE Spectrum recently interview William Meyer who is the author of the book The Environmental Advantages of Cities: Countering Commonsense Antiurbanism. The book’s central thesis is that we need…
Algae-Powered Building Opens This Week
Algae can be used for all sorts of wonderful things from cleaning up oil to producing energy. Architects in Hamburg have built a building that uses algae to power the…
New Homes in Lancaster, California Required to Produce Solar Energy
Lancaster, California has nearly half a million citizens and they want to reduce their carbon footprint. Their most recent step to being a green city is a world’s first as…
Earthships Taking Off in the Netherlands
Earthships are a type of house that are built using reused materials to construct a structure that is sustainable. Often the earthships are off the gird and can function autonomously…
Armageddon on December 21st, 2012
If you don’t believe me watch the videos below. You must send donations to me and I will build a big shelter, in a nearby moutain, to accommodate few hundred…
USA Urban Population Growth Outpaces the Suburbs
Regular readers know that in the modern world an urban lifestyle is more sustainable than a suburban lifestyle so it’s pretty good news to see that more people in the…
Dwell’s Top Green Projects of 2012
Architecture magazine Dwell has released their top ten green projects in the USA for this year. It would be great to see this done in a global perspective. On April…
Talking About Cities With People Who Don’t Live in One
When it comes to talking about the divide between urban and non-urban living there’s more differences than just who lives in a more sustainable community. People living in non-urban areas…