Re-contextualising design: Three ways of practising sustainable architecture

Architectural Research Quarterly

Volumn 17, Issue 2, 2013, Pages 106-119

  Farmer, Graham ^a  

^a NEWCASTLE UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84889772503     PISSN: 13591355     EISSN: 14740516     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S1359135513000468     Document Type: Article

References (49)

1. Sim Van der Ryn and Stuart Cowan, Ecological Design (Washington, DC: Island Press, 1996), p. 27.
2. Ralf Brand, Synchronizing Science and Technology with Human Behaviour (London: Earthscan, 2005).
3. Raymond J. Cole, Zosia Brown and Sherry McKay, 'Building Human Agency: A Timely Manifesto', Building Research & Information, 38.3 (2010), 339-50.
4. Fionn Stevenson and Adrian Leaman, 'Evaluating Housing Performance in Relation to Human Behaviour: New Challenges', Building Research & Information, 38.5 (2010) 437-41.
5. Patrick Feng and Andrew Feenberg, 'Thinking about Design: Critical Theory of Technology and the Design Process', in Philosophy and Design: From Engineering to Architecture, ed. by P. E. Vermaas, P. A. Kroes, Andrew Light and Steven Moore (USA: Springer Science, 2008), pp. 105-18 (p. 200).
6. Steven A. Moore and Andrew Karvonen, 'Sustainable Architecture in Context: STS and Design Thinking', Science Studies, 21.1 (2008), 29-46.
7. See for example: Steven A. Moore, Technology and Place: Sustainable Architecture and the Blueprint Farm (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001)
8. Sustainable Architectures: Cultures and Natures in Europe and North America, ed. by Simon Guy and Steven A. Moore (London: Routledge, 2004).
9. See Simon Guy and Graham Farmer, 'Reinterpreting Sustainable Architecture: The Place of Technology', Journal of Architectural Education, 54.3 (2001), 140-48
10. Graham Farmer and Simon Guy, 'Hybrid Environments: The Spaces of Sustainable Design', in Sustainable Architectures: Cultures and Natures in Europe and North America, pp. 15-30.
11. Design Discourse: History, Theory, Criticism, ed. by Victor Margolin (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1989).
12. Langdon Winner, Autonomous Technology: Technics-out-of-control as a Theme in Political Thought (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1977).
13. Langdon Winner, 'Political Ergonomics', in Discovering Design: Explorations in Design Studies, ed. by Richard Buchanan & Victor Margolin (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1995), pp. 146-70 (p. 150).
14. Andrew Feenberg, Questioning Technology (New York: Routledge, 1999), p. 93.
15. Feng and Feenberg, p 117.
16. Guy and Farmer, 'Reinterpreting Sustainable Architecture'.
17. The three projects described in this paper were undertaken during a period when the author was the Director of Teaching and Director of the Part 2 Architecture programme within the School of the Built Environment, The University of Nottingham, UK.
18. Moore and Karvonen, p. 34.
19. Carl Mitcham, 'Dasein versus Design: The Problematics of Turning Making into Thinking', International Journal of Technology and Design Education, 11 (2001), 27-36.
20. Andrew Feenberg, Transforming Technology: A Critical Theory Revisited (Oxford; Oxford University Press, 2002).
21. Moore and Karvonen, pp. 34-35.
22. Carl Mitcham, 'Thinking Re-Vernacular Building', Design Issues, 21.1 (2005), 32-40 (pp. 32-33).
23. Simon Guy and Elizabeth Shove, The Sociology of Energy, Buildings and the Environment: Constructing Knowledge, Designing Practice (London: Routledge, 2000).
24. Moore and Karvonen, p. 35.
25. The Nottingham House was designed by Ben Hopkins, Rachael Lee and Chris Dalton as part of a Year 5 Diploma (Part 2) studio: zCARS (Zero Carbon Architecture Research Studio) run by Professor Michael Stacey. The project was completed as a joint thesis project within MARS (Making Architecture Research Studio) run jointly by the author and Prof. Michael Stacey. The house was constructed by staff and students from across the School.
26. The Architecture and Engineering of Downdraught Cooling: A Design Source Book, ed. by Brian Ford, Rosa Schiano-Phan and Elizabeth Francis (Nottingham: PHDC Press, 2010).
27. Moore and Karvonen, p. 32.
28. See Carl Mitcham, 'Ethics into Design' and Albert Borgmann, 'The Depth of Design', in Discovering Design, pp. 173-89 and pp. 13-22.
29. Mitcham, 'Thinking Re-Vernacular Building', p. 32.
30. Mitcham, 'Dasein versus Design'.
31. Andrew Feenberg, 'From Essentialism to Constructivism: Philosophy of Technology at the Crossroads', in Technology and the Good Life?, ed. by Eric Higgs, Andrew Light and David Strong (London: University of Chicago Press, 2000), pp. 294-315 (pp. 308-09).
32. The Straw Bale café was developed with Hewitt Studios, a small architecture practice based in Bath, UK. The project was run by Paul Younger and offered as an extra-curricular opportunity to Year 5 Diploma students as a way to gain design/build experience and skills in sustainable construction.
33. Feenberg, 'From Essentialism to Constructivism', p. 310.
34. Moore and Karvonen, pp. 33-34.
35. Mitcham, 'Ethics into Design', p. 175.
36. Athena Swentzell Steen et al., The Straw Bale House (White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green, 1994).
37. Moore and Karvonen, p. 34.
38. Feenberg, Transforming Technology, p. 176.
39. Tyler Veak, Democratizing Technology: Andrew Feenberg's Critical Theory of Technology (Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 2006).
40. Feenberg, Questioning Technology, p. 209.
41. Hans Achterhuis and Andrew Feenberg, 'Farewell to Dystopia', in American Philosophy of Technology: The Empircal Turn, ed. by Hans Achterhuis (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001), pp. 65-93 (p. 91).
42. Ralf Brand and Andrew Karvonen, 'The Ecosystem of Expertise: Complementary Knowledges for Sustainable Development', Sustainability: Science, Practice and Policy, 3.1 (2007), 21-31.
43. Harald Rohracher, 'Social Research on Energy-Efficient Building Technologies', in Sustainable Architectures, pp. 201-08.
44. Graham Farmer and Simon Guy, 'Making Morality: Sustainable Architecture and the Pragmatic Imagination', Building Research and Information, 38.4 (2010), 368-78 (p. 376).
45. Andrew Feenberg, 'Function and Meaning: The Double Aspects of Technology'. Paper given at the University of Stockholm Conference on Technology, the Media and Phenomenology, 2009. Available online at: [accessed 30 July 2013].
46. For a fuller description of the project and participants see: John Ramsay, 'Jouberton School', in Intercultural Interaction in Architectural Education, ed. by Robert Mull et. al. (London: London Metropolitan University, 2011), pp. 40-42.
47. Good Deeds, Good Design: Community Service through Architecture, ed. by Bryan Bell (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2004), p. 13.
48. Farmer and Guy, 'Making Morality'.
49. Andrew Feenberg, 'Comments', Social Epistemology, 22.1 (2008), 119-24 (p. 119).