cjwho:

finca bellavista: a sustainable treehouse community, costa rica

aros:

Breuer/Lundberg Cabin. LUNDBERG DESIGN 

livestock tank pool. 25-feet diameter and 14-feet deep.

inatt:

reindeer farm in lapland by ezioman on Flickr.

 Unplugged by Scott Newkirk - A one-room cabin in the woods pulls the cord on modern living in New York.

(Source: cjwho)

scinerds:

Living Wall

These vegetated surfaces don’t just look pretty. They have other benefits as well, including cooling city blocks, reducing loud noises, and improving a building’s energy efficiency.What’s more, a recent modeling study shows that green walls can potentially reduce large amounts of air pollution in what’s called a “street canyon,” or the corridor between tall buildings.

For the study, Thomas Pugh, a biogeochemist at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany, and his colleagues created a computer model of a green wall with generic vegetation in a Western European city. Then they recorded chemical reactions based on a variety of factors, such as wind speed and building placement.

The simulation revealed a clear pattern: A green wall in a street canyon trapped or absorbed large amounts of nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter—both pollutants harmful to people, said Pugh. Compared with reducing emissions from cars, little attention has been focused on how to trap or take up more of the pollutants, added Pugh, whose study was published last year in the journal Environmental Science & Technology.

That’s why the green-wall study is “putting forward an alternative solution that might allow [governments] to improve air quality in these problem hot spots,” he said.Compared with reducing emissions from cars, little attention has been focused on how to trap or take up more of the pollutants, added Pugh, whose study was published last year in the journal Environmental Science & Technology.

That’s why the green-wall study is “putting forward an alternative solution that might allow [governments] to improve air quality in these problem hot spots,” he said.

Full Gallery

kateoplis:

WAN House of the Year: Gota Residence 

tomb-and-temple:

mysticplaces:Jarlshof archaeological site | Shetland, Scotland

These Beautiful Bridges Are Just For Animals

If we’re going to keep putting roads in the middle of their habitats, animals are sometimes going to need to cross the road. But it’s better for everyone involved if they don’t have to push a button and wait for the light to change, because they don’t have thumbs and nine times out of 10 they’ll just careen into the side of your car. Which is why some highways have overpasses built specifically for animals like deer, elk, and grizzly bears.

Nobody teaches moose pedestrian etiquette like “look both ways,” but they figure out pretty quickly that crossing the terrifying asphalt river is safer if you take the beautiful grassy bridge. That’s just my guess at a moose’s internal life, but there’s data too: In Banff National Park in Canada, animals have used the six overpasses and 35 underpasses more than 200,000 times since monitoring began in 1996…

(read more: Grist.org)

(Source: rhamphotheca)

archiemcphee:

This awesome swirling green rooftop was designed by CPG for Nanyang Technological University. The school sits in a wooded valley in Singapore. To minimize disturbance to the surrounding environment, the architect carved a habitat from the constraints of the valley and allowed the landscape to play an important role in moulding the building.

Aside from its visual impact, the turfed roof-scape helps to lower the temperature of the roof and surrounding areas. It works as both a functional space and a scenic outdoor community space. The roof top is easily accessible by steps along its edge. We’d like to go play up there.

[via Design You Trust and enpundit]