The glassy new plans for the Museum of Tolerance reflect badly on the nearby environment. During the festival of Sukkot, Jews worldwide are camping out in their organic Sukkahs, touching the earth, reconnecting. Karin wrote about sustainable booths all over Jerusalem, while another, snazzier Sukkah is currently being displayed on Manhattan’s Union Square. Contrasted with […]
New York City will host “The People’s Sukkah Choice” on Union Square during the Festival of Sukkot. In Great Falls, Virginia, where my parents have lived for the last umpteen years, the beautiful wooden homes shrouded by giant leafy trees have been carelessly discarded in favor of cleared properties and attendant “McMansions.” Washington D.C.’s wealthy […]
Mud buildings have withstood the test of time; will they populate our futures too? Think of Islamic mud structures and more than likely the iconic Great Mosque of Djenne in Mali will come to mind. The largest mud brick building in the world, the mosque is considered to be amongst the greatest achievement of Sudano-Swahelian […]
An ancient vernacular cave home from Iran
Park Inn Muscat receives the Middle East’s first internationally recognized Green Globe standard certification Creating quality tourism options in the environmental context has only been popular since the early 1990s. Now there are all kinds of opportunities to enjoy a relaxing holiday without causing harm to the surrounding environment: from bio tours in Israel, to […]
Palestinian Architect Omar Yousef draws attention to the occupation’s “forced ecology” at the Ecoweek conference in Israel [image taken by Tomer Appelbaum] Designed to teach young architects the most progressive building practices available, beyond borders or cultural differences, the Ecoweek conference taking place in Israel draws inevitable attention to disparities. Green Prophet’s interest in natural […]
Is Geotectura’s Sun Sail just another clever design, or is it redefining Israel’s building policy? Bold and innovative, the Israel-based firm Geotectura produces otherworldly designs with a social conscience that even Bill McKibben might endorse. Their CT-cubes and hovering high-rises rival any science fiction graphic, while the X2S shelter, designed to provide physical and medical refuge […]
Built by the the Safavid Dynasty in the 1650s as a dam and a bridge, Mehrdad asks how the Khaju (or Khajoo) Bridge in Iran can be restored more sustainably. Eventually all historical monuments and treasures will need preservation and renovation, like the Grand Bazaar in Tehran, but this should always be done with regards […]
Architect Marks Barfield is to design a £13 million “eco” mosque on a 0.4 hectare brownfield site in Cambridge. England’s historic city of Cambridge, with its world-famous university and idyllic countryside, will soon count a mosque amidst its stunning skyline of spires. But this isn’t just any old mosque. In fact it is the first-purpose […]
Finally environmental and cultural preservers, not destroyers, receive recognition [image by Brood_wich via flickr] UNESCO has ordained 890 world heritage sites around the world, one-third of which belong in the Middle East. While admiring Seville, Spain during a trip roughly two years ago, HRH Sultan Bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, from the country that is […]
“How Do We Want to Live?” asks England’s Former Secretary-General of the Royal Town Planning Institute Robert Upton at an urban planning conference in Israel. Whereas Colombian planner Oscar Diaz (who we interviewed here) was practical and sited specific planning examples at the anniversary conference at the Technion-Israel’s Institute of Technology, England’s planner Mr. Robert Upton’s […]
Get Your Green On in The Dmit Valley Ecovillages are slowly sprouting in the Middle East. There’s Kramim in Israel’s Negev Desert, as well as the well-known Kibbutz Lotan, and now the first of its kind in Lebanon. Called simply EcoVillage, this project was grown from the ground by Karim al Khatib and a group […]
Dosier’s fearlessness of the science of construction sets her apart from her peers [image courtesy of flickr] We were so intrigued by Professor Ginger Dosier, the Architect at Sharjah University who grows bricks by combining sand, common bacteria, calcium chloride and urea, that we decided to dig deeper. Some architects, like those at Geotectura, develop mindbending […]
The Better Brick? Although kinks need to be worked out, applying microbiological principles to design could revolutionize building materials. This researcher says she’s found a way to “grow” bricks from sand and urine. Finally! Suzanne LaBarre of Metropolitanmag.com brings us a design worth writing home about. In the same tradition as Hassan Fathy and architects […]
Does The First Arabian Construction Week Signal a Greener Middle Eastern Building Policy? [image via flickr] We have brought disturbing news from Dubai this week: a smuggled baby crocodile died and hyenas and baboons were confiscated from a private home. So it gives us pleasure to be able to provide our readers with a tidbit of […]