Pots and spans: a very simple little building with much to teach about sustainability.The Japanese concrete construction industry has become a serious threat to the ecological equilibrium of the planet. Forests have been razed raze also rase tr.v. razed also rased, raz·ing also ras·ing, raz·es also ras·es 1. To level to the ground; demolish. See Synonyms at ruin. 2. To scrape or shave off. 3. (particularly in Queensland) to provide once-used shuttering for elegant poured concrete buildings. After making a hollow building to contain the concrete one, the wood has often been simply thrown away, burned to add to the carbon overload See information overload and overloading. of the planet's atmosphere. When Sambuichi Architects were asked to make a new building for the Miwa dynasty of craft potters, they were determined to set a better example. The Miwa ceramicists have been using the site for 300 years, and family members include Japanese living national treasures Living National Treasure or Living Human Treasure is a title awarded in several countries, and denotes a person or a group which is regarded as a national treasure while still alive. . They wanted a place for four stages of pottery production: a store for raw materials, a place for half-finished products, one for finished work, and one for painting. Such an amazing a·maze v. a·mazed, a·maz·ing, a·maz·es v.tr. 1. To affect with great wonder; astonish. See Synonyms at surprise. 2. Obsolete To bewilder; perplex. v.intr. tradition made the clients acutely aware of their responsibility to the environment, so the architects had to invent a new way of working. They decided all the modularly-organized cedar shuttering should be reused in the building. Elements of the boarding for external walls were remade re·made v. Past tense and past participle of remake. as external doors and shutters. Inner shuttering was re-assembled as partitions. Supporting panels for the roof slab became wood flooring Wood flooring is a type of flooring made from the timber of hardwoods, or of spruce or hard pine. There are two basic manufactured types of hardwood. Wood flooring comes unfinished, and once installed is sanded, then finished on site. . Normally, even where shuttering is re-used, architects have no control of what happens to the wood. In this case, the whole process was integrated, and costs were obviously a good deal less than they would have been with the conventional system. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The Miwas wanted an ecologically friendly building in every sense. It is dug into the mountainside to obtain a natural internal climate suitable for storing clay. Its roof is covered in grass as an extension to the slope of the hill. Thermal flywheel effects The thermal flywheel effect, sometimes also referred to as "Thermal Momentum", is a term used to describe the property of a material to remain at a given temperature. It is generally applied to buildings or construction materials. This is distinct from a materials insulative value. are exploited to the full. The jury commended the ecological appropriateness of the little building, the quality of its execution and its potential as a model for construction in future. [GRAPHIC OMITTED] |
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