This thesis explores the formation of architectural responses to environmental questions by proposing a response to a historical arc of environmental, technological, and social imagination in architecture.
The project began by constructing a historical arc of environmental questions and architectural responses to these questions over time. It identified two more categories that informed and contextualized architectural thinking throughout the last century; technological innovations, and global events/demands. Because technological innovation has historically been seen as a tool for societal improvement, architecture has consistently turned to both scientific and use-based innovations when proposing solutions to climate mediation. Political and social global events have also created demands that pushed architectural imagination in specific directions; world wars, housing shortages, climate crises, have created urgencies that demanded new ways of constructing the built environment.
7 architecture case study projects were explored both within their temporal context and according to today’s metrics of sustainability to identify how these different technological innovations, global events, and representations of the environment impacted architectural language and strategies over time. These projects were synthesized into architectural categories as strategies applied to the mediation between user and environment: these categories included energy distribution systems, bioclimatic design, controlled climates, open component systems, design for disassembly, and technology as infrastructure.
As ramifications of the climate crisis are exponentially increasing, extreme weather events will only continue to occur more frequently. However, while climate change will occur across multiple regions, studies have shown that vulnerable communities will be disproportionately affected. For example, the mixed arid climate zone in the Southwest is projected to have the largest increase in energy expenditure necessary to mitigate climate change threats. These qualities prompted me to design with this larger scale in mind, researching climate threats and responses on the scale of an entire state. I selected one of the most affected areas, New Mexico, as the site to test my architectural system.
