Semester task: Sustainable Food and Architecture

Sustainable Food and Architecture
Every day we make decisions regarding what we eat. These lead to far-reaching consequences for our health, our budget, and the health of the planet we and future generations will live on. How shall we feed the city of the future? To begin to answer this question, we will start by constructing a tool which will allow us to analyze our diet in a typical week and predict the effects on ecological, economical, and social sustainability. Then we will delve into production, transportation, and consumption aspects in more detail. Where do the ingredients come from? Where are the food products we consume produced and how? Where do we consume our food? And where does the food wasted go to? What is the role of architecture in these processes of production and consumption? This can range from simple farm sheds and market stalls to high-tech factories and farms and luxury restaurants. Which diets are more sustainable, more healthy, more affordable? What can architecture contribute to the topic of Sustainable Food?  

Seminar Description:

Based on your research, we will discuss the environmental impact - positive and negative - of your design from your earliest conceptual ideas. Together, we will develop your concepts to bring together design excellence and a sustainable construction strategy. Any idea goes: from passive strategies of how to re-use any amount of energy, material or component in a building to energy producing algae farms you can live in. Interactive strategies are as much welcome as precise optimization of intelligently populated building envelopes. The core of the considerations is the energy balance of the built environment over its entire life cycle.

You can work in groups up to 3 students, so that you can share workload.

There are 4 obligatory meetings with Prof. Cody and in between Desk Crits with Bernhard Sommer.

By the end of the semester, you present a conceptual design that focuses on the energy and ecological questions. Besides a beamer presentation, a model will be required

This seminar is part of the teaching of the Energy Design department. Take a look at the work of our students and our projects and research:
https://energy-design.tumblr.com/