Trapions at the Earth Centre (cover story): The new
Conference Centre at the Earth Centre in Doncaster has been built using
'trapions', a structural cage made from steel mesh. Built for maximum energy
efficiency and using recycled materials wherever possible, this Centre's exceptional congruence with its surroundings has largely been achieved using a novel walling system which uses reclaimed concrete in wire cages to create a natural physical appearance somewhat akin to dry stone walling.
Architects for a future -Sustainability, we are told, is about living off the 'interest' yielded by the natural world, not the 'capital' of the natural world itself. It is about living today without jeopardising the ability of our children to meet their own needs in the future. However these 'children' will be the consumers of tomorrow, so as well as changing our patterns we need to educate these future generations, encouraging them to utilise the natural world's interest and avoiding running down its capital. Scot Fletcher considers whether this message is getting through to the next generation of architects...
 Gridshell at Firmwell:- "Although I haven't done the sums, it looks like 5 hectares of chestnut would provide enough wood to grow a new building every year." We are upstairs in the building which is part of an experiment in turning an historically important, though generally ignored coppiced wood, into a potential core building material for the whole of the South East region. Seven years since the project was conceived, the Feilden Clegg building went up last year, with an adapted modular gridshell roof, cladding, walls and flooring, using chestnut. Oliver Lowenstein talks to David Saunders, project manager of the Flimwell Woodland Enterprise Centre.
Woodwool revival - Woodwool slab - formed from matted lengths of wood shavings, coated with a mineral slurry, compressed into slabs and cured - is a material with a chequered history. Used widely in the 50's and 60's, it now seems deeply unfashionable with specifiers and almost unknown to builders. Architect Dil Green disples this myth…
Saving the wood from the trees - Certified tropical timber has been hailed by loggers and environmentalists alike as the best way to protect the rainforests. But is it? Klemens Laschefski and Nicole Freris have problems with it. Here they explain why…
Inner city sustainability - Transformation of a run-down inner city estate by Lambeth Housing.
Insulation Standards - Wall ties for full fill masonry cavity construction
Non-ventilated roofs - The Building Research Establishment has just completed a research project to evaluate the impact of traditional ventilation on the energy performance and air leakage of cold pitched roofs in the UK, and what potential savings could be achieved in practice by adopting the non-ventilated roof system approach.
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