Must woody organisms die to become construction materials? Long considered sustainable, clearcutting techniques used in timber farming actually causes many environmental issues, including habitat loss, species extinction, raised temperatures, and increased CO2 emissions, among others shown here. Can we alter our fundamental understanding of architecture by designing Living Architecture, exemplified by structures like the Living Root Bridges in India?
Buildings of the future will be grown from genetically engineered seeds, their lifecycles seen in terms of growth, care, and reuse instead of construction, maintenance, and demolition. Guided by grafting, lighting, and bracing techniques, seedlings will be slowly coerced into architectural components over decades. To take tangible steps toward realizing that future, the site will be divided into two zones: artificial (the reddish) and biological (the green), with the program for the artificial side separating into labs (the purple) and academic spaces (the pink). Artificial zones are dedicated to material research, while biological ones become ecological testing grounds for growing experimental materials like twisted bamboo and living wall systems.
Generative design using Grasshopper will optimize site planning for maximum contact between the two halves. Here you see the site iterating through various configurations, with each new iteration scoring higher than the last, from 293 pts to 449 pts. Buildings on site will utilize laminated timber structure, mycelium insulation, bamboo finishing, and deadwood facades made from salvaged wood. Plants will be grafted onto the deadwood using Phoenix Grafting techniques to test how they behave as architectural components in real site conditions. Laboratories with higher ceilings require mature deadwood with more girth, which can consequently host larger trees for grafting, while the shorter academic buildings can host smaller plant species. In the biome, more plant species are tested for their potential to become living building materials, where unpromising species are replaced by favorable ones over time.
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