Living, Thinking Houses

In the sizzling summer heat I’ve been thinking about igloos. To chill out in, of course, but also because I admire their elemental simplicity. Inuits traditionally used bone knives to carve bricks from quarries of hardened snow. A short, low tunnel led to the front door, trapping heat in and keeping out fierce cold and critters. Mortar wasn’t needed, because the snow bricks were shaved to fit, and at night the dome ossified into a glistening ice fort. The human warmth inside melted the ice just enough to seal the seams.

The idea behind such homes was refuge from elements and predators, based on a watchful understanding of both. The igloo was really an extension of the self — shoulder blades of snow and backbone of ice, beneath which a family slept, swathed in thick animal fur, beside one or two small lamps burning blubber. All the building materials lay at hand, perpetually recycled, costing nothing but effort.

Picture most of our houses and apartment buildings today — full of sharp angles, lighted by bulbs and colors one doesn’t find in nature, built from plywood, linoleum, iron, cement and glass. Despite their style, efficiency and maybe good location, they don’t always offer us a sense of sanctuary, rest or well-being. Because we can’t escape our ancient hunger to live close to nature, we encircle the house with lawns and gardens, install picture windows, adopt pets and Boston ferns, and scent everything that touches our lives.

This tradition of doing and undoing doesn’t really make sense or promote healthy living or a sustainable planet, so there’s an impassioned trend worldwide toward building green cities with living walls and roofs and urban farms in skyscrapers. Referring to “the north 40” would mean crops 40 floors up. In such a cityscape, the line blurs between indoor and outdoor.

Vertical gardens and living roofs are sprouting up everywhere.Mexico City’s three eco-sculptures, carpeted in over 50,000 plants, tower above car-clogged avenues. A blooming tapestry of plants adorns the exterior walls of the Quai Branly Museum in Paris. Inside Lisbon’s Dolce Vita shopping center, a plush vertical meadow undulates. In Milan’s Café Trussardi, diners and flâneurs sit in a glass-box courtyard beneath a hint of heaven: a vibrant cloud of frizzy greens, cascading vines and flowers. The Plant, an old meatpacking building in Chicago, has morphed into an eco farm, home to tilapia fish breeders, mushroom gardeners and hydroponically grown vegetables. Xero Flor America, based in North Carolina, has already sold 1.2 million square feet of living roofs.

by Diane Ackerman, NY Times | Read more:
Photo: Rodrigo Cruz