History of Sustainability

Architecture
Christine Mondor And Charles Rosenblum
Fall 04 and Spring 06

While the Modern Age has created a view of nature as separate from the built environment, relatively recent advances in theory and practice of environmentally conscientious or sustainable architecture have led architects and other designers to think otherwise. Architecture separate from environmental considerations is a luxury that we can't afford and shouldn't desire. In fact, architecture separate from nature is an unusual outlook specific to the Industrial Revolution and its adherents. Before industrialization, rich, disparate and changing concepts of nature were fundamental elements in understanding the both the theory and practice of building. Furthermore, even though many Modernist historians have proposed the factory and the machine as ideal models for building, some critics and detractors in architecture, landscape design and city planning even during the era of industrialism have frequently provided intellectual counterpoint or direct social protest to the despoiled cities and landscapes that have too often been the by-products of the industrial mindset. The purpose of the History of Sustainable Architecture is to examine designs and texts created either before or in response to the Industrial Revolution that productively inform today's renewed efforts to build with minimal impact of the natural environment. Materials will be drawn from ancient Rome, Renaissance Italy, Enlightenment France, nineteenth century Germany, England and Italy, as well as numerous twentieth and twenty-first century examples.