Author(s): Roya Plauche
This paper presents the pedagogical framework of an advanced design studio, ARCH 5500: What If? Infrastructure + Ecology. The studio seeks to initiate a conversation by questioning the role of infrastructure within a broader ecological context. The topic is situated within the discourse on climate change and the 2019 World Scientists’ Warning and the declared climate emergency, which identify the depletion of ecological systems as a critical point of investigation. “Climate change threatens biodiversity globally, on land as in the ocean. At the same time, biodiversity is a key feature of stable ecosystems, providing—among many other services to humanity—carbon stocks and sinks (absorbing about a quarter of human emissions) and thereby guarding the earth system’s resilience against disruption from anthropogenic carbon emissions.”¹ The studio organizes ecological inquiry across three domains. The domains of terrain, water, and air are understood as distinct carbon sinks with specific ecological characteristics. These domains operate through a modular framework consisting of container, collector, and housing systems. The studio demonstrates how architectural pedagogy can integrate ecological theory, systems thinking, and design through research-driven design exercises and speculative infrastructural proposals.
Volume Editors
Reed Kroloff & Francisco J. Rodríguez-Suárez
ISBN
978-1-944214-52-4