A
Professor
Institute of Architecture and Culture
Nicolai Bo Andersen
I am an architect and full professor at the Royal Danish Academy, where I head the Centre for Sustainable Building Culture and the master’s degree programme Building Culture – Sustainability, Strategy and Transformation. Taking a design-based approach, my research investigates sustainable building culture as seen through the lens of New Phenomenology.
From Construction to Cultivation
Building Culture
Humans transform their environment to survive. Using tool technology, materials are extracted, processed and made into things to compensate for deficiencies and enhance performance. In the process, things are given a certain character to express the values and identities of the makers. The problem is, however, that we have become so skilled at transforming the crust of the Earth that seven out of nine planetary boundaries are now transgressed. In this situation, the big question is, how we may rethink architecture and build in ways that observe the safe and just operating space above the social foundation and below the ecological ceiling?
My research investigates how architecture mediates experiential quality, cultural values and environmental responsibility.
Architecture must be understood as a fundamentally life-sustaining and environment-improving activity that includes responsive making and careful cultivation of the buildings we already have.
New Phenomenology
The phenomenological approach is a systematic and targeted empirical study of lived experience as seen in an embodied, first-person perspective. Rather than focusing on the physical body, New Phenomenology emphasizes the "felt body" as the place of affective involvement. Understanding the physical environment as a place of embodied communication and meaningful situations, New Phenomenology in architecture may draw attention to humans and the environment as intrinsically connected.
Ingenious Houses
I propose that architecture should be understood as meaningful dwelling aiming at enhancing the health of both people and planet. We need to respect the environment, consume much less and use the scarce resources with responsiveness and care. My best suggestion is to use local, fast-growing and renewable materials such as sustainably grown reed, hemp and grass for the gentle transformation and restoration of the buildings we already have. Importantly – since dwelling concerns more than satisfying physical needs – experienced architectural quality is pivotal in a sustainable building culture of the future.