Affordable housing for livable cities

The book addresses current housing affordability challenges and presents innovative planning and design strategies for contemporary communities and homes that are both livable and affordable.

Ai in modern architecture and design

This volume of Emerald Studies in Sustainable Architecture and Design examines the intersection of AI and architecture and provides a comprehensive exploration of AI-based tools and their role in shaping contemporary architectural practice.

An even better way to zone

Zoning is the tool that everyone loves to hate. It may also be the most important and least understood process affecting how US communities shape the lives of their residents. While almost every community comprehensive plan calls for more affordable, equitable, and sustainable development, zonin...

Architects, sustainability and the climate emergency

Architects, Sustainability and the Climate Emergency: A Political Ecology chronicles how architects have shaped their ideas of the city—and sustainability—as knowledge of the climate emergency has unfolded. Have architects responded to the climate crisis too slowly?

Building metabolism

How can we design the architecture of metabolism? How can architecture redefine resources, produce nutrients and contribute to regenerate land and protect communities at risk? Building Metabolism aims to reveal how architecture constructs, distributes, and leverages power via material recycli...

Climax change!

Climax Change! represents the much-needed overview of how climate change and the current environmental emergency will affect the practice of architecture, both in terms of its design philosophy and rising opportunities to innovate and radically transform the current tenet of architecture’s aesth...

Common ground in a liquid city

An unapologetic defense of city life in a time of environmental crisis.

Container and modular buildings

Creating cohousing

Cohousing balances privacy and independence with the benefits of living in community. This new book by the authors who brought you the "cohousing bible" invites readers into these sustainable neighborhoods, and provides practical tools for developing their own.

Data. energy. matter.

The work of Serero, through investigations of patterns found in nature, does not envision architecture to create new spaces, but rather as a strategy to unfold together patterns of cultural, social and spatial origins. Architecture, as a living organism, establishes a relationship between beings ...

Design with climate

Architects today incorporate principles of sustainable design as a matter of necessity. But the challenge of unifying climate control and building functionality, of securing a managed environment within a natural setting—and combating the harsh forces of wind, water, and sun—presented a new set o...

Design with nature now

In 1969, Ian McHarg’s seminal book Design with Nature set forth a new vision for regional planning using natural systems. To celebrate its fiftieth anniversary, a team of landscape architects and planners from PennDesign have showcased some of the most advanced ecological design projects in the w...

Essential building science

Poor heat and moisture detailing are enemies of durability, comfort and efficiency in house design. Essential Building Science provides a visual, accessible introduction to the fundamentals of building physics and the skills to develop thermal and moisture strategies for creating better new bu...

Essential cob construction

Essential Cob Construction presents both hands-on and rigorous technical information on how to build code compliant, low-embodied carbon, and fire- and earthquake-resistant buildings from cob – a mix of clay, sand and straw. The definitive cob guide for engineers, architects, designers, contracto...

Essential green roof construction

Essential Green Roof Construction is a comprehensive, in-depth guide to building simple green roofs for houses and small buildings. Packed with detailed photos, illustrations, case studies, and code compliance advice, it offers clear step-by-step instructions necessary to create your own living r...

Essential light straw clay construction

Light straw clay is a code compliant high-performance, low-impact building material with insulation and moisture handling qualities. This illustrated guide to light straw clay for stud, timber, pole and other framing styles covers material specifications, best use, mixing, installation, retrofits...

Essential natural plasters

Essential Natural Plasters is the most comprehensive guide to making and using natural plasters for all types of buildings. It covers clay, lime, and gypsum plasters; waterproof tadelakt plaster; fibers and additives; interior and exterior use; substrate preparation; mixing, testing, and tinting;...

Essential prefab straw bale construction

Essential PrefabStraw Bale Construction is an illustrated guide to pre-manufactured bale walls. This manual covers the properties, applications, specifications, code-compliance and climate data, with step-by-step instructions and budgeting information for this development in sustainable building.

Essential rammed earth construction

Essential Rammed Earth Construction covers design, building science, tools, and step-by-step building methods for building with rammed earth - and, gravel, and clay or lime/cement binder packed into forms - in any climate with an emphasis on cold climates.

Essential sustainable home design

Essential Sustainable Home Design walks homebuilders through designing an environmentally friendly home. Covering what makes a building green, a criteria matrix to guide design, material, and systems decisions, working with code officials, and choosing sustainable materials to keep the project ...

Finding community

Finding community is as critical as obtaining food and shelter, since the need to belong is what makes us human. Iintentional communities or ecovillages are an appealing choice for like-minded people who seek to create a family-oriented and ecologically sustainable lifestyle—a lifestyle they are...

Fundamentals of planning cities for healthy living

The proposed book illustrates the decline of community planning for healthy living and outlines measures that can be reintroduced to foster active lifestyles.

Histories of ecological design

This book documents the intersection of architecture and design with ecology, environmental history, policy, governance and law from the 19th century to today. It presents conflicting definitions and concepts of architects and designers and the parallel histories of their intellectual positions t...

Houston genetic city

Houston Genetic City offers a vision for a future Houston as a global city, beyond its current petro-economy, its laissez-faire land speculation, and its notorious sprawl. The book speculates about new forms of urbanism that offer resiliency against our changing climate—from flooding to sea level...

Just enough

How the mindset of traditional Japanese society can guide our own efforts to lead a green lifestyle today.

Manual of biogenic house sections

Recognizing that buildings are a major contributor to global warming and the critical role of embodied versus operational carbon, the book focuses on houses built from materials that either sequester carbon (plants), use materials with very low embodied carbon (earth and stone) or reuse substanti...

Material variance

This book insists on materials not as passive inputs but as unruly agents, shaped by and shaping the political, ecological, and cultural processes around them.

Microhydro

Microhydro features the smallest version of the renewable engery technology dubbed the simplest, most reliable and least expensive way to generate power off grid. Highly illustrated and practical, it is a complete guide to designing and constructing reliable hydroelectric power systems.

Nature and cities

This illustrated collection of essays by leading international architects, landscape architects, city planners, and urban designers demonstrates the economic, environmental, and public health benefits of integrating nature more fully into cities.

Pragmatic engineering and lifestyle

Pragmatic Engineering and Lifestyle draws together international experts from engineering and architecture to disclose the latest insights into forging viable means to sustain tomorrow’s needs.

Projective ecologies

The past two decades have witnessed a resurgence of ecological ideas and ecological thinking in discussions of urbanism, society, culture, and design. The field of ecology has moved from classical determinism and a reductionist Newtonian concern with stability, certainty, and order in favor of m...

Rurality re-imagined

Against a backdrop of rapid urbanization, representations of rural society and experience are re-thought and re-imagined in this book by leading contemporary artists and scholars.

Smart cities for sustainability

As decision-makers apply digitalization in global cities to achieve their SDG goals, contributors from around the world here shed light on forthcoming developments in Smart Cities, and set out how to plan for increasingly rapid changes,

Sustainability, resilience, and inclusiveness through human-centred architecture and design

This edited collection examines the profound ways in which architecture and design can contribute to global imperatives framed by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly those focused on sustainable cities and communities (SDG 11), affordable and clean energy (SDG 7)...

Sustainable architecture

This paperback edition of our bestseller analyses the complex aspects of sustainable architecture and its sociological, environmental and economic impact.

The biomimicry revolution

Henry Dicks explores the philosophical significance of biomimicry, the application and adaptation of strategies found in nature to the development of artificial products and systems. He argues that biomimicry can serve as the basis for a new environmental philosophy that radically alters how we u...

The new carbon architecture

In The New Carbon Architecture, discover biomimicry-inspired innovations in construction – from wooden cities to mycelium insulation – that pull carbon from the atmosphere, heal the climate, and produce safer, healthier, and more beautiful buildings.

The rare metals war

Is the shift to renewable energy and digital devices going to free us from severe pollution, material shortages, and military tensions?

The russian urban sustainability puzzle

This book provides comprehensive analysis of the social-environmental situation and sustainability issues in Russian megacities based on a large-scale mixed method original empirical research conducted in 2015–2019.

The senior cohousing handbook - 2nd edition

This handbook is for seniors who embrace the challenges and opportunities of growing old by creating a community of neighbours and friends in shared cohousing. Senior Cohousing describes a supportive, independent future outside of retirement villages and institutions.

The sustainable city

The Sustainable City provides a broad and engaging overview of the urban systems of the twenty-first century. This second edition dives deeper into the financing of sustainable infrastructure, reviews current trends in urban inequality, and features many more examples and new international case s...

The year-round solar greenhouse

Passive solar greenhouse design including material selection, building methods and how to store thermal energy. Case studies provide real-life inspiration, with guidance for building a durable, energy-efficient greenhouse. Variations include underground and aquaponic greenhouses and integrating ...

Timber!

Planting trees is not enough to reduce carbon. Counterintuitive as it may seem, we must also cut them down and start using wood as a construction material. With the built environment responsible for 40 per cent of the world’s carbon emissions, Brannen's message is clear: we must change how we build.

Today's comprehensive plan

A new model of comprehensive planning as a living process rather than a static documentHow does your community map out a long-term vision for the built environment? Most US cities and counties have long used the comprehensive plan for this purpose. While the plan was conceived to meet the existen...

Urban alchemy

Urban Alchemy delves into the pressing challenges and unique opportunities facing developing countries in their quest for sustainable urban transformation. Readers are introduced to a comprehensive framework designed to guide policymakers, urban planners, and scholars in reimagining the future of...