Foliage covered building by Mass Studies

Seoul, South Korea

Belgian Fashion Designer Ann Demeulemeester's store is absoluelt covered in plants and foliage in a living wall that takes it to the extreme!! External and internal walls are living which creates a feeling that the building is 'growing up from underneath the greenery'.

The building is 3 floors tall, with Ann Demeulemeester's store on the first floor, restaurant on the third and a 'multi-shop' in the basement. Seoul-based designers, Mass Studies Architects wanted to incorporate as much nature into the building, considering the building's low-elevation, high density urban environment.

Visit their site at: http://www.massstudies.com/

google earth pollution

Something that should help some of us landscape architects - google earth is now showing air pollution -





''Google Earth has always been a very cool way to see the world, and recently they have added some very green features including green buildings, and now the ability to visualize air pollution! Thanks to the US EPA, it is now easy to find out exactly how air pollution is affecting your neighborhoods and neighborhoods around the world.

With the new Google Earth features, you will be able to find out the sources of pollution from the major point sources in the United States. These include cement facilities, manufacturing plants, refineries and electric generating units. Each of these will provide information on the carbon monoxide, lead, nitrogen oxide, VOCs, particulate matter and sulfur dioxide. The data is displayed in graph form, and you can also visually compare each emitter to the next, thanks to the location of the height of each marker.''


http://www.inhabitat.com/2007/12/26/google-earth-shows-the-air-pollution-of-where-you-live/#more-7727

Ham House

On a brisk morning in December, I cycled to Strawberry Hill to visit Ham House - the topic of our year one first assesment essay for History and Cultural studies.

A thick coating of mud and a 45 minute wrong turn into the common eventually delivered me to the fantastic wonders of this 17 Century house. Ok in all honesty it is rather dull, since the house is closed for visits during Winter. The gardens however are lovely and rather grandeur....