When millions were displaced by the Dust Bowl and job loss during the Great Depression, the federal government made housing a priority. The Roosevelt Administration enlisted leading thinkers, collectively known as “housers.” These architects, designers and social scientists challenged barriers to housing for all.
On the surface, the comfortable escapes inhabited by 21st century men seem worlds apart from the dark, stoney initiation chambers fashioned by their ancient brothers. The carpeted contemporary cave and the jagged cleft in the earth, however, share common foundations in the male psyche.
Sanctuary is hard to find these days. Even home, that timeless refuge from the world’s travails and upheavals, offers little escape from the social unrest that’s raging around the globe. Now more than ever we need a safe harbor, a haven that can soothe and calm us, and be a bulwark against the problems of the outside world.
We regard any change in the home—whether it’s downsizing, renovating or reorganizing—as a rite of passage, a fresh start that comes with a built-in guarantee of happiness like finding a new career or falling in love. Yet these activities are fluid, rich, expansive, and our approach to the home has grown perfectionistic and restrictive.
Physicist and Emmy-award winning filmmaker Brian Swimme explores our place in the cosmos and the role of chaos, awe, and wonder in the birth of the universe. Drawing on discoveries in astronomy, geology, biology and the humanities, he tells how we came to call this planet home.
For years I have been teaching people how to look at nature and how to use its basic principles to create an inspired home. Here are a few tips that will make your house feel like it’s part of a living landscape. These stem from 3.8 billion years of evolution, or the earth’s own R&D.
Our new skyscrapers will head in the opposite direction—down into the oceans like strands of kelp and into the earth like searching roots.
Green buildings are a growing presence on city skylines, making the temperatures more comfortable and the air easier to breathe. The skin of the building is covered with such dense plantings it appears to be wholly organic.