BIOARCHITECTURE ARTICLE
BY ARCH. UGO SASSO
Principles and achievements
Architecture that is attentive to the environment and life has been talked about for some time now, even if the achievements completed, beyond a few houses built for oneself or for a homeopathic friend, are still very few.
The problem is that ecological architecture is not just a style applicable to a finished product, it does not contemplate standardized solutions capable of transforming an insensitive intervention into the home of dreams.
Instead, it is a matter of adopting a more correct attitude at every moment of the design and construction, capable of mediating the different needs (organizational, distributive, economic), combining them with the coordinates of Bio-compatibility and eco-sustainability. In this sense, it is a matter of recovering a culture of design that, at different scales, cares more about substance than image, remembering that even the smallest intervention interferes with the previous balances and changes the interior anyway, so building is always an act of violence against nature.
So, before designing, renovating, intervening, you need to talk, listen, feel the owners the place the sky the wind. Here are some general rules on the organization of a healthy home.
First of all it must breathe, that is, allow the exchange of air, dispose of humidity and allow the passage of radiation that comes from the cosmos.
Dampen, filter, select the extreme world (polluting noises, cold and heat, foreign presences, etc.).
Use natural materials (wood, lime, magnesium, earth, terracotta, cork, wool, linen). Be wary of plastics and new products (experimentation on humans is not advisable).
Avoid any waste of energy both in the construction and maintenance phases. Solar energy does not cost and is essential for life: open air, glass gardens, thermal accumulation in walls, solar panels, etc.
Imitate heating to the minimum necessary. Avoid types of heating that, by moving the air, raise dust and microbes. The sun heats by radiation: this is the best way. So large radiant surfaces (stoves, walls, long system runs), no to radiant floors.
Highly fear glues, paints, chemical solvents of any kind. Remember that materials have a color that is beautiful even when it ages and changes. Do not look for an aseptic and perfect house, but a comfortable house that grows with us.
Pay particular attention to electromagnetic pollution, therefore shielded cables and appliances, excellent earthing, distance from the station places of any ferromagnetic mass. Remember that magnetic fields are not shielded by walls and therefore also act beyond the walls.
Love greenery so that nature enters between the walls and helps to purify and oxygenate the air: plants everywhere except in the bedrooms.
Give care and consideration to the bedroom, if you do not sleep well your energies are not recharged. Therefore no spatial furnishings but simplicity and affection in things. The bed should be on the north-south axis, possibly with the head to the north. No synthetic materials. Springs, masses or metal stems and mirrors that look at the sleeper.
Save, recycle, recover (the old wardrobe or the fruit crates, the roof tiles or the disused sink). If we have participated in the construction, the house will be more ours.
