Why remove the human hand? As mentioned in The Art of Classic Planning, hand work is essential for human wellbeing, and massive construction projects may in fact be our way out of this difficult time. The savings with 3D-printing technology benefits only the owners of that technology, not the users or buildings or the people in the street on which they stand. Certainly not the construction worker. Definitely not the community. 

But worse than that is the idea of using solid wastes sourced from steel mills, coal plants, and urban construction sites. Sorting them, granulating them and processing them into the ink that feeds the 3D printer almost guarantees the increased presence of heavy meals in the built environment. Where is the proof of their absence? And while the world is running out of sand, such systems rely on it, no less than conventional concrete does. So where is the improvement?⁵ 

In its quest for progress, Western society is, to its detriment, subsidizing certain technologies and methods over others, and China is following suit in blind imitation. Worse, with steel mill wastes making up to 60% of the building “ink,” China may not only be poisoning itself but re-poisoning its people and places.

No, there is nothing progressive about glass curtain walls. They have been an architectural fashion for 100 years. In the US, the Gulf States, and even in China, the proclaim nothing more than Modernism’s reliance on cheap energy—and the presence of huge government energy subsidies. Everywhere else curtain walls express dreary consumerism. Their reflectivity is sold on the myth of their transparency. Is there any other field in which the Emperor’s clothes are more obvious? 

If China insists on an illusion that will expire like bad milk in the heat, it is their choice. But other places, where there is still a measure of common sense should reconsider the false promises of so-called “green” but in fact over-complicated devices and systems. Architects can no longer hide behind their mechanical or structural engineers. They have to fully understand and know what they are putting into their buildings.

Creating new floor surfaces with recycled pieces of old glass is old-hat. Building exterior retaining walls of “rip-rap,” chunks of old cement collected from demolished structures, has been done since concrete was invented 2,000 years ago. Today, anyone considering a “curtain wall” as an important energy efficiency renovation is likely fooling only themselves. It is not only the heat gain on a building, but how that heat moves around. And then there is the matter of fresh air and air changes. Has anyone recently thought of simply opening a window?

Just as in the fountains of Rome water flowed from its natural sources, through them, and drained directly into the Tiber without stopping, atmospheric air should, in most cases, flow directly through buildings for their ventilation. Net Positive Toronto Mechanical Engineer Jack Laken says that heating, cooling, humidifying, desiccating, and filtering air should in most cases be necessary only in highly specialized environments like operating theaters, clean rooms, and food plants. If the external air is not good enough to breathe, the place is not good enough to inhabit.

Thank normal people for the slow acceptance of novelty. Passive design, heating or cooling a building without mechanical means, has been done for thousands of years. Indeed, when it comes to habitation comfort heating in deserts in winter often requires more energy than cooling them in summer might need. Traditional Baghdadi, Damascene, Cairene and Pakistani townhouses all had substantial elements that provided comfort in summer and winter. Many “passive designs,” which use no fuel for heating or cooling, already exist in China’s traditional houses.⁶

Sometimes, taking vernacular ideas and expanding on them for energy-efficient public buildings is a good way to start, as Beijing-based architect Dong Mei has been doing in her exploration of daylighting. The problem with “green” solutions isn’t resistance to something different and new, but that they are simply inadequate when out of context. When a vernacular-type “daylighting solution” requires more Jetsons hardware for mechanical shading, it is simply yet another system for a client to purchase and manage.

But in the traditional Chinese courtyard houses, temperatures are regulated without any mechanical means. In these houses, warm air rises through a tall space and draws a draught of cooler air in below.