Facing Density
How Facades Can Facilitate Spatial Densities
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Overview
Abstract
The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs projects a world population growth of over three billion over our current, nearly eight billion by 2100. The World Bank’s downside projections approximate that 751.5 million people are in extreme poverty. Humanity cannot even support the current population, so how will we accommodate an additional one-third of our entire population right now, coupling this with the effects of climate change causing a loss of livable landmass, projected at 19% by 2070. The conflation of these forces upon the Earth implores innovating strategies for providing livable spatial densities for all. Design strategies will be needed to create architectural infrastructure providing a high quality of life for home, work, and play within increasingly dense spatial envelopes. This paper examines the role(s) facades could occupy in creating experiences of spatial expanse within increasingly tighter spatial volumes.
[i] “Climate Issue” New York Times, 26 July 2020, 7.
Authors
Wendy Cox
Professor of Architecture
Norwich University
wcox@norwich.edu
Keywords
Paper Content
Light cannot escape the extreme density of a black hole. Nor could it enter the depths of the former Chinese walled city Kowloon which once held the densest population of
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Conclusion
Limits are real. Limits have been defining how to stay alive during this pandemic. Although social limits are temporary, we continue breaking our planet's physical, chemical, and biological limits, insouciant