Color Theory

These images on MoCo Loco's Art MoCo featuring the work of artist Denny McCoy's simple yet somehow deep paintings of colored bands, jogged my memory of a couple of recent color-related resources that floated by recently. Part photoshop swatch, part Timbuk2 messenger bag - it's not the composition, but the complement of shades and tones that give this work resonance.

:: Rural Free Delivery - image via MoCo Loco



:: Cypress Creek - image via MoCo Loco

Maybe it's because plants come with so many built in choices, or that we fear the power of color, but often this is an overlooked and powerful design element to and landscape composition. The psychological effects of color on the psyche is oft-mentioned and probably more oft-misapplied due to generalization, but at least the effort is there. How can this be applied in a meaningful way to design? I've always relied on my slim copy of Johannes Itten's wonderful book 'The Elements of Color' , a text for 100-level University Art, for the basics. I still reference often today.


:: image via Amazon

A couple of recent reports expanded the idea of color-related preferences, and their applicability to landscape architecture and urban design. A fascinating study of Canadian cities and 'Local Color' from Brand Avenue - taken from a recent article in The Walrus, where Todd Falkowsky's is described: "I began by taking scores of photographs and employed computer software to pull out the predominant colours of Ottawa and the provincial and territorial capitals. The exact process that worked in Toronto did not necessarily work elsewhere — there is also an intuitive element to it. For each city, I had to centre on what makes it unique, such as prominent landmarks or distinctive features of its built environment. As a result, regional differences emerge: the North tends to be very bright, the Maritimes aquatic, Ottawa pale."

See swatch samples from Winnipeg, Victoria, and Quebec City below. What colors would your city be?






:: images via Brand Avenue

Treehugger profiled a study by Getty Images MAP study 'Aspirational Environmentalism' that studies imagery and shows the trend of environmentalism away from stereotypical representations and 'propoganda' into a more expansive message. One that will typically eschew the color green - due to the direct connotation with the environmental movement.

:: MAP Report 2 - via Getty Images

:: image via Treehugger

I wonder how this will affect architecture and design, as green becomes a stigmatic hue - will vegetation on buildings become a problem versus a value-added?

Color theory is more vital due to the prevalence of digital rendering software in our field. These tools offer some great resources for determining color palettes for both representation and design. A colleague at work found Kuler, from Adobe Labs. A shared resource where designers can develop, save and sift through others color combinations. Here's the swatches from the 'Orange on Olive', one of the combos featured, amongst hundreds.




:: images via Kuler

The site also offers a number of additional color-related resources. One favorite I found was 'In the Mod: Color Analytics' - which provides Photoshop swatches of famous modern artworks. Once a palette is chosen, other palettes of similar paintings by other artists - a way of noticing some similarities, and I was frankly surprised by some of the similarities.

Color, as I mentioned, is a powerful tool. Architecture spans monochromatic to highly varied colors in both interiors and exteriors. Landscapes offer, through plants, soil, water and sky - any hue imaginable in our imagination. Collectively, these become powerful materials and options at our disposal as designers. Like all other materials we utilize, we must continue to study, learn, evolve our thinking to capture the potential of this simple yet powerful tool.

Living Walls: Indoor Filtering

New Vegetated Architecture, moving to the indoors. This post was borne of images from the Cambridge Civic Administration Building in Toronto, featuring a large indoor living wall very reminiscent of the project at Guelph-Humber. This gives us the opportunity to get into depth regarding the function of indoor walls (and indoor vegetation by default) to provide climate modification via 'vertical filters' (one of the VegArch typologies).

From World Architecture News on the Cambridge Building: "Features of the building include a four-storey atrium which will act as an interior public square during the winter months. The atrium also features a green wall bio-filter which is a component of the indoor air quality systems and is an element of the sustainable design strategy for the building."




:: images via WAN

So how do these things work? For some answers, the first stop is a company that evolved from the research of Dr. Alan Darlington on the Guelph-Humber project, Air Quality Solutions, and specifically their Naturaire® Systems.


:: images via Air Quality Solutions

Their site offers the most detailed account of some of the scientific processes at work to provide air quality benefits by the use of indoor plants. In addition, the also have a pretty good library of research. A summary of the process (all quotations from the AQS site):

1. The process involves a hybrid of two technologies: "... biofiltration, the use of biological systems of beneficial microbes to break organic pollutants down their benign constituents and phyto-remediation, the use of green plants to facilitate the remediation or reclamation of contaminated soils or water."

2. Unlike mechanical filters which clog or saturate, plants are self-rejuvenating: "Because the pollutants in the air are broken down to their benign constituents, there is nothing to accumulate in the system."

3. Because of the variability of indoor contaminants,: "Microbial species diversity is a key parameter. To maximize diversity, an indoor biofilter must provide many different microbial ecological niches."

4. This is where planting comes in, offering a: "...complex ecosystem which infers operational stability and, in contrast to conventional biofiltration, ecosystem diversity which may promote the degradation of a broader range of contaminants."

5. Plants are beneficial in other ways, by a variety of means. These include, a high surface area ratio, they are regenerative, can actively break down microbes versus merely filtering - both in vegetation and roots, accumulate airborne pollutants and dust, and provide a CO2 sink via photosynthesis.


:: images via Air Quality Solutions

Why would you implement a project such as this, aside from the obvious aesthetic benefits? The quality of our indoor air has degraded to the degree that poor air quality is fourth on a list of 31 environmental threats in the US, according to the EPA. According to Air Quality Solutions: "It is estimated that nearly 25% of US residents are affected by poor indoor air quality, either at the workplace or the home. Indoor air pollutants can be as diverse as toxic chemicals emitted from building materials and furnishings, combustion pollutants like carbon monoxide and toxic particles, and biological contaminants such as moulds and bacteria."


:: Dr. Darlington, I presume? - image via Treehugger

The final technical issue is sizing, which varies depending on the system, contaminant load, and level of cleaning, but works by the following rule of thumb: "Given most residential and office conditions, a ratio of at least 1 to 100 for the area of the biofilter to floor area to be treated will give desired affect. Given typical operating conditions, this will mean that one square metre of biofilter will treat 100 square metres of floor space (or 1 square foot of biofilter will treat 100 square feet of floor space)."

Below is a simplified diagram of a circulating indoor system, with pump, and fan providing flows throughout the aparatus:

:: images via Manhattan Plant Experts

The type of plants matter, for starters, check out Treehugger's list from NASA of the top 5 indoor cleaning plants, (fyi: peace lily, bamboo palm, English ivy, mums, gerbera daisies). Yikes, I may stick with bad air if that's my choices.

And applications vary as well, to high-tech, small-scale solutions working on similar principles, such as the Bel-Air, "...a mini mobile greenhouse that continuously inhales the space-polluted air, forces it through three natural filters (the plant leaves, its roots, and a humid bath) before ejecting it, purified."


:: Bel-Air - image via Core77

So the multiple benefits together help to justify the cost of implementation. Natureaire has developed two 'systems', Natureaire Supreme - in 'classic' or 'custom'. This always kind of scare me a bit as off-the-shelf nature (read green roof 'systems') is never something I've been too comfortable with. But the idea of a system, or at the very least, some viable precedents with proven track records, makes me feel that we will soon be seeing more of these proposed and built throughout the world.

Veg.itecture: Queens Botanical Garden Visitors Center

It really amazes me the composition of buildings envisioned 5 years ago versus today, and the short time period that has elapsed between sporadic vegetated architecture examples and the explosion of current projects. Some days, it seems hard to keep up. Here's a new, built example in NYC:


:: image via NYT City Room

A note from Archinect announced the opening of BKSK Architects' Visitor's Center for the Queen's Botanical Garden. Partially earth sheltered, and partially vegetated building, this LEED-Platinum building is a stunning expression of the QBC's mission: "...a living museum serving the most ethnically diverse county in the United States, is committed to presenting collections, education and research initiatives and programs that demonstrate environmental stewardship, promote sustainability and celebrate the rich cultural connections between people and plants."




:: images via Wired New York

Another recent article in Metropolis featured the project, 'A Garden Blooms in Queens' with some great photography and a wonderful overview. Here's the an overall plan (top), a photo of the ecoroof (middle) and the water feature at the end of the cleansing biotope (bottom):

:: Plan: Click to Enlarge - image via Metropolis




:: additional images via Metropolis

A major strategy in LEED-Platinum is water-efficiency, and the building has an agressive plan for On-Site Rainwater Reuse (via Metropolis), including the rooftop and biotope spaces:

"On-site Rainwater Management: When children come to visit the garden, members of its educa­tion staff perform a very simple experiment, Jennifer Ward Souder says. “They put red-tinted water in a length of clear glass pipe, which contains a thick layer of soil. When the water comes out at the other end, it’s clear.” The same experiment is operating on a much larger scale all around them: the new building and the grounds around it have been designed to capture and filter rain. Since the building was completed in September, there has been plenty of rainfall, and none of it has entered the city’s sewers, which is important because they carry effluent and storm water through the same pipes; when they overflow during a deluge, they pollute the city’s rivers. “We set the goal of one hundred percent storm-water management on-site,” Souder says. So far the goal is being met.

1. TERRACE ROOF Rainwater collected on the gull-shaped roof over the building’s plaza pours down dramatically into a “cleansing biotope.”

2. CLEANSING BIOTOPE Captured rainwater enters a catchment area (augmented by a 24,000-gallon underground tank), where it is filtered through soil and the roots of native wetland plants, including soft rush, pickerelweed, and cattail."

Even some of the details were arboreal, with an main entrance gate in metal tree-form:


:: image via Metropolis

The ability to have a building and site strongly reflect the mission of an organization is a statement of the quality of designers and clients both. A Botanical Garden leading the way with innovative sustainable landscape strategies is laudable, and striving for high LEED rating, as well as taking advantage of extremely refined approaches, makes this a case study for all to study.