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The February issue of RECORD included work by SiP presenters including Bucholz McEvoy. Photo © Architectural Record

On February 19, more than 200 architects, allied design professionals, and students gathered at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge for RECORD’s third Sustainability in Practice conference. Organized in collaboration with MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning, the sold-out event was an opportunity to discuss new products and bespoke building systems, innovative built projects, groundbreaking research, and in some cases, career-spanning work by sustainability pioneers in both architecture and landscape architecture.  

Ellis Herman, principal product manager at Autodesk, presented Forma, a cloud-based software that allows architects to quickly determine the most effective massing strategies, optimal orientations, and building materials to reach sustainability goals during the concept and schematic design phases. Giuseppe Ardito, senior product owner at Autodesk, presented Insight for Revit, a tool for total carbon analysis in architectural design. Andrea Zani and Anna Foden of Permasteelisa discussed the company’s use of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) to measure and minimize environmental impact, and its strategies for designing and constructing low-carbon curtain walls. Kingspan’s Andy McIntyre talked about methods and tools that building designers can employ to limit embodied carbon in building envelopes.

Ilias Papageorgiou, founder of Greek studio, PILA, presented his firm’s revamp of a 24-story tower in Piraeus, a port city neighboring Athens. The office building had been nearly vacant since its construction in the early 1970s. The architect outlined the strategies for bringing the long-dormant structure back to life, including a new facade of louvers, which, though fixed, give the appearance of rotation as one moves around the building. The louvers shield a new skin of high-performance glazing, replacing the original curtain wall, which was carefully dismantled and recycled. Even the gaskets, said Papageorgiou, were reused to make athletic turf.

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Anna Foden and Andrea Zani of Permasteelisa discuss low-carbon facades (1); Ellis Herman and Giuseppe Ardito of Autodesk discussing the company's Forma and Insight software (2). Photos © Architectural Record, click to enlarge

Structural engineer John Ochsendorf, a professor at MIT, and Juliana Berglund-Brown, a PhD researcher at the school, gave a joint talk on designing for circularity and low-carbon construction technologies. To illustrate how varied two buildings for the same use could be in their environmental impact, Ochsendorf pointed to the Bird’s Nest, the stadium built forwe the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, and the stadium built for the 2012 games in London. The former has an embodied carbon intensity of 1,300 kgCO2e per square meter, while the latter has one of only 250 kgCO2e per square meter. “We could build five London stadiums for every Bird’s Nest,” he said. Meanwhile, Berglund-Brown advocated for using salvaged materials—steel in particular—in new buildings, with Ochsendorf recommending “designing with the beam you have instead of the beam you want,” and adding, “we need to get creative and stop the cycle of build-demolish-landfill.”

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MIT's head of architecture Nicholas de Monchaux (3); MIT PhD researcher Juliana Berglund-Brown spoke about building obsolescence and steel reuse with John Ochsendorf (4). Photos © Architectural Record

Their talk was followed by a presentation by Brian Raff, vice president of Sustainability & Government Relations at the American Institute of Steel Construction, who discussed ways the steel industry in the U.S. has moved toward cleaner production and promoting steel reuse.

Landscape architects Chris Hardy of Sasaki and Anne Whiston Spirn of MIT talk with RECORD deputy editor Joann Gonchar. Photo © Architectural Record

A panel discussion pivoted away from buildings, instead focusing on landscape, with Anne Whiston Spirn, professor of landscape architecture and planning at MIT, and Chris Hardy, senior associate at Sasaki’s Boston office, presenting two urban projects at very different scales—from neighborhood regeneration in West Philadelphia to reimagining the former Athens airport.

Karen McEvoy and Merritt Bucholz of Dublin-based Bucholz McEvoy Architects. Photo © Architectural Record

Merritt Bucholz and Karen McEvoy, founders of Dublin-based Bucholz McEvoy Architects, concluded the day-long conference with a keynote highlighting their firm’s climate-attuned architecture. Among the civic projects that the duo presented was the new headquarters of the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority (TRCA), whose mission includes regulating development in the surrounding area to ensure responsible management of water, land, and natural habitats, as well as to protect it from extreme weather events, especially flooding.

A Q&A with the audience followed many presentations. Photos © Architectural Record

The next Sustainability in Practice conference will take place in September at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago alongside the magazine’s annual Women in Architecture Awards and coinciding with the city’s decade-old architecture biennial. Sign up for RECORD’s new Sustainability newsletter to be the first to know when registration opens up.