Sustainability

Awards, panels, exhibitions and a long overdue update /  by Julian Rutt

Once again, it's been too long between posts. With two projects due to begin on site shortly, its been a busy time of late.

The Billabong Houses are once again (most likely for the last time ever) being opened to the public on Sunday the 23rd of October as part of the Space Open House tours, a national day. Bookings are essential: Eventbrite link

The AIA awards were held back in July, and once again I had the honour of being a juror for the sustainability category, entailing a full day of presentations from architects and clients on the design philosophy and sustainability merits of their projects, followed by a day of site visits of those shortlisted and interesting discussions. All up an interesting, thought-provoking process celebrating excellence in architecture. You can see the results and winners of the various categories here with beautiful images and jury citations: AIA SA Awards

 

As a precursor to the 2016 Sustainable House Day, I recently had the opportunity to speak on a panel in a forum hosted by the Adelaide Sustainable Building Network (ASBN) regarding zero energy homes along with representatives from Sustainability House and Solar Quotes for the ASBN's mini-expo. A podcast of the discussion is online HERE.

For the first time in 20 years, April saw the AIA National Conference held in Adelaide, curated by the former State Government Architect Ben Hewitt, Sam Spurr & Cameron Bruhn. Another fantastic event with a myriad of intriguing global speakers, well attended by delegates from all around the country.

And the Billabong Houses picked up another award in the City of Norwood, Payneham & St Peters Excellence in Urban Design Awards 2016. Held once every 4 years or so, the award aims to foster excellence in the public realm through design and thoughtful regeneration, other award winners included Troppo for their Maylands House and Williams Burton Leopardi for Base 64 in Kent Town. NPSP EIUDA

On the photography front, I've had the pleasure of exhibiting again with Skrambled Eggs, this time being run as part of the Shimmer Photography Biennale held by the City of Onkaparinga in September. Skrambled Eggs is the brainchild of photographer Ben Liew, having established photographers exhibit works taken purely by smart phones - my contributions being typically architectural in nature. For something a little different I was asked to document various Indonesian batiks and fabrics for an exhibition run in conjunction with Flinder University and the Oz Asia festival and held recently at the Adelaide Festival Centre.

Fun with thermal cameras, or how you can see your design's insulation performance.. /  by Julian Rutt

Early in the summer, I had the chance of running a thermal imaging camera through one of the Billabong Houses, to 'view' the thermal range within the internal spaces and across different components of the house, eg the walls, glazing, frames etc.

After the some initial amusement from its resemblance to The Predator's heat-vision of its victims (from the 1980s movie of the same name) you can see how the camera allows you to view the range of temperatures in the frame; the highest temperature (HI) and the general range colour coded.

These images below (from friend Scott who hired the camera to test on his new eco-home) show where ceiling insulation was detected missing there, the last image around a light fitting.

The following are some images taken within the Billabong House with a regular photo beside it for orientation. In the first example notice how the heat outside is visible through the half open door and how the 'Low-E' glazing cuts out transmission of the infra-red heat to inside.

The next image of the lounge room shows the narrow temperature range inside, the window locations being easily distinguishable.

Here the positions of the timber studs are clearly visible behind the wall face - no missing insulation here! Again, the roof windows showing only minor variation in temperature from the surrounding surfaces.

The final image is of a detail of the green wall adjacent the deck area - a much larger temperature range is detected, but interesting of note that the vegetation of the partly grown green wall is shown to be significantly cooler than the surrounding surfaces; this will have some effect on cooling the local micro climate to an area with doors and a large area of glazing and will continue to improve as the green wall gets covered and the vines on the pergola over continue to grow.

Greenwall thermal

Adelaide Sustainable Building Network talk + SHD '14 /  by Julian Rutt

I have the honour of presenting at the next of the Adelaide Sustainable Building Network's 'Spotlight' series events; The Eco Build Experience, specifically regarding my experience during the design process and build of the Billabong Houses. Co presenting will be Terry Dolman who is a lecturer at TAFE in the school of Building, Design & Drafting and has his own project underway.

Registration, presenter & event details here:  https://guestlistapp.com/events/275943

It's being held at the Institute of Architects SA office, 100 Flinders Street, Adelaide, from 6:30 pm on Wednesday 27th August, with a Q&A session following the presentations.
 

The ASBN on Facebook here:  https://www.facebook.com/pages/Adelaide-Sustainable-Building-Network/219452251408780

And a video archive of many previous ASBN talks can be found here:  https://vimeo.com/adelaidesbn

 

In related news, one of the Billabong Houses will again be open for tours on Sustainable House Day, in early September. A quick link is here, though there will be another post about this closer to the date(s):  http://sustainablehouseday.com/item/julians-house/

ASBN Flyer

ASBN Flyer

The Adelaide Sustainable Building Network is a small, locally based, not-for profit business group with the aim of connecting professionals and community members passionate about building sustainable living environments. Our organization aims to connect many different fields and branches of society.  This exposure to other local professionals and community members is what we believe will foster collaboration between businesses, other organizations, and individuals to make a sustainable future a reality.

AIA awards 2014 - Winners (+ Billabong house success!) /  by Julian Rutt

Friday the 4th of July saw in the 2014 SA Chapter Australian Institute of Architects awards presentation and ceremony at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre, and Lumen's Billabong Houses project picked up a Commendation in the Sustainability category, and the Adelaide Review People's Choice award!

A night celebrating excellence in architecture, the already iconic SAHMRI building on North Terrace picked up 5 awards for Public, Commercial and Interior architecture, Sustainability and the Colorbond steel prize, with other notable winners including Sue Phillips and Michael Pilkington winning the President's medal and projects from Grieve Gillett, Max Pritchard, Dimmity Andersen, MPH and Troppo amoung others, with Guy Maron's Bicentennial Conservatory winning the 25 year enduring architecture award and Matt Davis the Emerging architect prize.

Congratulations to all the winners, thanks to all the jurors giving their time, everyone at the SA chapter of the AIA making the night, and of course those who voted for the Billabong Houses for People's Choice!

 

Click the links below to read in more detail and peruse the inspiring images of the winners:

http://wp.architecture.com.au/voice/2014-winners/

http://architectureau.com/articles/2014-sa-architecture-awards/

South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI) by Woods Bagot. Image: Peter Clarke

South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI) by Woods Bagot. Image: Peter Clarke