Julien De Smedt was interviewed for an article on desiring sustainably in the new magazine Above, out now in magazine shops worldwide!

Check out the article which also includes interviews with Charles Renfro of Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Marc Kushner and Mattias Hollwich of HWKN, and Florian Idenburg of SO-IL.

Here’s a little bit about Above:

Responding to the urgent need for sustainable living, Above magazine calls upon the environmentally conscious and everyone else interested in the future by sharpening its focus on the endangered beauty of the world.

It is our firm belief that photography, the plastic arts, fashion, architecture and design can be instrumental in raising awareness about the need to preserve nature and we aim to share our opinionated, yet aesthetic vision, with our readers.

Check out an online preview of the magazine HERE

Click on to find out more about Above

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Rori Knudtson and Ken Renaud along with 11 students from UC Denver journeyed their way into Copenhagen for their investigation of research-based, multidisciplinary practices.  Visiting JDS was part of their individual projects and preparation for the Biennial of the Americas next summer in Denver, a seven-week event directed by the city and Bruce Mau. Their next destination: Bergen!

More info can be found here:
www.ingoodwetrust2010.com
www.ucdenver.edu

Henrik Vibskov . The Solar Donkey Experiment . Show ss10 .

25th June 2009 . 9pm . Lycee Turgot . 69 Rue De Turbigo . 75003 Paris . Press Contact: press@agenturv.de . tel +49 176 310 710 . fax +49 30 420 19 266 .

Showroom . 26th - 29th June . Galerie Pascal Gabert . 11 Rue De Perche . 75003 Paris . Sales Contact: rune@henrikvibskov.com . tel +45 26 125 129 .

Julien De Smedt is to lecture on the subject Advancing in Basic Architecture on Friday, 19 June, 2009 at the IAAC Auditorium in Barcelona, Spain at 19.30 h.

More information can be found on the IAAC site.

The Holmenkollen Ski Jump is on its way for completion by 2011.  Here is a nice little morphing of  the current construction site to the completed design for our impatient readers.

Archinect features the work of the JDS UK Studio focusing on the Shippingport area of Lousville, including an interview with Julien De Smedt by Archinect’s Paul Petrunia.

Read the full article HERE

Stefan Behling gave a superb lecture on the glabal environment and the way we live in cities and the small changes we can make in order to radically reduce carbon emissions, he then went on the describe Masdar city and how it was conceived. One of the core principles is to be a zero carbon city, compared to the average 1,100,000 Tonnes of Co2 that is put into our atmosphere every year by other comparable sized cities. The goal is to use good, sustainable architecture to bring down the carbon footprint of a person in the worlds most extreme climate, where the UAE has the highest carbon footprint per capita in the world. Stefan showed figures that prove by using intelligent innovative sustainable design we can reach targets of 20% our current carbon footprint per capita that in turn give people not only a lower carbon footprint but a better quality of life.

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European Future Energy Forum - Day Two, 10th June 2009

Today’s focus was on the transport industry and how it is far to slow in catching up to adequate levels to mitigate climate change, Former UK Minister for Transport Steven Norris chaired an extremely interesting debate which he hopes will influence UK and European policy to be much tougher on Transportation and Energy companies to invest in renewable and fossil fuel free technologies to turn the transport industry into a sustainable one. Contrasting against Bianca Jaggers statement that we have 10 years left, the transport industry heads pessimistically say it will take 35 years to implement policy change.

Round table discussions involved talking about Masdar new PRT (public Rapid Transport) tram system which will be a public transport system that will completely replace cars in Masdar city relying solely on electricity generated from the solar power, currently the technology transports the entire container traffic around Rotterdam port and Masdar wish to change this into public transport that can transport 6 people from one destination to the next without stopping and picking up other passengers, it will have 3000 PRTs running underneath the ground in Masdar when it is finished!

European Future Energy Forum - Day One 9th June 2009

Today’s debate revolved around changing energy policy at Governmental level with Bianca Jagger, Chair, World Future Council and Council of Europe Goodwill Ambassador, opening up with a alarming statement that we have only 10 years to improve our stance and global agenda towards climate change and sustainability before the carbon levels are irreversible and shall permanently damage the planet affecting 300 million humans worldwide.

In contrast to this Dr Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, CEO of Masdar, Abu Dhabi’s new carbon neutral, zero waste and energy positive city gave an optimistic talk about breaking the boundaries of sustainability as we know it and creating a society that is engineered and invented to subvert radically changing our lifestyle but embracing sustainability as a way of life. An extremely interesting and positive development it will be the first realised example of a carbon neutral city and employ radically advanced changes that will help shape how we as architects operate.

JDS’ exhibition in the Future Urban Zone opened today with 7 exemplar sustainable projects in different regions around the globe highlighting specific responses to individual climates and bold visions which seek to innovate the world of sustainability in Architecture.