Customer Reviews

The Philosophy of Sustainable Design

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Simply put, this book serves up excellent insights into the only future of architecture and the hope for our injured environment... sustainable design. McLennan is more than an author or advocate... he is a deep green thinker who practices on a daily basis what he preaches. Of the many great books available on this subject I found this one the most comprehensive. The Philosophy of Sustainable Design encompassing not only the materials, technologies, and methods available to green designers but it highlights the leaders, champions and innovators who are driving the green building movement forward. This book offers information (and inspiration) for the seasoned and the novice. Read it, share it and read it again!

Jason is the quintessential green warrior. Young, enthusiastic, exceedingly bright, and seemingly undaunted at the prospect of swimming against the current, Jason shares with us his passion for sustainable design. Having spent the formative years of his career working with the veritable giants of the sustainable design field, Jason shares his unique perspectives and experiences that today's up and coming green warriors can only dream of.

A must for any aspiring architect, Jason takes the reader through the entire series of timeless principles that form the very foundation of sustainable design with loads of practical examples and current references to help empower the reader to internalize and apply those principles in their own practice. At the end of our journey, we are convinced that it is the rest of the world that is, in fact, swimming against the current, and we are emboldened and encouraged to follow our instincts, and are reminded that good design not only can, but in fact must be sustainable. He also dedicates an entire chapter to predicting the future of architecture, complete with a timeline for the next 100 years!

Jason specifically reaches out to encourage the next generation of green warriors with a chapter dedicated to understanding the drivers of, and barriers to, sustainable design in today's corporate structures and design firms, giving the reader a helpful "big picture" overview to help recognize the progress of an organization's corporate culture on the path to sustainability, and to better understand how to make a difference.

To complete the package as an essential resource, the appendices include Jason's own "Green Warrior Reading List", & a "Who's Who in Green Design".

A must-read for anyone serious about facilities design in the 21st. century.

I came late to bioneering, after I was inspired by Herman Daly's Ecological Economics: Principles And Applications, Brian Czech's Shoveling Fuel for a Runaway Train: Errant Economists, Shameful Spenders, and a Plan to Stop them All; and everything by Paul Hawkin, but especially The Ecology of Commerce.

I have had an interest in the intersection of global science, sustainable political and social and economic orders, and the vulnerability of the nation-state in the face of growing complexity for some time, and many of my other reviews focus on these literatures, as well as the literatures of collective intelligence, global assemlages, wealth of networks, localized resilience, and so on.

I make mention of that broader literature to add emphasis to my view that this book is one of the most extraordinary I have ever encountered. I made a mistake when I first got it months ago and put it sight unseen into my "hard and dense, save for intercontinental trip." This book is not hard, not dense, and it is both easy to read and intellectually elegant. I can easily see this book as the single mandatory first year or summer pre-reading at any level--undergraduate or graduate--along with contextual books such as:
High Noon 20 Global Problems, 20 Years to Solve Them
Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, Third Edition
The Future of Life
The leadership of civilization building: Administrative and civilization theory, symbolic dialogue, and citizen skills for the 21st century and
Collective Intelligence: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace

The sixteen chapters and five appendices are elegant--concise, clear key points, short, just the right mix of photos (including color in a center spread) figures, and text.

The publisher has been criminally remiss in failing to load the varied items that Amazon allows, such as the table of contents. I am increasingly disenchanted with publishers and of the view that Amazon should get into the book publishing business, sending digital copies to FedExKinko's, helping authors self publish (full disclosure: BOTH Fred Smith at FedEx and Jeff Bezos at Amazon blew me off--these guys are simply not serious about innovation).

Preface: Philosophical Beginnings
Chapter 1: The Philosophy of Sustainable Design
Chapter 2: The Evolution of Sustainable Design
Chapter 3: The Principles of Sustainable Design (Biomimicry)
Chapter 4: The Principles of Sustainable Design (Human Vitality)
Chapter 5: The Principles of Sustainable Design (Ecosystem/Bioregional)
Chapter 6: The Principles of Sustainable Design (Seven Generations)
Chapter 7: The Principles of Sustainable Design (Energy/True Cost)
Chapter 8: The Principles of Sustainable Design (Holistic Thinking)
Chapter 9: The Technologies and Components of Sustainable Design
Chapter 10: Shades of Green--Levels of Sustainability
Chapter 11: Productivity and Well-Being
Chapter 12: Greening Your Organization
Chapter 13: Green Economics
Chapter 14: The Sustainable Design Process--Holistic Thinking
Chapter 15: The Aesthetics of Sustainable Design
Chapter 16: The Future of Architecture
Appendix A: The Green Warrior Reading List
Appendix B: Who's Who in Green Design
Appendix C: The Phases of Green Design
Appendix D: The Elements of Green Design Methodology
Appendix F: The Principles of Sustainable Design--Summary

I put this book down with several thoughts:

1) Enormously impressed with the University of Oregon in Eugene, to the point of trying to get my oldest to take his computer and creative skills there.

2) Profoundly delighted with the deep philosophical underpinning that one finds throughout the book, without pretense or pomposity.

3) The one appendix I would have liked to see that is not there is the one entitles: Green to Gold--Bottom-Line Dollar Savings Over Time, and then a whole range of the elements of sustainable design by climate zone.

This is an extremely satisfying book to read. My last throught: it's time to write the Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth. Read more about this at Earth Intelligence Network. This book by Jason McLennan is a perfect model for what the larger systems book should strive to be.

See also the literatures under panarchy, resilience, sustainability.

This book is the new heavyweight contender of green building titles. If you liked Natural Capitalism by Hawkins and Lovins, you'll enjoy this book. It's more comprehensive and uses facts and figures more judiciously. I'm impressed with the author's courage to make predictions in a chapter on the future of sustainability. This book should be required reading for all architecture students.

A very easy to read book that will help anyone, with or without an architecture or design background, to understand the basics of Sustainable Design. Well written, with very precise, intelligent, and oftentimes humorous commentary. Mr. McLennan knows his stuff, and the only thing in my mind that he could be faulted for is not going deep enough on some of the topics. That is the nature of the book, however. It is mean to be a high level overview of all aspects of Sustainable Design. Mr. McLennan has been very thorough, though, in including tons of references for those of us looking for a deeper understanding of any of the topics mentioned in the book. A must have for any aspiring architect or designer and a fabulous addition to any arcophile's library!

This book should definitely be on the must-read list for anyone interesting in sustainability. Describes a plethora of green building technologies, concepts, and practices without being overly technical. Although focused on green building, the discussion includes and applies to many other industries.

This is an awesome book. It has changed the way I think about the way we look at 'green' products and sustainability.

A great book to understand what green and sustainable environment exactly mean! a lot of good informations.