Using nature in architecture: Building a living house with mycelium and trees

Abstract

This study proposed the development of a house with the following characteristics: grows, builds, and repairs itself; changes with the seasons; uses the forces of nature and is in harmony with its environment; favors biodiversity and natural equilibrium; low cost and does not require considerable workforce or industrial material; carbon free and waste free; returns to nature when no longer inuse; enables sustainable and balanced mankind development. The use of living architecture to decreaseor nullify the environmental costs of structure materials was also investigated. Furthermore, the use of living architecture techniques to comply with the current living and construction style with as little change as possible was analyzed. A new envelope material with little to no carbon impact was scientifically explored, and the use of this material to create a sustainable house was technically examined. Findings demonstrate that such a house is not only feasible but also rational and beneficial from the economic and environmental perspectives.

Keywords

Living house / Tree / Inosculation / Mycelium / Envelope / Temperature / Substrate

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

2017 Higher Education Press Limited Company. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of KeAi. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).