Building with the elements: in the quest to evolve a more ecologically balanced approach to living and building, humankind's immemorial and intuitive relationship with the elements offers the potential to bring nature and architecture into greater accord

Architectural Review, The, Sept, 2004 by Catherine Slessor

To our ancestors, the ancient elements of earth, air, fire and water had profound significance. Each was regarded as a kind of spiritual building block from which all things were made, including human beings. They also symbolized forces of nature, physical states, gods and goddesses, and acted as bridges between the manifest world and the realms of the divine.

This notion of a fundamental element or elements forming the basis of all matter has existed since the Classical era. The Greek philosopher Empedocles identified four immutable, eternal substances or elements (earth, air, fire, and water) that formed the physical universe and gave the appearance of change through infinite combinations. This pre-Socratic view of matter influenced scientific thought for more than 2000 years, perhaps in part because of its comforting rationalization of our complex and bewildering world. Medicine's long cherished obsession with the four element-related humours as the root causes of ailments (1) shows how pervasive such theories can be.

Although modern scientific understanding of the elements has expanded unimaginably since the time of the Greeks, their mystical and symbolic characteristics endure. Earth represents the solid state of matter, manifesting stability, permanence and rigidity. Water, necessary for the survival of all things, characterizes change. Air is the gaseous form of matter which is mobile and dynamic, existence without form. Fire, bringing warmth and light, has the power to transform the state of any substance. The French philosopher Gaston Bachelard puts it more lyrically: 'Earthly joy is riches and impediment; aquatic joy is softness and repose; fiery pleasure is desire and love; airy delight is liberty and movement'. (2)

The power of symbolism

The historic urge to reduce the complexities of our existence and surroundings to a comprehensible state follows many traditions in both Western and Oriental thought. And, though we continue to develop and promulgate sophisticated theories of the environment, the primeval notions of earth, air, fire, and water still potently symbolize some of the most significant aspects of life on the planet.

Ancient civilizations noted the interconnectedness of forms of matter and guessed at higher meanings, striving to live in balance with the natural world. In our modern era, rapaciously expanding industry and a growing population continue to threaten the world's delicate ecological balance, proof of a relationship out of kilter with nature and the elements. Water, for example, has the power to destroy as well as create; at the wrong time and in the wrong place it can cause high tides, floods, erosion, destruction and spread disease. Its absence can be just as pernicious: droughts and lack of ground water can wipe out people, flora and fauna and change ecosystems. (Even today, a billion people do not have adequate supplies of drinking water.) (3) Fire can be equally devastating, witnessed through history from the volcanic eruptions that consumed Pompeii, to modern forest fires and the wasteful burning of fossil fuels that is slowly adding to the burden of global warning. As economic and social development accelerates, the need to stem ecological degradation and evolve strategies for sustainable development intensifies. Technologies that address issues such as soil conservation (earth), wind power (air), energy (fire), and desalination (water) will help reevaluate and inform contemporary attitudes to age-old elements.

Keeping the elements at bay

In architecture, keeping the elements at bay has always been a crucial concern. Structural systems are explicitly designed to resist the effects of air (wind) and fire, and the building envelope must be waterproof. But in striving against the elements, often employing costly and unsustainable technologies in the process, we lose sight of their wider potential. By tempering and exploiting their inherent properties, they can play an important role in a mandate for environmentally aware design, helping to advance a less ecologically demanding approach to living and building. (Obvious examples might include exploiting the mass of earth both to warm and cool and using natural ventilation as opposed to air conditioning.) This represents a synthesis of tradition and technology through an understanding of the innate qualities of architectural forms and materials, reinforced by awareness of climate and vernacular tradition. As Peter Blundell Jones demonstrates in his analysis of traditional Korean domestic architecture (p80), the simple, unaffected way in which people lived in balance with climate and landscape gave rise to a richly nuanced architectural culture that offers a compelling alternative to the air-conditioned and overheated buildings that have become the depressing, energy-guzzling norm.

Re-evaluating relationships between buildings and the elements has both physical and experiential consequences. Rather than undifferentiated space hermetically enclosed by a homogeneous skin, buildings can display different degrees of enclosure, which may be inhabited more flexibly, with the potential to respond to changes in the external environment. Devices such as solar shading, screens, balconies, brises solcil, and shutters add layering and complexity to the external envelope. Archetypal forms such as porches, arcades and conservatories animate external edges, while courtyards and atria bring light and air into deep plans. The use of planting, both as a source of visual delight and as a heat and light diffusing screen, has numerous historical antecedents. In this issue, these are creatively reinterpreted by Studio Downie's new archive for the Royal Geographical Society (p70) and Edouard Francois' quirky Parisian housing block (p74).