The Co-Housing Phenomenon


Book Description

This book presents 50 case studies of contemporary co-housing projects spread all over the world to show how communities of shared living have become a global phenomenon that can serve as a tool to promote social and urban sustainability. By presenting evidence that shared housing experiences are capable of revitalizing sterile urban fabrics and promoting social sustainable practices, the volume situates co-housing experiences as microscale responses to the macroscale challenges posed by environmental degradation and the decline of communitarian ways of living. The volume also reviews the most famous typologies of shared living in different parts of the world across human history. By analyzing historical experiences in different regions of Africa, Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceania, the author shows that living together is part of a historical culture of sharing that is being rediscovered all over the world by people who activate public spaces, work in shared offices or live in contractual communities. The Co-Housing Phenomenon – Environmental Alliance in Times of Changes will be of interest to both professionals and scholars involved in urban design, urban planning and architecture, especially those in the field of sustainable urbanism. It will also be a valuable resource for public agents and civil society organizations dealing with housing, social, environmental and sustainability policies.




Housing Phenomena in Abuja, Nigeria


Book Description

Zippy the TV Chimp tells the little-known story about a very well-known personality. Zippy got his name from the way he "zipped" about while wearing his skates. He was given his "little boy" style and status because of his intelligence, understanding and ability to do so many things the same way (or nearly so) humans do them. He made his way to live television and performed professionally with no second takes. Zippy was a dependable regular on the variety shows of Jackie Gleason, Ed Sullivan, Gary Moore and "Howdy Doody", and appeared with hundreds of other TV personalities. Zip became a recognizable character with "Star" status. He was featured in magazines and newspapers, but he was often seen dining in some of the best restaurants, using impeccable manners. He was known by millions. Zippy was loved by children and adults, thousands of whom grew up loving their "Zippy" doll and feeling the nostalgia of a time of innocence. This book allows the reader to become a kid again and read the little-known (and some, until now, unknown) tales of Zippy's exploits. Complete with pictures to reinforce the memories, Zippy the TV Chimp is a biography of one of the most popular animal stars ever. The story is told by one who held Zippy's hand and trained him to be the star he was... Carole, Zippy's Mom.




Contemporary Co-housing in Europe


Book Description

This book investigates co-housing as an alternative housing form in relation to sustainable urban development. Co-housing is often lauded as a more sustainable way of living. The primary aim of this book is to critically explore co-housing in the context of wider social, economic, political and environmental developments. This volume fills a gap in the literature by contextualising co-housing and related housing forms. With focus on Denmark, Sweden, Hamburg and Barcelona, the book presents general analyses of co-housing in these contexts and provides specific discussions of co-housing in relation to local government, urban activism, family life, spatial logics and socio-ecology. This book will be of interest to students and researchers in a broad range of social-scientific fields concerned with housing, urban development and sustainability, as well as to planners, decision-makers and activists.




Design for Sustainability


Book Description

With radical and innovative design solutions, everyone could be living in buildings and settlements that are more like gardens than cargo containers, and that purify air and water, generate energy, treat sewage and produce food - at lower cost. Birkeland introduces systems design thinking that cuts across academic and professional boundaries and the divide between social and physical sciences to move towards a transdiciplinary approach to environmental and social problem-solving. This sourcebook is useful for teaching, as each topic within the field of environmental management and social change has pairs of short readings providing diverse perspectives to compare, contrast and debate. Design for Sustainability presents examples of integrated systems design based on ecological principles and concepts and drawn from the foremost designers in the fields of industrial design, materials, housing design, urban planning and transport, landscape and permaculture, and energy and resource management.




Finding Community


Book Description

How to research, visit, evaluate, and join the ecovillage or sustainable community of your dreams. Finding community is as critical as obtaining food and shelter, since the need to belong is what makes us human. The isolation and loneliness of modern life have led many people to search for deeper connection, which has resulted in a renewed interest in intentional communities. These intentional communities or ecovillages are an appealing choice for like-minded people who seek to create a family-oriented and ecologically sustainable lifestyle—a lifestyle they are unlikely to find anywhere else. However, the notion of an intentional community can still be a tremendous leap for some—deterred perhaps by a misguided vision of eking out a hardscrabble existence with little reward. In fact, successful ecovillages thrive because of the combined skills and resources of their members. Finding Community presents a thorough overview of ecovillages and intentional communities and offers solid advice on how to research thoroughly, visit thoughtfully, evaluate intelligently, and join gracefully. Useful considerations include: Important questions to ask (of members and of yourself) Signs of a healthy (and not-so-healthy) community Cost of joining (and staying) Common blunders to avoid Finding Community provides intriguing possibilities to readers who are seeking a more cooperative, sustainable, and meaningful life. Diana Leafe Christian is the author of Creating a Life Together and editor of Communities magazine. She lives at Earthhaven Ecovillage in North Carolina.




Renewable Energy Communities and the Low Carbon Energy Transition in Europe


Book Description

This volume addresses renewable energy communities, and in particular renewable energy cooperatives (REScoops), in the context of the revised EU Renewables Directive. It provides a comprehensive account of the history and development of the renewable energy community movement in over six different countries of continental Europe. It addresses their visions, strategy, organisation, agency, and more particularly the challenges they encounter. This is of particular importance to gain more understanding into how renewable energy communities fare in domestic energy markets where they are confronted with regime institutions, structures and incumbents’ agency that tend to favour maintaining of the status quo while blocking attempts to empower and institutionalise renewable energy communities as market entrants having a disruptive, radical green and localist agenda. This volume will be an invaluable reference for academics and practitioners with an interest in social innovation in sustainable transitions, the role of community energy in energy markets, their agency, as well as an outlook to the impact that the EU Renewables Directive may have to change national legislation and policy frameworks to create a level playing field that is essentially more fair and beneficial to renewable energy communities.




Future Urban Habitation


Book Description

Presents forward-looking concepts, innovative research, and transdisciplinary perspectives for developing strategies for future urban habitation Around the globe, urban populations are growing at an unpreceded rate, in particular in Asia and Africa. In view of pressing social and environmental challenges it is essential to reimagine current design strategies to build affordable, sustainable, and inclusive communities that can respond to future demographic dynamics, new social practices, and the consequences of climate change. Future Urban Habitation presents an integrative, transdisciplinary approach for developing long-term strategies for urban housing at a different scales. With focus on the rapidly growing cities of Asia, and urban processes in Europe and North-America this volume offers perspectives from both researchers and practitioners involved in multiple aspects of urban habitation. The authors address a range of challenges to urban habitation with four intersecting thematic frameworks: Inclusive Urbanism, High-Dense Typologies for Building Community, Adaptable and Responsive Habitation, and New Tools and Approaches. Throughout the text, readers are presented with innovative design ideas from different fields, new concepts for social practices and sustainable housing policies, recent research on urban housing, and more. Exploring both social and architectural strategies for sustainable and livable dwelling models, Future Urban Hanitation: Addresses challenges associated with urbanization, population growth, societal segregation, shifting demographics and the crisis of care, and climate change Discusses advanced approaches for design thinking and design research and the impact of inclusive people-centric social design Explores the building of collaboration-based, cohesive neighborhoods and community-based social and health services Describes the use of innovative tools and methods affecting design practices and decision-making processes, such as co-design, social design, parametric design, performance simulation and sustainable construction to develop urban housing Includes perspectives and concepts from policy makers in housing boards and social service administrations, urban planners, architectural and social designers, innovators in sustainable construction, and researchers working on urban society Future Urban Habitation is an invaluable resource for designers from various fields including architecture, urban planning, and social design, for researchers from social science and design fields, and for policymakers, and other practitioners working on the provision of housing and the facilitation of social services in urban environments.




The re-emergence of co-housing in Europe


Book Description

Across Europe, the number of co-housing initiatives is growing, and they are increasingly receiving attention from administrators and professionals who hold high expectations for urban liveability. Is co-housing a marginal idealist phenomenon, or the urban middle class’ answer to the current housing crisis? And has the development of theoretical insight and research kept up with the actual expansion of co-housing as a practice? These questions were raised during the first European conference on co-housing research, which took place in Tours, France, in March 2012. Both the conference and this book aim to move beyond case-studies, and to look more particularly at the implications and wider perspective of the current co-housing trend. Using the specific vocabulary of different disciplines and geographic regions, the contributions to this book analyse the underlying thinking behind, and the expectations projected on, diverse models of collaborative housing. The authors are aware of the qualities of contemporary co-housing, but they go beyond advocacy to investigate the conditions under which co-housing can be successful as a strategy for housing provision; can offer solutions for sustainable urban development; or indeed can contribute to involuntary or intentional gentrification. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Urban Research and Practice.




Play and playfulness for public health and wellbeing


Book Description

The role of play in human and animal development is well established, and its educational and therapeutic value is widely supported in the literature. This innovative book extends the play debate by assembling and examining the many pieces of the play puzzle from the perspective of public health. It tackles the dual aspects of art and science which inform both play theory and public health policy, and advocates for a ‘playful’ pursuit of public health, through the integration of evidence from parallel scientific and creative endeavors. Drawing on international research evidence, the book addresses some of the major public health concerns of the 21st century – obesity, inactivity, loneliness and mental health – advocating for creative solutions to social disparities in health and wellbeing. From attachment at the start of life to detachment at life’s ending, in the home and in the workplace, and across virtual and physical environments, play is presented as vital to the creation of a new ‘culture of health’. This book represents a valuable resource for students, academics, practitioners and policy-makers across a range of fields of interest including play, health, the creative arts and digital and environmental design.




Design for Vulnerable Communities


Book Description

This book aims to provide bases for reasoning on what challenges urban-architectural design for vulnerable communities will face in the coming years. Several issues, such as technological development, climate change, political crisis and economic uncertainties show as traditional strategies and methodologies are not sufficient to deeply solve the problems of these complex realities. These new changes, which are studied in different fields of knowledge, highlight the fact that the development of effective solutions must be characterized by multidisciplinary approaches and must be based on strategies promoted by different disciplines. For this reason, this contributed volume collects contributions and considerations from experts in various fields of knowledge working in different parts of the world, such as the Americas, Europe and Asia. The goal is precisely to provide the reader with multidisciplinary knowledge and methodologies in order to better reflect and analyze the challenges that designing for vulnerable communities will face in the next few years. These multidisciplinary studies are organized into five sections: Sustainability and Vulnerabilities in Time of the Anthropocene Approaches, Principles and Paradigms to Contemporary Research and Practice for Vulnerable Communities Designing for Vulnerabilities: Applications and Actions Social Engagement in Vulnerable Communities Between Digital and Humanist Visions Vulnerabilities in Context: Analysis and Projects in the U.S.-Mexico Border Region Design for Vulnerable Communities will be of interest primarily to researchers and professionals in the field of urban-architectural design, but it will also be a useful tool to policy makers and members of civil society at large interested in making cities more inclusive.