Natural Light
PASSIVE RESILIENCE
Recorded by Sofie Pelsmakers, images by Essi Nisonen and Veera Saastamoinen
KEY READINGS
Nick Baker and Koen Steemers, Healthy Homes: Designing with Light and Air for Sustainability and Wellbeing, RIBA
Pelsmakers, S., Donovan, E., Hoggard, A., Kozminska, U., Designing for the climate emergency, a Guide for Architecture Students, RIBA
Vivienne Brophy and J. Owen Lewis, A Green Vitruvius: Principles and Practice of Sustainable Architectural Design, Routledge
Lechner, Norbert, and C. Wallace. Heating, Cooling, Lighting : Sustainable Design Methods for Architects. Fourth edition. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley
Rosa Urbano Gutierrez and Laura de la Plaza Hidalgo, Elements of Sustainable Architecture, Routledge
Huw Heywood, 101 Rules of Thumb for Low Energy Architecture, RIBA
Pelsmakers, S. The Environmental Design Pocketbook, RIBA
Kimpian, J., Hartman, H., Pelsmakers, S. Energy, People Buildings: Making Sustainable Architecture Work, 2021, RIBA
INSPIRATIONAL BUILT EXAMPLES
Architype Architects – The Enterprise Centre, Norwich, UK
Helen & Hard – Vindmollebakken Housing, Stavanger, Norway
Alvar Aalto, Kunsten Museum of Modern Art, Aalborg, Denmark
Glenn Murcutt, Marie Short/Glenn Murcutt House, Kempsey, Australia
Herzog & de Meuron, Dominus Winery, California, USA
Sauerbruch Hutton, GSW Headquarters Tower, Berlin, Germany
Muzharul Islam, The College of Arts and Crafts, Dhaka, Bangladesh
Bearth and Deplazes, Vineyard Gantenbein, Switzerland
NATURAL LIGHT
Good natural light, views and connection to outside are crucial for human health and well-being. Good visual comfort needs to be provided in all spaces inhabited by humans for any length of time. Doing so supports people’s well-being and can create delightful spaces, while at the same time minimising the energy needed for active heating and artificial lighting. This can reduce running costs and reduces running costs and tackles the climate emergency.
Key design considerations to include access to natural light in your project include:
understanding the local climate, context and the building’s functions and users’ needs
orienting and spacing buildings appropriately in your project
carefully designing window openings
Your design should ‘lock in’ access to sunlight at early stages: building orientation cannot be changed once built, and adding windows is often not possible once built.