Arquitectura vernácula de Irlanda Parte 1 : Una evolución constante

Arquitectura vernácula de Irlanda Parte 1 : Una evolución constante 

Esta publicación hace parte de una lectura que hice en La Universidad del Valle, Cali, Colombia en 2011.

El Pasado

La formación del presente 

Con el fin de comprender mejor, las actuales patrones de asentamiento en Irlanda, lo primero que se verá es una breve historia de los asentamientos en Irlanda. La cultura dominante de cada período en Irlanda ha dictado los patrones de asentamiento que existía en aquellos tiempos y mucho se puede deducir de la cultura de los restos que aún se pueden ver. Podemos ver los cambios en los distintos patrones de asentamiento con la llegada de los conquistadores diferentes.

Porque hablar del pasado para aprender del presente?

Elementos manifiestos de una riqueza natural y cultural que pertenece a toda la humanidad, los sitios del patrimonio mundial, así como los monumentos, cumplen una función de hitos en el planeta. Son símbolos de la toma de conciencia de los Estados y de los pueblos acerca del sentido de esos lugares y emblemas de su apego a la propiedad colectiva, así como de la transmisión de ese patrimonio a las generaciones futuras.

Elementos manifiestos de una riqueza natural y cultural que pertenece a toda la humanidad, los sitios del patrimonio mundial, así como los monumentos, cumplen una función de hitos en el planeta. Son símbolos de la toma de conciencia de los Estados y de los pueblos acerca del sentido de esos lugares y emblemas de su apego a la propiedad colectiva, así como de la transmisión de ese patrimonio a las generaciones futuras.

Irlanda boscosa. Islas de asentamiento aprox. 1000 AC

En primer lugar, el medio ambiente en general. Los primeros mapas topográficos y sugerencias  de otras fuentes a Irlanda está muy boscosa en la mayor parte de su superficie, excepto donde las tierras altas o pantanos intervinieron. Los asentamientos se muestran como "islas" en el bosque durante la mayor parte de Irlanda. Asentamientos centralizados (pueblos y ciudades) no existieron hasta la llegada de los nórdicos y más tarde la colonización normanda. Esto fue uniforme tipo "einzelhöfe '- es decir, dispersos hogares. Por esta razón, sólo voy a hablar de los asentamientos después de ese tiempo con alguna referencia a los pequeños asentamientos vikingos como un medio de comparación

Staigue Fort

Ringforts

STAIGUE FORT

Antes de 700AD y antes de la llegada de los vikingos en Irlanda, la inmensa mayoría de la gente vivía en ringforts que fueron asentamientos sola vivienda construida, en promedio, cada 2 kilómetros. Fuerte Staigue es una de las fortalezas del anillo más grande y mejor que es probable que veamos en Irlanda. Se asienta sobre una colina, dominando una bella vista de la bahía de Kenmare al sur y es muy impresionante en tamaño y estatura.

La fortaleza consta de una muralla masiva circular rodeada por un banco externo. La pared es de hasta 5,5 m (18 pies) de alto y 4 metros (13 pies) de espesor, que rodea un área circular de 27.4m (90 pies) de diámetro. Fuerte Staigue muestra una gran habilidad y la artesanía en el ámbito de la construcción de piedra. La técnica de pared seca tan bien demostrado aquí tiene una larga tradición en Irlanda. La supervivencia de las estructuras de principios de tantos a lo largo de la campiña irlandesa se ​​debe en parte al dominio del arte de piedras entrelazadas para lograr la estabilidad total, incluso en obras grandes, como fuerte Staigue. Una de las cosas más interesantes acerca de la fortaleza es que hay diez vuelos de pasos, construido en una forma de X,a lo largo de la pared circular interna que da acceso a la parte superior de la muralla.

 Fechas de este sitio es difícil, pero pudo haber sido construido durante el período celta y puede tener posiblemente funcionó como un centro de la tribu. Estas construcciones fueron construidas para proteger las casas y las tierras de los pueblos más ricos de la tierra. Lamentablemente, debido a las técnicas de construcción pobres y más frágiles materiales de construcción de la gente normal, muy poca evidencia de sus viviendas existe.


Para leer mas, espera hasta la prxima parte en donde escribiré de Skellig Michael, un monasterio escondido en el Atlantico.

Re-use vs Recycle- The Fallacy of a pretty decor

Re-use vs Recycle- The Fallacy of a pretty decor

It may be my social circles and my profession that has resulted in my social networks being inundated with this sort of thing. Maybe it´s just that the internet itself is flooded with it. Sometimes we get a very blinkered view of the world based on our facebook friends. This thing that I refer to is eco-design. Perhaps you are aware of its existence, perhaps not. Either way, you should know that eco-anything is the trend de jour and as with any trend, it makes its way into our view somehow.
Just in case this has passed below your radar, I provide you with some visual examples of exactly what I refer to. It is essentially using rubbish to decorate, build, beatify and serve in domestic uses. I cannot deny that some of these ideas are really quite ingenious and most are very aesthetically pleasing, which, I am pretty sure, is the main reason behind the popularity of these ideas among social networks. Also, sharing them makes us look ingenious, eco-aware and funky. 

Before I get to the bones of my issue with these ideas, I first must concede that  they are important and , yes, as consumers, we must be more conscious of where our waste goes and what we do with it. This are great ways of doing this and I too am collecting wine bottles with the idea of using them some day for something equally quaint and quirky and I may even post it on the internet too. We live in a society of disposable consumerism. We throw out useful packaging and never worry about where it goes once it leaves our kitchen. There have been huge improvements over the last years, especially in Europe and the U.S.A. where it is most needed. In my experience less developed countries still tend to re-use and don´t tend discard so much.
So what could I possibly have a problem with? It´s not the people who have these ideas, nor is it the people who share them or promote them. We need more consciousness as I said. My gripe is the principle. Just like separating your glass from your paper from your compostable waste is good but not enough, this idea of using glass bottles in construction for example is getting closer to the answer but not quite there. 
Let me explain.
Let´s take a glass bottle for example. I but a bottle of wine, I finish the wine and I throw the bottle out, never to be used again. The next time I drink a bottle of wine, the bottler has used more glass to create that bottle. More material and more waste. What is the answer? Reuse the bottle or at least reuse the glass to make a new bottle. If I drink 1,000 bottles of wine over my life time, and that is entirely probable, without reusing or recycling the bottles, that is 1,000 bottles worth of glass wasted. If however I reuse those bottles, theoretically I can consume 1,000 bottles of wine and only need 1 bottle. Follow me? OK.
Now lets consider using those bottles to create a beautiful, multicoloured eco-wall in an eco-house. This is a very popular trend and on the face of it, seems to be a very environmentally friendly manner of construction, but if we consider that we are taking 100 bottle out of the cycle, that theoretically could result in the production of 100,000 more glass bottles. This is a huge exaggeration on my behalf and I only use the extreme case, to highlight my point, the principle of which is that these bottles are better off staying in their intended use and being reused as such so as to not result in the production of more.
When we take a product out of its use-cycle, it must be replaced. Products that can be and are used over and over such as bottles, containers, wooden pallets etc, can be much more productive than if they are used once in a building or as a bookshelf in your living room where they will remain for anything up to 50 years. 
We live in a living, breathing eco-system that is fed by materials. These materials are finite and the only way to prolong the life of this eco-system is by using these materials in the most efficient and lasting manner possible. This idea comes from the theory of cradle-to-cradle design as developed by McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry (MBDC) consultants. This idea is essentially to grant as many lifes to a product as possible before retiring it from circulation.
One effective example is a shoe that is designed and mass produced using the C2C model. The sole might be made of "biological nutrients" while the upper parts might be made of "technical nutrients." The shoe is mass produced at a manufacturing plant that utilises its waste material by putting it back into the cycle; an example of this is using off-cuts from the rubber soles to make more soles instead of merely disposing of them (this is dependent on the technical materials not losing their quality as they are reused). Once the shoes have been manufactured, they are distributed to retail outlets where the customer buys the shoe at a fraction of the price they would normally pay for a shoe of comparable aspects; the customer is only paying for the use of the materials in the shoe for the period of time that they will be using the shoe. When they outgrow the shoe or it is damaged, they return it to the manufacturer. When the manufacturer separates the sole from the upper parts (separating the technical and biological nutrients), the biological nutrients are returned to the natural environment while the technical nutrients are used to create the sole of another shoe. 
For more info visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cradle-to-cradle_design
Also here is a video http://www.ted.com/talks/william_mcdonough_on_cradle_to_cradle_design.html

I said before that I don´t blame the people who promote the reusing ideas, so who do I blame? The industries. We need standards. We need to put pressure on all manufacturing industries to a adopt more eco-friendly processes. That is the next step. 
So, my problem with people posting pictures of ingenious decorations with used tires? Well, it´s just not good enough. It´s getting there, but I fear that we as people, may lose momentum. Lets not accept mediocrity. Let´s push it further.