Lecture

Soil as Dwelling Place

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In course

AR-597(a): Superstudio A

This Superstudio will study the history of the villa by focusing on 30 case studies, from antiquity to the last century. The aim of this study is to understand through the architecture of the villa the most quintessential tropes of architecture: form, poli ...

Description

This lecture explores the interdependence of soil and dwelling in agroecological farms, focusing on the evolution of architectural typologies for food cultivation and storage. It delves into the soil profile, food web, and human nutrient cycles, emphasizing the importance of soil care and composting toilets. The presentation discusses alternative human dwellings without foundations, agroecological practices in Switzerland, and the role of agriculture in hybridizing political autonomy. It also addresses the concept of subsistence, the cultivation of land determining settlement types, and the resistance to industrialization in agricultural spaces. The lecture concludes with narratives on household, soil, plants, animals, and land, highlighting the significance of collective property struggles and the blurring of theory and practice.

Instructors (3)

Paolo Tombesi

Teaching & PhD PhD Students Martin Peikert, Chloé Lucie Joly-Pottuz Courses Political economy of design AR-485 Political Economy of Design (PED) seeks to position and discuss architecture in relation to the world of production, economic interests and community benefits or decisions, at a local and global scale. Studio BA5 (FAR) AR-301(j) The design studio deals with a Women's Centre located in Wau, South Sudan. It is part of a two-semester program focused on the theme of ar

Sébastien Jacques Marie Marot

Martin Fröhlich

Expertise Trained Architect and Co-Founder of AFF Architekten Berlin / Lausanne Teaching & PhD Courses Saxa Loquuntur: Culture of construction PENS-240 The course explores how material extraction, territorial change, trade, local traditions, and industrial production interconnect. By examining scales from territory to building detail, students learn how various professions interact to shape the built environment. Studio BA6 (Fröhlich M. & A.) AR-302(ag) Greenhouse Studies exp

Official source

Related concepts (32)

Soil biology

Soil biology is the study of microbial and faunal activity and ecology in soil. Soil life, soil biota, soil fauna, or edaphon is a collective term that encompasses all organisms that spend a significant portion of their life cycle within a soil profile, or at the soil-litter interface. These organisms include earthworms, nematodes, protozoa, fungi, bacteria, different arthropods, as well as some reptiles (such as snakes), and species of burrowing mammals like gophers, moles and prairie dogs.

Soil

Soil, also commonly referred to as earth, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, liquids, and organisms that together support life of plants and soil organisms. Some scientific definitions distinguish dirt from soil by restricting the former term specifically to displaced soil. Soil consists of a solid phase of minerals and organic matter (the soil matrix), as well as a porous phase that holds gases (the soil atmosphere) and water (the soil solution). Accordingly, soil is a three-state system of solids, liquids, and gases.

Soil science

Soil science is the study of soil as a natural resource on the surface of the Earth including soil formation, classification and mapping; physical, chemical, biological, and fertility properties of soils; and these properties in relation to the use and management of soils. Sometimes terms which refer to branches of soil science, such as pedology (formation, chemistry, morphology, and classification of soil) and edaphology (how soils interact with living things, especially plants), are used as if synonymous with soil science.

Soil pH

Soil pH is a measure of the acidity or basicity (alkalinity) of a soil. Soil pH is a key characteristic that can be used to make informative analysis both qualitative and quantitatively regarding soil characteristics. pH is defined as the negative logarithm (base 10) of the activity of hydronium ions (H+ or, more precisely, H3O+aq) in a solution. In soils, it is measured in a slurry of soil mixed with water (or a salt solution, such as 0.01M CaCl2), and normally falls between 3 and 10, with 7 being neutral.

Food web

A food web is the natural interconnection of food chains and a graphical representation of what-eats-what in an ecological community. Another name for food web is consumer-resource system. Ecologists can broadly lump all life forms into one of two categories based on their trophic levels, the position it occupies in the food web: 1) the autotrophs, and 2) the heterotrophs. To maintain their bodies, grow, develop, and to reproduce, autotrophs produce organic matter from inorganic substances, including both minerals and gases such as carbon dioxide.

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