Fourteenth International Conference on The Constructed Environment

Abstract

Jesse Curran states, there is a “breath awareness” that “facilitates a present-minded capability” to catalyse an “epistemological rupture” in Emily Dickinson’s poetry: Non-humans are subjectified as nature ceases to be subordinated to human interests and Dickinson’s Eco-humility has driven us readers into mimicking nature for the making of a sustainable world. In constructing sustainability, Norman Foster is among the representatives who utilise BIM to reduce architectural waste while satiating the users’ aesthetic craving for a spectacular skyline. Notably, the Gherkin - 30 St. Mary Axe in east-end London. In 2019, Foster and his team aspired to savour the London skyline with his new design - the Tulip, certified by the LEED as a legitimate green building to complement the Gherkin. However, Foster’s proposition had been denied for the Tulip failing to blend in. On the other hand, Tokyo’s Mode Gakuen Cocoon tower, completed in 2008, intended to honour Nature with the symbolism in the building’s aesthetic design. It serves as an architectural cocoon that nurtures the students of “Special Technology and Design College” inside. The building itself turns into a Dickinsonian anthropomorphism, where humans are made humble to learn from the entomological beings for self-betterment in Anthropocene. Despite bearing resemblance to a tulip as well as its LEED credential, Norman Foster’s Tulip merely pays tribute to the Nature in a relatively superficial manner without constructing an apparatus that substantially benefit the Londoners as all green cities should embrace Dickinson’s Eco-humility and their buildings should be the extensive/expansive forms of biomimicry.