I was asked to prepare a series of lectures that covered the key issues Architects needed to know about sustainable built environments.

This was conceptualised as 7 videos. With Lockdown, instead of the videos, I have been able to present the lectures ‘in Zoom’ to a large group of students.

This has worked well and some interesting discussions have developed. It seems to be a good time to be thinking about how we design better environments.

The 7 lectures are outlined below.

1. Understanding: This provides an understanding of sustainability and why this is important.  
2. Interpreting: This shows how knowledge about sustainability can be interpreted and applied in construction and buildings. 
3. Planning: Frameworks that can be applied to plan for sustainability in built environments and construction are introduced.
4. Analysing: Analysis processes that can be undertaken to ensure that buildings respond to, and work with, their context to enhance local sustainability are described.
5. Designing: This describes processes which can be used to ‘think with’ sustainability in the design of built environments.
6. Constructing: This describes how sustainability can be integrated into construction processes. 
7. Living: This introduces approaches which embedded sustainability in built environments to enable sustainable living and working patterns.