Weekend Linkages: Quilts, Pedways and Past Futures

...Quilt, Solar System. 1983.0618.01. Ellen Harding Baker’s “Solar System” Quilt Nobody Drives in LA — Exploring Downtown’s Calvin S. Hamilton Pedway A 19th-Century Vision of the Year 2000 The Best Commuter Bike Lights A digital archive of graphic design related items that are available on the Internet Archives (via Recomendo) Soda Can Aluminum Chuck Glider...

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Who Needs Windows?

...ded me of this issue. If ever there was an example of the over-reliance on energy intensive HVAC systems it’s the idea that buildings don’t need windows. I can’t possibly, in a short blog post, round up all the windowless buildings such as phone company switching facilities (like the famous brutalist AT&T switching center in New York above), all those Amazon warehouses, or Los Angeles’ hidden and still functioning urban oil wells. Our window free...

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Los Angeles Permaculture Design Course Certificate Series

...teading • Home & Garden Design • Natural Building & Property Development • Urban Gardens & Food Forestry • Celebrating Community • The Economics of a Sustainable Society THE PERMACULTURE DESIGN COURSE EXPERIENCE For anyone serious about creating a sustainable future. Permaculture Design touches on all aspects of life, offering decision-making protocols based on nature, for problem-solving, critical thinking and design. THE CURRICULUM Our text book...

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Climate Change and Personal Responsibility

...en so much positive change on this front, even just in the last few years. Urban homesteading, slow food, organics, bikes, car share, DIY, all of it — it’s blossoming. It’s very hopeful. I’m going to put the next part in italics because it’s so important: The pleasure and satisfaction that we all receive from living this way is the positive counterspell to the dark enchantment of consumer culture. When we live this way, we become positive examples...

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Piet Oudolf’s Enhanced Nature

...at’s pragmatic, recognizing both the need for natural ecosystems within an urban environment, while at the same time providing visual interest. Oudolf’s imprint is on the landscape, but to most people that human touch will remain on a subliminal level. It’s a brilliant “third way” strategy outside of the dualistic smackdown between the simulated nature of English style gardening and the rectilinear hedges of Versailles. Oudolf’s plan for the Serpe...

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