Designing an Eco-Friendly House

Growing up, I was always interested in games that involved building like Minecraft. Whenever I had free time, I always logged into these games and started building. Since the game was filled with elements of nature, I often wanted to create buildings complementing this. It allowed me to develop and design ideas while visualizing them inside the game. This, of course, opened my eyes to a whole new world of design and creation, leading to my growing interest in architecture. Although I had always loved creating designs in the game that complement nature, in reality, not many buildings make the most out of natural components. According to Jakartapost, there is a lack of awareness toward green buildings. It states that 90 percent of all buildings in Jakarta were built before green building decrees were issued, meaning a lack of sustainable and eco-friendly buildings in the area. Seeing this problem, I believe a product that promotes sustainable living and housing is needed. With the recent issue of sustainable housing and my current interest in architecture, I decided that my project would be to design and model a sustainable house that would help me delve deeper into architecture and solve an environmental problem alongside it. My goal for this project is to research sustainable architectural designs while developing my skills in 3D modeling. Then design and model an Eco-friendly house implementing efficient sustainable architecture.

Having only played around in architectural applications and watching random videos on it, there is room for improvement in my skills and knowledge regarding architecture. I could not design a perfect house model that is intriguing and fully sustainable without prior learning or further research. The following made my project challenging, as the project not only needed the skill for the 3D modeling applications but also knowledge in sustainable architecture. The project also required artistic knowledge alongside experience in realistic design.

Global Context

The global context my project engages in the most is Globalization and Sustainability because the product of the project aims for sustainable living and housing. The project seeks to practice the interrelation between human-made housing and natural elements exploring the relationship of human-made systems and local/global processes. It allows a more sustainable way of living by conserving energy through the use of modern-day architecture, aiming to showcase how the different technological innovations created throughout the world can be implemented into creating a sustainable design that will benefit the environment.

Product

The final product is a house designed to be eco-friendly and sustainable by implementing as many techniques and approaches as possible. By putting thought into passive and active sustainable design, renewable energy systems, green building materials, and native landscaping, the house is able to achieve the goal of creating “a design for life”, as stated by Mr. Ruben in an interview.

My product is an eco-friendly house consisting of two floors covering an area of around 232 square meters. It gives room for an aesthetically pleasing design along with the many sustainable features it possesses. It is able to understand and respond to the global context strands, Globalization as the product implements different technologies and techniques coming from different parts of the world, exploring the relationship of human-made systems and local/global processes in the focus of environmental friendliness in housing and Sustainability as these different technologies and techniques aim to decrease energy consumption and allow for a more sustainable way of living through design. With the implementation of this global context, the product also offers a flattering design that combines all the components needed in a house.

Reflection

As a part of the project, we are encouraged to practice the IB learner profile as well as incorporate it into our daily lives. As IB learners, we continuously develop these skills throughout the various projects, including the Personal Project. Though all of the skills included in the IB learner profile is seen throughout the project, the most notable ones included thinker, knowledgeable, and reflective.

While working on this project, I had multiple opportunities to show that I was a thinker. I was able to solve numerous challenges through this skill as I had to think of various solutions to the goal I wanted to work on. I also had to think and play around with different designs and come up with different questions to ask interviewees, fully utilizing my primary resources. For the project to succeed, I had to fully utilize my thinking and problem-solving skills. I used these skills to overcome multiple obstacles and challenges to not only finish the project but also capture the global context of my goal into the product.

Other than the main global context of the product, one of the side-goals of the project was to increase my knowledge of architecture in general. Through this project, I was able to gain knowledge on sustainable architecture as well as the process of architecture as a whole. For my project to succeed, I had to gather knowledge from different sources as well as my own experiences to understand the role of an architect in the creation of a building. This especially helped me when restarting my initial product as I had the opportunity to do so with all the knowledge I gained on the first try.

With these two notable IB learner skills being used throughout the project, one of the more natural ones is being reflective. Entirely natural throughout the process, reflecting on the actions done and the concepts behind the product comes with the project. Shown through the journals and reflections, reflectiveness is something that is developed with the knowledge and problems you. Through being reflective, I was able to understand the different mistakes I made during the process and fully utilize the experience to add to my growing knowledge.

IB Learner Reflection

Working on the project, I got to realize and experience various new things. I gained a better understanding of the global context of Globalization and Sustainability and learned how integral the relationship between the two is. Understanding the global context allowed me to fully utilize different ideas in the process of the project.

Throughout the time I have been working on the project, I was able to further explore the global context and the ideas I have employed. Although this was important, the knowledge and experience I gained from the project were some of the most satisfying parts. I was able to learn new skills along the way that I could use for my future in architecture while also expressing ideas that I could implement into my product. No matter the result, I will always see upon this project with great fulfillment.