(re)Inventing Materiality: The Developers of Sustainable Materials

As sustainable ideas flood the design field to attempt to quell the effects of global warming it is sometimes hard to decipher all of the information and the directions that the ideas might be going in. Sustainable Material development is one of these many emerging fields, but we consider it to be extremely important, and decided to research it with respect to the question "what is (re)inventing material?".

As previously mentioned, sustainable material development is part of the explosion of "green" ideas that have emerged in the last 30 years (though exponentially greater in the last 10). A simple search engine search for sustainable material development produces countless hits ranging from sustainably grown bamboo to natural yarns which might be able to be used as structural elements. It is estimated that Architecture causes almost half of CO2 emissions in the USA alone and the development of these materials is crucial in lowering our impact on the world. We looked thoroughly through these and emerged with a plethora of information, the best of which we have highlighted below.


The National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) in Japan is an amazing institute, dedicated to the science behind sustainable materials and their possible uses. Not only does the site list it's research, discoveries, and patents, but it takes an in depth look at each one of them with diagrams and full explanations. One of the most important aspects of this institute is it's multidisciplinary approach, not a singular look at materials, but a look at how they can be used in many different fields. Another Japanese institute of higher learning is the International Research Center for Sustainable Materials at the University of Tokyo

Half way around the world, but developing the same types of ideas, is the University of Toronto Department of Material Science ad Engineering. The research pages of their website contain multiple pdf's of their research but also broad overviews of things such as what nano-technologies are and what their sustainable significance is for the world.

Overall the idea of Sustainable Material invention is similar to any other process of invention: a combination of innovation of existing materials and a need for something new to solve a problem. The ideas and products highlighted in these pages are the technologies that need to be used to reduce our impact on the planet and ensure the survival of the world as it is today.


Other Websites of Note:
Arc-Architects
Timber Building in Australia
The Association for the Advancement of Sustainable Materials In Construction (AASMIC)