Absolute zero cultural buildings in the US

by Prateek Jain, Associate

Grandiose architecture and low-carbon design are often at odds.

The very gestures that make cultural buildings iconic and permanent – elaborate façades, gravity-defying forms, soaring interiors – are also the hardest to reconcile with low-carbon design principles. Limiting ourselves to a carbon lens to evaluate structures of such importance and visibility, however, would be malfeasance; cultural buildings are exactly the type of project where the carbon premium is worth the delight.
But what if we could flip the script – transform cultural landmarks into beacons of low-carbon design?
Here’s how design teams can plan for truly transcendent sustainability outcomes:

• Get your Skin in the game
  For showstopper façades, designers often probe materiality deeply. Even if you can’t make embodied carbon a driver of your façade choice, engage the supply chain to look inwards: Can they propose a decarbonization plan? Can they deliver EPDs if they don’t have one? Can they optimize support assemblies and formwork? Can they devise attachment techniques for future disassembly? Use the high visibility lever for cultural projects to challenge suppliers as well as signal your impact, like the DING Museum in Belgium and Munch Museum in Oslo.
• De-stress; let forces dictate form
  Curves, arcs, and organic geometries delight the eye but often complicate load paths—inviting transfers, oversized members, and material inefficiency. Leaning into funicular geometry, where bending stresses are minimised and axial members carry the load, yields structures that are efficient and expressive. Think of Gaudí’s famous hanging-chain models for the Sagrada Família: forms ruled by forces, not excess.
• Calibrate for comfortable conservation
  Art loans can come with strict conditioning criteria that are often accepted at value. However, there are conversations unfolding around expanding the acceptable ranges for temperature and humidity – participating in those can not only help fine-tune your facility’s operational energy, but shift paradigms towards a culture of more evidence-based preservation guidelines. Atelier Ten worked with the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art to drive down operational energy use in exhibit halls through such collaboration.

Each of these strategies can have far-reaching impacts that can spur industry conversations, transform supply chains, and educate masses. When you’re designing for posterity, don’t just count the carbon – make the carbon count.