The green cities conference was possibly one of the best so far and with the combination of the well attended gala function on Monday night, one could say that this is becoming the premier function in the property council calendar. expand »
Past conferences have mainly focused on the commercial sector and have been generally aligned with the current demand of the property market. Last weeks conference tabled two new areas which focused on the creation of sustainable communities / precincts and health projects.
Combining these two themes has presented a significant leap in the current thinking of sustainable design & architecture as it has started major discussions on creating healthy living environments and communities. It presented the idea of how architecture can affect the health of a community both physically and mentally, which has a huge potential when combined with the current drain on society due to health related issues.
This next stage in sustainable design is setting the stage for an architect led movement as it is our expertise that has the most influence on how a space is formed and how the programme is utilised within it.
The stand out of the conference was Dr Esther Sternburg who is an expert on neural-immune science and is author of the book healing spaces. It is this link that Esther is providing in understanding the human condition and how our surrounding environments affects our health that will impact on how we as designers deliver projects across a most of our sectors.
Green Cities 2011 is the Australian Property Industry’s major Sustainability conference, co-hosted by the Property Council of Australia and the Green Building Council of Australia. It was held between 27 February and 2 March in Melbourne.
