For a newly minted museum in San Francisco, the green architecture is the main exhibit

The Living Museum The California Academy of Sciences is the world's most eco-friendly museum Graham Murdoch

From a bird’s-eye view, the domes of the California Academy of Sciences, set to open in the fall, bulge out of the ground like giant scoops of green ice cream. These undulating hills built into the museum’s 2.5-acre, flora-covered roof integrate the building into the green space of surrounding Golden Gate Park. They also conserve energy, since the roof insulates and ventilates the 400,000-square-foot museum below.

Rooted in Sustainability: The living rooftop is tiled with 50,000 biodegradable trays made of coconut husks. Each tray is specially layered to keep plants from slipping down the roof’s steep slopes.  Graham Murdoch
Designed by renowned Italian architect Renzo Piano, whose works include the landmark modern-art museum Centre Pompidou in Paris, the $484-million structure will most likely be the largest public building ever to qualify for the U.S. Green Building Council’s “platinum” LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) rating. The designation, so far held by just 70 buildings worldwide, is the highest honor in green construction.

Beneath the roof, museumgoers will find a natural-history museum, a planetarium, a rainforest with free-flying birds, a coral reef inhabited by 4,000 fish, and an aquarium filled with saltwater pumped in from the Pacific Ocean. The most influential display, though, may well be the marriage of the museum’s physical design with its educational mission. “It’s not about dusty stuffed animals,” says executive director Greg Farrington. “It’s about human survival and living in harmony on planet Earth.”

Check out our animated tour, below, and launch our photo gallery of the world's greenest museum here.

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9 Comments

Christian Madajski

from Indian Trail, North Carolina

I think that things like this will lead to revolutions in technology and environmental acts in the future.

I love how more and more research is showing us how we can use nature to our benefit, w/o having to destroy it the way we have for the past few centuries. Large cities are trying to incorporate green roof tops for the sky scrapers and smaller office buildings. Even homeowners are using these to their benefits. If only we could get more people to use geo-thermal energy to heat their homes, ppl would save millions on heating costs, as well as benefit the environment, and decrease dependency on foreign oil, etc. Unfortunately, these technologies are suppressed by large corporations who will not be able to generate profit from the eco - friendly choices.

EnviroVhargeze

from San Francisco, California

Indeed.

You might find the academy website on the building more informative... http://www.calacademy.org/academy/building/index.php

Enjoy!

kardelen133 (not verified)

there are many lichtenberg figures on the ice near my home and they are not drain holes. They are merely the first places that the sun melts the ice, usually caused by something dark at the center which heats up and starts the melting. I have 40mg of pix if pop sci is interested.
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ankara nakliyat ankara temizlik şirketi
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thanks.

These undulating hills built into the museum’s 2.5-acre, flora-covered roof integrate the building into the green space of surrounding Golden Gate Park

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The founders of the Living Museum were two scholars, Bolek Greczynki and Janos Marton, who sought asylum in the United States, at Columbia University’s School of Visual Arts in the early 1970s. Their idealism, influenced by ongoing studies of the work of André Breton, Jean Dubuffet, Meret Oppenheim, Hans Prinzhorn and Leo Navratil, led them to start the project of an ever growing refuge of Art Brut in New York City. Dedicated to beauty, the arts and healing, in collaboration with self taught artists who had experienced the burdens of the world, the project space was initiated as a conceptual performance “taking place in the formless and fleeting (vergaenglich) sphere of trust in the patient, the prejudice of the spectators and the actual work of the artists in the space”. The Living Museum became, for several decades, a space where each participant could develop a sense of ownership and foster their inherent creative talents in any sphere of the Arts.

Located in the grounds of Creedmoor Psychiatric Center, one of New York State’s largest Psychiatric facilities, the project found its current home in 1983. It was initially housed on the second floor of a desolate, abandoned 19th century kitchen–dining building.

Thanks,

RJ Harris

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Wow, that's incredible! This seems like the start of a huge breakthrough!

- Tyra, (http://www.profitablenuggets.com/)

Sad not to see my old home town of San Diego not on the list... all that sunshine not being put to good use - very disappointing. http://www.hedefnakliyat.com



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