Glazing is Fine?

Sometimes I don’t think we’re actually learning anything about architecture in this course. Don’t get me wrong, I’m having a great time and everything, but it’s way too much fun. Our professor just keeps setting us fun assignments, and I’m thinking…tone down the fun. It was fun designing our perfect bouncy-castle-city to accommodate a thousand children, and it was pretty fun to design our private floating island on a future Saturn colony in the year 2126, but seriously. When do we learn about actual architecture, in the here and now? I think I’m the only person in class that considered the higher sea levels that must be dealt with in the future.

I guess our current assignment ticks one of those boxes. We have to make a perfect home using only glass, and find quotes from commercial glaziers in Melbourne to substantiate our claims. Alright, so…at least we’re learning about glass, glaziers and the futility of building homes out of glass because it just does NOT work. Heat becomes a serious issue, as well as cold, because the insulation inside a glass box is…well, it’s not good. Perfect for plants in a greenhouse, not so good for people trying to live there. In fact, it’s been done before. I talked to some professional glaziers and they said that some famous, avant-garde home designer made a home out of entirely glass, and all the furniture was glass as well. Sounds completely impractical, right? Well, you may be surprised to learn that…yes. Yes, it was impractical. I’m sure the glass stair balustrading was really nice and all, but they moved out after a month, and every glazier could have told you that was going to happen.

Maybe…I was meant to research this, and learn about the impracticality? This is some sort of unorthodox teaching method. Usually those are really unconventional and not fun at all, so I’m glad our tutor has found a way to incorporate both.

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