The Space Required to Care And the Built Environment

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THE SPACE REQUIRED TO CARE: AND THE TOXIC BUILT ENVIRONMENT

MAE MURPHY & RUN LIN

Our process of understanding care began by analyzing spaces through the exploration of Maggie’s Centers providing emotional and social support care to cancer patients in a structure built just outside of major hospitals. The Maggie’s Centers have become quite trendy for well-known architects to design around the world. For example, Zaha Hadid’s center in the Fife Victoria Hospital, Richard Murphy’s center at the Edinburgh Western General Hospital and Frank Gehry’s in the Dundee Ninewells Hospital. Mapping the care spaces is important to understand where these acts of care occur. Yet it can be even more intrinsically important to locate the spaces causing harm-- a factor against care practices.

Often the most abundant and affordable building materials such as plastics, metals, and wood are very toxic. What can we use that is better for the environment, cost effective, easily constructed and ethically aware? Every day, buildings are designed to take CARE of people but they are built upon the very materials that cause harm. Carcinogenic building materials are present within almost every space created in the 20th and 21st century.

Cancer is caused when two cells divide during mitosis incorrectly due to a mutation. They miscommunicate, replicate uncontrollably, obtain too many messages and/or divide incorrectly. Whatever the case, these bad cells begin to build up without the preventative checks in balances in place. This process is internal. The cell comes from within and outwardly destroy us. 20th century building materials --along with pretty much every manufactured item within consumerism today-- cause forms of cancer such as lung, stomach, pancreatic, bladder, kidney, skin, prostate, nasal passage, breast, testicular, and many more. The very walls we build to shelter ourselves are the ones harming us.

“The very walls we build to shelter ourselves are the ones harming us. This toxic relationship with our beloved materials causes the most harm.”

This toxic relationship with our beloved materials causes the most harm. So why don’t we have more PREVENTATIVE measures instead of post diagnosis in terms of cancer treatment? The very research that goes into curing cancer is the

research that goes into creating materials that cause it. The repercussions of consumption.

Who will be impacted in this “gamble”? Who will get lucky and win all the chips? Who will lose?

+We spend so much money researching CURES for cancer +We spend so much money developing products and materials that CAUSE cancer +Why don’t we spend time PREVENTING cancer?

The materials we are creating are turning around and harming us in many ways. What can you do?

Use Your Resources - Research sites that discuss available non-carcinogenic materials such as the Healthy Building Network, Living Product Challenge, International Living Future Institute, Cradle to Cradle Products, Green Seal, and BlueGreen Alliance.

Consume Consciously - Find approval lists that identify safe alternatives and place your money to support those institutions. Research toxic materials and learn how to avoid them.

Promote Capitalist Transparency - Support policies and regulations that promote manufacturers to publish the exact information regarding health and the environment with their product.

Knowledge is Key - Education is critical when discussing topics of harmful building materials. Research products, find credible sources and share the information. Care for oneself and our environment is critical. This is how we can make a change.

How do we propose alternatives? Who is responsible to make a change? Education is a key component to prevention, specifically within designers. We hold power to specify the very materials that make up the built environment. With the research gathered, we discovered it is important to understand the political impacts of carcinogenic materials. We hear about banned materials only after thousands of cases have impacted our society. Phthalates, VOCS, formaldehyde, and spray foam building insulation are some of the most toxic examples of mediums that harm our bodies on a daily basis. As the two of us begin our journey of discussing toxic materials we are exposing the very infrastructure built to shelter us. This perpetual cycle instigates the very need to learn about our surroundings and what we are consuming.

Work on following page created by Mae Murphy & Run Lin 13

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