The effect of applying greenery systems on a building's sustainability performance

Urbanisation has increased the worlds' cities populations and influenced the living conditions within these cities. Temperatures rise, the air becomes more polluted and noise levels increase. It has been proven that types of vegetation such as plants and trees can reduce the negative effects of urbanisation by for instance cooling cities,...

Irrigation of Urban Moss Surfaces: Making Cities Climate Resilient by Enhancing Moss Growth on Façades

Moss covered surfaces are a promising way to mitigate the urban heat island effect. A layer of moss on a building’s façade reduces heat absorption during summer, hence passively cooling the building and its surroundings. The startup Respyre wants to offer such moss layers as a commercial product. A bio-gel mixed with moss fragments is sprayed on...

Green facades for a resilient and liveable built environment: A holistic multi-criteria approach for selecting vertical greening systems

Vertical greening systems (VGS), i.e. vegetated building facades, can harness the benefits of nature to contribute to resilient and healthy cities. A lack of guidelines for the early selection and design of VGS currently limits implementation. Based on a literature study and expert interviews, this thesis proposes a multi-criteria framework and...

Reducing the environmental impact of distribution centres: Designing green-enveloped biobased alternatives to compare with reference steel and concrete designs

The climate emergency calls for a global shift towards a low-carbon economy, to preserve natural resources and biodiversity, while limiting global warming and its consequences. This project focuses on the impact of distribution centres, intended for the storage of commercial goods. Warehouses are characterised by large flexible spaces and simple...

Respite care hotel in Amsterdam

The topic of the studio, “city hotel”, concerns sustainability and hospitality at the same time, aiming to provide a temporary living space within the doughnut model. Since the location of the project is the historical center of Amsterdam which has been largely affected by tourism and become less livable in recent years, the project aims to...

Bioreceptive brick facade: Incorporating plant into a dry-stacking masonry wall system

The current study focuses on the development of a new façade system which introduces greenery as part of brick walls. The main aspects of the proposed system are sustainability, moisture and materials, water supply and structure stability. The goal is to achieve a balanced relation among these aspects and reflect those into the product design....

Quay walls Greening with Mosses: “How can quay wall elements be designed with improved bio receptivity to stimulate high moss growth coverage that will add social and environmental values to Amsterdam citizens’ wellbeing?”

Amsterdam city is currently facing problems of old quay walls and bridges renovation, followed by insufficient greening in the city. This study aims to propose a method to increase Amsterdam's greenery that will add social and environmental value through the renovation work of quay walls. The main objective is investigating how the quay walls...

Green facades for cooling urban hot spots: The cooling effectivity of green facades on spaces adjacent to and inside dwellings in Amsterdam

To limit increasing heat problems in cities, green areas are being implemented in the urban context. Since space is often scarce, an opportunity lies in the use of green facades. This research has investigated the cooling effect of natural green facades in the form of He¬dera helix. Both the effect on thermal comfort inside and outside buildings...

The most beautiful green facade

An experimental study of vertical greenery systems for window shading for energy saving in summer

Past studies have demonstrated the remarkable energy-saving effect of vertical greenery systems. The vast majority of these works focus on opaque building walls. While external shadings on windows are more effective than these on walls. Inspired by the climbing plants (vines) raised outside windows by residents, the present study proposed the...

Performance assessment of a “do it yourself” double skin green façade for an existing office building

This project is based on two sustainable construction methods, namely up-cycling (reuse of materials) and vertical farming (green facades). These two concepts are combined to form a ‘Do It Yourself’ double skin façade, a double skin façade made with re-used sliding doors, which is aimed to be capable of developing ‘Edible Green’, which refers to...

Bioreceptive Urban Facades: Integration of Bryophytes Into Facades and Their Impact on Exterior Building Temperatures

Rapidly expanding urban developments are having an inverse relationship on the surrounding urban environment. Facades and the materials that they are composed of can have a large impact on the warming of urban microclimates. By reducing or cooling the external surfaces of a facade a building maybe able to offset its contribution to the urban...

AMC Amsterdam as green lung for its inhabitants and environment

The Academic Medical Center (AMC) is one of the largest hospitals in the Netherlands and it is located in the Bijlmer district. The complex was built in 1981 and consists of 64 hectares of land. The complex is surround by a green belt where also the former psychiatric center was located. The AMC can be seen as a stand-alone city, with daily...

Effects of a Vertical Green Façade on the Thermal Performance and Cooling Demand: A Case Study of a Tube House in Vietnam

Traditional architecture has often applied greenery in the design to improve the thermal performance of indoor spaces. Such a bioclimatic approach is not often seen in the contemporary tube houses of Vietnam. Vietnamese architects recently started to focus more on greenery solutions for housing projects. However, the quantitative effects of...

Comparative experimental approach to investigate the thermal behaviour of vertical greened façades of buildings

Greening the building envelope is not a new concept, however it has not been fully approved as an energy saving method for the built environment. Vertical green can provide a cooling potential on the building surface, as plants are functioning as a solar filter and prevent the adsorption of heat radiation of building materials extensively. In...

Domestic greywater treatment through the integration of constucted wetlands in Living Wall Systems (LWS)

The main objective of the thesis is to develop a design for a vertical green facade with integrated wastewater treatment. Vertical green systems provide a highly versatile type of facade that upgrades equally the building and it’s surroundings. The lack of quantitative benefits though, limit the motives for installing green facades to...

Green facades and Building structures

Plants can fulfil various functions. Plants provide places for playing, sports and recreation, establishing social contacts, isolation and escape from urban life, aesthetic enjoyment, viewing buildings from a distance and so on. Vegetation and plants on roofs and façades is one of the functions of plants most with respect to the built...

The green building envelope: Vertical greening

Planting on roofs and façades is one of the most innovative and fastest developing fields of green technologies with respect to the built environment and horticulture. This thesis is focused on vertical greening of structures and to the multi-scale benefits of vegetation. Vertical green can improve the environment in urban areas and is becoming...