Architecture Meets Ecology at Arcosanti

Architecture Meets Ecology at Arcosanti

Abstract

In the Green Architecture Meets Ecology at Arcosanti By Ted Mero Jeff Stein sits in his apartment built on the edge of a hill in the desert of Central Arizona, 70 miles north of Phoenix. A two-foot by two-foot insulated cabinet door in the corner of his living room opens directly to the highest point of a three-story solar greenhouse that slopes down the south face of his building complex. When the sun shines on the greenhouse surface, the warm air rises and heats Stein’s apartment during the winter months. When Stein opens the cabinet door, he feels the humidified air at double the temperature, a byproduct of the transpiring plants. “That’s good in the dry Arizona desert,” Stein says. The dense plant life enriches the air with oxygen. “I’m getting smarter just sitting here.” The air is fragrant, too, perfumed by the blossoming plants below. “Believe me when I tell you that everyone should have this experience.” But Stein has little time to sit back and smell the cactus flowers. His apartment is part of the East Crescent Complex at Arcosanti, a developing, experimental town that began construction in the 1970s under the principles of arcology, a