Chris Stewart
Collective Architecture's Chris Stewart discusses his overlapping roles as architect and member of the Scottish Ecological Design Association in promoting green design to a wider audience.
COP26 Day Four
November 4th, 2021Finding it hard to face being locked in a windowless COP campus for a third day in a row, I thought I would venture out into the Fringes. The weather is fine and there is so much happening, a glance at the climate fringe calendar tells me there is something for everyone. I decided to head for East Glasgow and the Many Studios, the GIA Cop Shop and ACAN’s exhibition at the New Glasgow Society Gallery.
First stop the Many Studios, an independent organisation who run a creative hub and workplace at Ross Street in the Glasgow Barras and home to several ACAN COP26 events. Yesterday saw ‘Replicating Retrofit’, a locally driven retrofit movement; this evening we have ‘Cop or Flop’ a cabaret style evening of stand up comedy, roasting the state of the built environment. This afternoon however I sat down to a joint ACAN / SEDA event ‘Zero Carbon Homes: How can they be healthy too’. A fascinating debate around air quality and its impact on architecture.
Nearby on the High Street in an ecological shop front face off, the Glasgow Institute of Architects (GIA) COP shop and the New Glasgow Society Gallery stare across at each other. The GlA 'pop up' COP Shop at 274 High Street will be open for a fortnight to raise awareness about the impact that climate change will have on Glasgow, why we must all work together to combat it, and the role architecture plays in our environment. Across the road, the New Glasgow Society play host to the Architects Climate Action Network (ACAN) exhibition, Architecture of Crisis: Hopes and Visions in two parts. The first part will run from the 27thOctober to the 13th November and explain the work of ACAN. While from the 14th November until the 21st November, once cop has run its course, the exhibition will demonstrate a vision for a post COP26 world.
Back to formal COP26 duties tomorrow but I would recommend to everyone, please get involved, all the great events and exhibitions are not just fascinating, they could make all the difference.
COP26 Climate Fringe Events Calendar - https://climatefringe.org/events-calendar-all/
ACAN COP25 events - https://www.architectscan.org/cop26
Glasgow Institute of Architects - https://gia.org.uk
SEDA events - https://www.seda.uk.net/events
New Glasgow Society - https://www.newglasgowsociety.org
