"Touch the earth lightly"

The most energy-efficient buildings function similar to living things. Designed in such a way to capitalize on the local environment and to respond to the climate.

Glen Murcutt uses the Aboriginal proverb touch the earth lightly to express this way of designing it expresses his concern for nature. Making sure that the area on which we build is protected creating an area which we can live within an environment without disturbing it. Even though he is an Australian Architect his way of thinking expands further than that, whether you live in Australia or not the idea of touching the earth lightly doesn't change.

I personally think that we in Ireland can learn a great deal from this. The idea of touching the earth lightly here and using the Glen Murcutt way would make a lot of sense. His ideas create a sustainable building choice one which is certainly becoming the preferred. He is known for designing buildings with readily available materials which are easy to obtain close to the site and native to Australia which makes it sustainable cheaper and easier. His buildings are designed to gain as much natural light as possible and follow the sun and usually have verandas, skylights and adjustable louvers trying to be as energy efficient as possible, all of which we could adapt to our climate, in Ireland of instance we don't get enough sun and the idea of us maximizing this by following the sun is great and our homes are dark in winter because of short days and as much natural light as we can gain from is a plus. His homes work with the Australian climate and land in a sustainable way, which we can learn from by adapting his ways to our own climate and land.

"Life is not about maximizing everything, it's about giving something back like light, space, form, serenity, joy." Glen Murcutt