In Novae Res Urbis (NRU), senior reporter Lana Hall looks at how one of this year’s SHIFT Challenge  winners, "Speculative Assemblies," encourages building professionals to critically examine the origins and lifecycle of their materials. Amid escalating carbon emissions, pollution, and micro-plastics, the project suggests a pivot to more sustainable, regenerative options like straw, feathers, and recycled wood.

The SHIFT Challenge is an annual design competition hosted by the OAA that invites practitioners to consider the many ways architecture can be used to solve societal challenges. This year's SHIFT Challenge theme was "reshaping communities;" a subject that highlights the potential role of architectural design in promoting stability, built form resilience, and fostering a sense of belonging. The sustainable materials entry "Speculative Assemblies" was one of six winners chosen last month by the competition jury.

The project, led by Carleton University assistant professor of architecture Jerry Hacker, envisions a suite of sustainable construction materials that could be created from lumber offcuts, pine resin, feathers, straw, burlap, beeswax, discarded fabric, and even coffee grounds. These raw materials can be processed and transformed into building components such as membrane panels, bricks, insulation, and cladding. Not only can these materials be sourced sustainably, says Hacker, but at the end of their life cycle, these products can be returned to the earth, resulting in a regenerative cycle.

Posted with permission of the publisher of NRU Publishing Inc. Original article first appeared in Novae Res Urbis GTHA, Vol. 28, No. 23, Wednesday, June 4, 2025.

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