Third in a series.
Re: “Seeing World Through a Large Small Mind”
He had just finished describing one of his more adventurous and exotic assignments, writing about reviving the downtown area of the ancient Central Asian city of Baku, capital of Azerbaijan.
“Oil was discovered there in the 15th century, just bubbling out of the ground,” said Thomas Small. “Most of the oil fields have been moved out of the center of the city to an offshore location, the Caspian Sea. A whole section of the city became available for redevelopment, something like what I imagine could happen to us here in Baldwin Hills someday.”
When he has not been writing about architecture as an advocate for massive building projects, here and abroad, City Council candidate Small has been practicing a more traditional journalistic form, especially regarding sustainable design.
“I have made a number of presentations at international conferences, largely on sustainable design,” Mr. Small said.
Two and a half months out from the April 12 election for three open City Council seats, Mr. Small remains, arguably, the most unique of the seven contenders, pursuing a non-traditional path for an office-seeker.
Sustainable design – defined as “using a conscious approach to energy and ecological conservation in the design of the built environment” – is a relatively recent popular concept.”
It is, said Mr. Small. “But it has grown tremendously in importance over the last decade.
“There was certainly a surge of it much earlier particularly in the ‘60s and 70s.
“The great architect Buckminster Fuller was very involved in that. Sustainable design went away for awhile, and then it came back in the mid-‘90s.”
Mr. Small’s notion of sustainable design “involves the concept that we are designing to meet the needs of the occupants and users of buildings and cities today, but also of the future users.”
(To be continued)
