What do Paul Gardiner Architects, the City of Yarra and Rwanda have in common ?

This week, the world celebrates “World Environment Day (WED)“. Initiated by the UN as part of the United Nations Environment Programme “UNEP”, it is a day that stimulates awareness of the environment and enhances political attention and public action around the world. World Environment Day takes place on June 5 and during the week after. Every year a different country is hosting the official events, this year’s host is Rwanda, a small country in Central Africa with a density of approx 500 people per sq km, and a surface area of approx 26,000 sq km. Is that big, small, dense? Well, in comparison, Australia is about 300 times the size of Rwanda surface-wise, but instead of 500 it has a density of less than 3 people per sq km. That is, of course, an average between coast and inland, and it would therefore vary greatly. However, even compared to the UK with a population density of approx 250 people per sq km, Australia’s 2.9 doesn’t sound a lot – so why, again, do we keep complaining so much about Australia becoming overpopulated? We’ll have to come back and investigate that a bit closer over the next few weeks.

Coming back to the question above, as most readers here would be aware of, one of the main focus points in our work is Sustainability, and the question of how we can help create a world that is still worth living for generations to come. All our projects feature sustainable elements as much as possible, and these include various ecological sustainable design systems (ESD), both passive and active. We incorporate these sytems into our designs and base architectural ideas on them.

Having moved from Northcote to North Fitzroy a couple of months ago, Paul Gardiner Architects now call the City of Yarra their home. So having been nominated and shortlisted for this year’s Yarra Sustainability Awards, makes us particularly happy, and we are proud to be part of a lively and forward thinking community. The project that will feature in the Awards exhibition is our “Upside-Down Living”, a sustainable and contemporary refurbishment/extension project that we have completed for a fantastic forward-thinking client in Richmond last year. Tonight, the exhibition will be opened with the “Yarra Community Celebration and Awards Night”, an event that is a local celebration of the World Environment Day and Australia’s participation in same. Wanna be part of it? Give us a call and we’ll RSVP for you. It’s on tonight, Tuesday 8 June in the Fitzroy Town Hall. The evening will include a presentation of the Yarra Sustainability Awards 2010 winners and showcase the Yarra community’s outstanding environmental projects, as well as the latest in environmentally sustainable design.

So let’s celebrate World Environment Day, together with the City of Yarra and the country of Rwanda, and if each of us contributes a special idea or donation or action towards the environment this week, then I think that would be the best celebration we can have.