Dutch practice V8 Architects has created a pavilion with its own enclosed water, energy and food system and a leave-no-trace philosophy as the Netherlands' contribution to Expo 2020 Dubai.
Located in the Expo's sustainability district, the Dutch Biotope pavilion features an integrated water, energy and food system, with technology that extracts water from the desert air and uses it to irrigate an 18-metre-high "food cone" covered with edible plants.
The Dutch Biotope pavilion centres on a plant-covered "food cone"
It also creates a cool microclimate within the cone for mushrooms to grow, with colourful solar panel skylights providing the energy to power the whole system.
V8 Architects designed the pavilion to provide "hope in the desert" that technology can provide sustainable ways of living, even in arid conditions. Water harvested from the desert air is used to irrigate the plants
The practice's other key goal was to ensure all of the building materials could be reused or returned to the earth, and the plot returned to its original state.
"Being in the Sustainability District, the thing that we really focused on is trying to completely minimise our footprint and make it as sustainable as possible," V8 Architects associate architect David Spierings told Dezeen.
The harvested water also falls as rain within a cool microclimate inside the cone
"And of course, being a temporary pavilion, it was really one of the most important thin...