Philip Jackson The essence of a sustainable home is one that is sustainable: environmentally, socially and economically and yet is also enjoyable to live in and improves quality of life. Discuss the role of design and thoughtfulness in the creation of sustainable homes. If design is to effect true ‘sustainability’ it must conceive radical new expectations of human existence, the preconditions for which so fundamentally challenge present socio-cultural assumptions as to constitute a world-view change; at the heart of this change is a return to true community in place of contemporary individualism, in a move that would re-imagine the ‘home’ as an interdependent cell in the organism society; if design is to effect sustainable homes it must first, in its character of practice, become sustainable, it must explicitly challenge counter-sustainable cultural norms before then forging a positive framework of settlement to serve a new understanding of true ‘dwelling’. 1 There is a difficulty in any discussion of sustainability because its hackneyed terms have lost their meaning 2 . When greenness became marketable 3 the resulting emotive greenwash 4 lead to a blurring of definitions in a field already fraught with uncertainty. The 1987 Brundtland Report has defined sustainable development as that which “meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” 5 This anthropocentric view of sustainability, that it is human life that is being qualitatively sustained, must be tempered by a humility that is informed by the complexity of and objective intrinsic value in nature that ‘deep positions’ on environmentalism revere. It is also assumed that the binary state of sustainability renders discussions of degrees of sustainability incoherent, but also that it is not a fixed state harmony nor end-product, but rather a process of change, just as life, that which ultimately is being sustained, is a process. ‘Sustainability’ is objective and ultimate, ‘quality of life’ is subjective, and beyond being kept alive, improvements to quality of life are concerned more with non-material things, it is crucial it be understood as this if are to avoid the misguided association of wealth with happiness. 6 To advocate a design solution on the credentials of its environmental sustainability to the exclusion of its economic or social sustainability is to set up a false dichotomy, a socially 1 Heidegger, M (1993) [1978] ‘Building Dwelling Thinking’ in DF Krell (ed.) Basic Writings from Being and Time (1927) to the Task of Thinking (1964) London: Routledge, p362 2 Nadarajah, M; Yamamoto, Ann Tomoko (Eds) (2007) Urban crisis : culture and the sustainability of cities Tokyo : United Nations University Press, p7 3 Fisher, J (1994) A Global Perspective, Perspectives, p33 quoted in Williamson, TJ; Radford, A; Bennetts, H (2003) Understanding Sustainable Architecture London : Spon Press, p10 4 Greer, J; Bruno, K (1996) Greenwash: The Reality Behind Corporate Environmentalism, Penang: Third World Network, quoted in Williamson, TJ; Radford, A; Bennetts, H (2003) Understanding Sustainable Architecture London : Spon Press, p10 5 WCED (1990) ‘Our Common Future (The Brundtland Report)’ Melbourne: World Commission on Environment and Development (1987, Oxford: Oxford University Press) p8 6 James, O (2007) Affluenza (,æflu'enza): how to be successful and stay sane, London : Vermilion 1