OUR LADY SUSTAINABILITY

OR HOW TO GET A FUTURE. an editorial by Francesco Lipari

She is 24 years old, she works in class A and she only goes by three rules.

Everyone yearns for her and dreams of meeting her and falling in love; some actually claim to have had an affair with her.

She is Our Lady Sustainability. The one Italians love the most, our salvation, our light at the end of the tunnel…

I hear her name brought up in conversations everywhere I go, but I want to learn more, so I do a quick search on Wikipedia. I find out that the term sustainability was first used in 1987 in a document issued by the World Commission for Development and the Environment (the Brundtland report), which states that «sustainable development is that which meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to also meet their needs».

“Future generations, future generations, future generations”.

I repeat the terms out loud three times to myself because both words sound new to me. I now know enough about sustainability though:

I know that it is often regarded as a piece of jewelry, a prized diamond, an object that everyone seeks but few know its proper use.

We must therefore be realistic. If there is anyone who thinks he can simply roar out, “SOStainability!” and pull the emergency brake in response to the neglect that has been going on, he is a dreamer.

SOStainability does not only mean recycling, or leaving your car in the garage on a Sunday, or installing photovoltaic panels on your roof.

SOStainability is a cultural approach that we must all adopt before it’s too late.

Architects should be among the “bishops” of this cultural evolution, of this historic transition towards an education that is entirely sustainable, at least when it comes to the use of nanotechnology professes John M. Johansen, speaking of nano-architecture, introducing a challenging thought to the instant responsiveness and flexibility of space with a concept of architecture that is in constant mutation.

Unfortunately, at least in Italy, this is not the reality.

The shortage of new construction opportunities, combined with the excessive enthusiasm of builders loyal to a style outdated by 50 years or of those that try to copy the new designs of the big firms, have destroyed our beautiful paper castles (recycled).

This continuous waste of natural resources has even brought back outdated color schemes of yellow and black to dress our future.

We are talking about the future that awaits us as a result of events that are happening now. If they did not occur at all, then it would mean that we are living in the past.

And unless you own a DeLorean time machine, it will be hard to change the course of events and to correct the improper actions that have occurred and created our current situation and that which is to follow.

Reading between the lines: we’re succeeding a generation that fucked things up for us.

In short, the future is already the past and we have a lot of catching up to do in order to come out on top in the end; we must advance through every car of the train to finally surpass it and arrive at the next station without having to chase after the train when it will start running again.

In any case, looking at the world of Robert Zemeckis’ famous film, Back to the Future, can give us a better idea of how exaggerating, or rather removing obstacles from our imaginations, makes one start to think that a vision of a not-so-distant future where social boundaries no longer exist between people, an orgy of sponsors engulfs the city, a bit of nostalgia is closed up in an 80’s bar still playing Thriller, is nothing but an image of who we are today.

With the exception of flying cars.