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It was the end of October
in the mountains in Austria.

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I was there on a field trip
with my architecture students from Zurich.

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And when we reached a high valley,

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I surprised them with the news
that there was no hut

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or hotel booked for the night.

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It was not a mistake.

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It was totally on purpose.

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The challenge was to build our own shelter
with whatever we could find.

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And we all survived.

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It was cold, it was really tough ...

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and it was a great learning experience

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to discover that there are a lot
of resources given by nature for free,

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and all that we need
is our sensitivity to see them ...

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and our creativity to use them.

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I found myself in a similar situation.

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When I was an architecture student
about 13 years ago,

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I went to Bangladesh
to a remote village called Rudrapur

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with the aim to design and build
a school as my thesis project.

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I had lived in that village before
when I was 19 and a volunteer

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at Dipshikha, a Bangladeshi NGO
for rural development.

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And what I had learned from them

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was that the most sustainable strategy
for sustainable development

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is to cherish and to use
your very own resources and potential,

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and not get dependent on external factors.

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And this is what I tried to do
with my architecture as well.

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In terms of suitable building
materials for my school,

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I didn't have to look far.

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They were right under my feet:

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mud, earth, dirt, clay,
however you call it ...

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and bamboo that was growing all around.

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Electricity in remote Bangladesh is rare,

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but we didn't need it.

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We had human energy

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and the people were happy
to have the work.

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Tools were an issue too,

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but we had these guys,

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water buffalos.

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We had also tried a bit cows,

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but interestingly,
they were too intelligent.

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They were always stepping
in the holes of the previous round.

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They wouldn't mix the mud, the straw --

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(Laughter)

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the sand, which are
the ingredients in the walls.

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And except a small team of consultants

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like my partner
for realization, Eike Roswag,

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and my basket-weaver cousin Emmanuel,

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it was all built by craftsmen
from the village.

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And this is the METI school
after six months of construction.

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(Applause)

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Thank you.

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(Applause)

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Load-bearing earth walls
that really ground the school,

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and large bamboo structures
that bring the lightness in.

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That's the classroom on the ground floor.

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Attached to it are the caves.

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They're for reading,
for snuggling, for solo work,

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for meditation, for playing ...

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and the classroom on the top.

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The children all signed
with their names in Bengali the doors,

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and they did not only sign,
they also helped building the school.

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And I'm sure you all had your hands
in mud or clay before.

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It's wonderful to touch. I love it.

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The children loved it.

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And can you imagine the feeling
of a small boy or a girl

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or an illiterate day laborer standing
in front of that school building

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and knowing that you built this

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out of the ordinary bamboo
and just the dirt underneath your feet,

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using nothing but your hands?

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That gives such an enormous boost
of trust and confidence

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in yourself and the community.

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And in the material.

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Especially mud has a very poor image.

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When we think of mud, we think of dirt --

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it's ugly, it's nondurable --

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and this is the image I want to change.

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In fact, it's the 11th rainy season
for this school now,

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really harsh, horizontal monsoon rains,

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and the walls are standing strong.

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(Applause)

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So how does it work?

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First rule, a good foundation
that keeps the wall dry from the ground,

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and second rule, a good roof
that protects from the top,

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and third rule, erosion control.

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Mud walls need speed breakers

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so that the rainwater
cannot run down the wall fast,

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and these speed breakers
could be lines of bamboo

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or stones or straw mixed into the mud,

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just like a hill needs trees or rocks
in order to prevent erosion.

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It works just the same way.

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And people always ask me
if I have to add cement to the mud,

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and the answer is no.

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There is no stabilizer,
no coating on these walls,

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only in the foundation.

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So this is the close-up of the wall

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after 10 rainy seasons,

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and as much as I grew a bit older,

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the wall got some wrinkles as well.

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The edges my not be as sharp as before,

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but it still looks pretty good,

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and if it needs repairing,

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it is really easy to do.

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You just take the broken part,

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make it wet, and put it back on the wall,

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and it will look the same as before.

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Wish that would work on me too.

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(Laughter)

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Yeah, and the great thing is,

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if an earth wall is not needed anymore,

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it can go back to the ground it came from,

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turn into a garden,

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or get fully recycled
without any loss of quality.

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There's no other material
that can do this,

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and this is why mud is so excellent
in terms of environmental performance.

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What about the economic sustainability?

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When we built the school,

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I practically lived
on the construction site,

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and in the evening, I used to go
with the workers to the market,

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and I could see how they spent the money.

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And they would buy
the vegetables from their neighbors,

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they would get a new haircut
or a new blouse from the tailor.

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And because the main part
of the building budget

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was spent on craftsmanship,

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the school wasn't just a building,

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it became a real catalyst
for local development,

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and that made me happy.

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If I had designed the school
in cement and steel,

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this money would have been exported
and lost for those families.

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(Applause)

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The building budget at that time
was 35,000 euros --

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it's probably doubled by now --

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and this is a lot of money
for that region,

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and especially because this money
is working within the community

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and rotating fast,

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and not on the stock market.

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So when it comes to the economic
sustainability of my project,

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my main question is, who gets the profit?

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How many of you in here

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have some experience
living in a mud house?

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Chris Anderson, where is your hand?

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(Laughter)

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You? OK.

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Yeah.

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It seems totally out of our focus,

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but approximately three billion people
all around the planet

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are living in earth houses,

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and it is a traditional building material

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in Europe just as much as in Africa.

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Strangely enough,

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mud is not considered worthy
of being studied at universities ...

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so I brought the dirt to Harvard,

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(Laughter)

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precisely 60 tons of dirt
right in front of the main facade

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of the Graduate School of Design.

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Students and faculty
rolled up their sleeves,

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got their hands dirty,

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and transformed the front
into a warm place for people to gather.

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Children would climb the structures,

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skaters would ride the ramp,

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students having lunch breaks,

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and it was particularly fascinating to see
how many people were touching the wall,

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and we usually don't go around cities
caressing our facades, right?

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(Laughter)

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(Laughter)

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Of course, this was a small-scale project,

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but in terms of awareness-building
and in terms of education,

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it was like an acupuncture trigger point.

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And in fact, in more and more countries,

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load-bearing earthen structures
are not allowed to be built anymore

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although they're traditional
and have lasted for hundreds of years,

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and not because the material is weak,

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but because there are
no architects and engineers

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who know how to deal with that material.

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So education on all levels,

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for craftsmen, engineers, and architects,

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is really strongly needed.

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Equally important
is technological development,

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like prefabrication developed
by my colleague Martin Rauch,

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who is an Austrian artist
and expert in earthen structures.

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And he has created technologies
for rammed earth elements,

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for prefabrication
of rammed earth elements

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that include insulation,
wall heatings and coolings

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and all sorts of electrical fittings

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that can be layered
to multistoried buildings,

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and this is important in order to scale up

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and in order to fasten up the processes,

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like in the Ricola Herb Center
in Switzerland.

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And finally, we need good built projects

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that prove you can build
with an ancient material

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in a very modern way.

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It is not a matter
of how old a material is,

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it's a matter of our creative
ability to use it today.

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These, for example, are three hostels

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that I did in China in the village Baoxi,

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about six hours by bus from Shanghai.

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The outside shape is woven bamboo,

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and the inside core
is stones and rammed earth.

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And it is a traditional building material.

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Even large parts
of the Great Wall of China

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have been built with rammed earth,

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but it's getting replaced by concrete.

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And this trend is happening very fast.

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Within only a couple of years,

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China has consumed more cement
than the United States

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in the entire 20th century.

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And this trend of replacing
natural building materials

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with materials that require
a lot of energy,

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that are energy-intensive,

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and that emit CO2,

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is really clearly contributing
to climate change.

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And we have alternatives,

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such as mud, stones, timber,
bamboo, earth,

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that are totally effective options
for all sorts of purposes.

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This, for example,
is an office building that we did

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for Omicron Electronics in Austria.

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Mud is healthy for the planet,
but also for the human bodies,

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and the material is low-tech,

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but the performance is high-tech.

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The earth walls keep the highly
sophisticated tools in the building safe

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by naturally regulating moisture.

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And this wall in my own home

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is our humidfier.

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We love our six tons of dirt at home

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not only because
it's healthy and sustainable.

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Its archaic warmth
is touching deep within.

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My personal dream is to build
a mud skyscraper right in Manhattan.

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(Laughter)

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Yeah.

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(Applause)

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And this dream isn't so crazy

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if you think of the mud city
of Shibam in Yemen

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that was built in the 16th century

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and has lasted now for 500 years.

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What was possible that long ago
is possible today as well,

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and we can apply
all our technical know-how

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to these ancient materials

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so that it meets our needs and our dreams.

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All around us,

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and just below our feet ...

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are wonderful natural building materials.

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Let's use them.

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And I deeply believe

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our homes, our work spaces, our cities

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would become more healthy and sustainable

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and more humane

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and beautiful.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)