Architettura e polvere

la lezione dell’impermanenza

Abstract

This essay reflects on dust and raw earth as foundational materials in architectural culture, interpreting impermanence not as weakness but as a generative condition. Starting from the biblical notion of afar – fine, primordial matter – the text explores clay as both geological substance and cultural medium, capable of recording gestures, climates, economies, and collective practices. Through an analysis of earthen construction techniques such as adobe, rammed earth (pisé), and sun-dried bricks, the essay situates raw earth within a long architectural tradition that challenges industrial permanence and extractivist paradigms. Contemporary practices and figures – such as CRATerre, Francis Kéré, Anna Heringer, and recent experiments combining earth with digital fabrication – demonstrate how these materials are being reinterpreted today as environmentally intelligent, circular, and socially embedded. Drawing on philosophical references from Aristotle to Ruskin, the essay argues that dust and clay embody a minimal material condition that enables form, memory, and transformation.
Ultimately, the text proposes raw earth as a critical material through which architecture can renegotiate time, care, and responsibility, shifting from domination over matter to awarness and engagement with it.