Bio Buildings

Right now in Urbanist circles green roofs are becoming a major plus for new urban design and making our cities more sustainable. Well here we have the next step Bio Buildings, while this firm isn't the only one out there doing this, it is the first firm to have crossed my web wanderings in search of fun urban factoids.
TR Hamzah & Yeang is an Architectural Firm based in Kuala Lumpur and has been around for three decades, they have an interesting portfolio with a couple Bio buildings including the two that you can see here. The firm has a pretty pro sustainability mission statement and is worth a look over to see some of the stuff they have in the hopper.

The first picture is of their Editt Tower, it has a number of interesting features but my favorite is the 'Vertical Landscaping'

Vegetation from street-level spirals upwards as a continuous ecosystem facilitating species migration, engendering a more diverse ecosystem and greater ecosystem stability and to facilitate ambient cooling of the facades. Species are selected not to compete with others within surroundings. “Vegetation percentages” represent of area’s landscape character. Source


To the right is their 'Elephant & Castle Eco Tower'
This tower seeks to take mixed use development to another level.

The Concept - "City-in-the-Sky".The design takes the model of a general geographical area of a city, with its inherent systems, zoning and social infrastructure and inverts it into skyscraper buildings. The skyscraper and its retail and commercial base is seen as a microcosm of the city, containing within itself the inherent elements of a city block, i.e. parks, shops, entertainment centers, community facilities and housing etc. The "City-in-the Sky" concept provides for:-
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opportunities for local employment through mixture of use, both on ground and upper levels
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A healthy mix of residents within the same building. Through "vertical zoning", resident types are grouped according to accommodation preferences (single units, family units, luxury apartments), yet common facilities (e.g. parks, shopping streets etc.) are shared.
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close proximity to basic amenities, such as the local grocery store, postal boxes, chemist etc. These are all located within the ground development and/or within the tower.
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a healthy landscaped environment, with spatial progressions of public open spaces (parks in the sky) to semi-private (entrance courts) to private open spaces (balconies). Source

These are the type of dynamic buildings that make me want to paw through their plans, models and whatever other material I can get my hands on.