Today, nightime temperatures no longer drop significantly enough to enable such intelligent and low energy, passive material strategies. A high volume of concrete and asphalt in desert cities creates an urban heat island effect where sidewalks, parking lots and streets radiate the heat they have collected during the day off at night. With little to no night time cooling available in desert cities, can the material intelligence of thermal mass, stack ventilation and energy storage still be harnessed to prevent buildings from overheating? Designers need to update how we build with thermal mass to engage with contemporary construction methods, industries, and trends of hot nightime temperatures in a changed desert climate. The exhibit displays three full-scale building portions or prototypes for incorporating these ancient and intelligent material technologies into contemporary construction methods.