This paper is about designing solar buildings within given urban contexts and the resulting restrictions rather than about town planning with the freedom to arrange buildings freely so as to maximise access to natural resources. A comprehensive bioclimatic design in such a given urban environment must carefully investigate and assess the building's access to natural resources while taking into account the negative influences that might prevail around the site. The associated constraints can be a challenging but very interesting and rewarding starting point for architectural design. If understood and considered from the beginning these constraints can lead to creative, innovative and beautiful architectural solutions, in other words, to real architecture. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.