Green is all around me

It's St. Patty's Day and I have just begun to study for the LEED NC exam, which I have scheduled for March 26th at 1:30 p.m. Ouch! I can't believe I am making a public announcement, but hopefully that's incentive to do well and make this one a success. As if the hefty price tag is not enough. What is LEED you ask? I was going to write a post all about it, but my friend Cassi (in my head I call her Cassi the Extraordinary) who is also taking the exam on that day wrote a great post about it last week, so I thought I'd give her a virtual shout out : http://leomonkey.wordpress.com/2009/03/09/gloom-doom/ To prepare for the intense studying (okay, memorizing), I was reading from a text called In the LEED written by a former test-taker who started a blog about preparing for the exam and turned all of his knowledge in to a helpful text (smarty pants!). He explains all the different credits, their intents and implementation methods and how the various points are awarded. Currently, buildings can be rated LEED Certified, Silver, Gold or Platinum based on the number of points:

• Certified - 26-32 points
• Silver - 33-38 points
• Gold - 39-51 points
• Platinum - 52-69 points

Many cities around the country are now (some for a few years already) requiring that all city-funded new construction over 5,000 s.f. or a certain dollar amount or major renovations to existing building be at least LEED Silver. Clearly the demand for LEED Accredited Professionals is rising. Instead of talking more about the finer points of the process, I thought I'd write about my limited experience with the LEED program in the past. I had the great pleasure of volunteering on Saturdays for several months last year at the Ronald McDonald House in Austin, Texas which was the third building in Texas to be awarded LEED Platinum and Austin's first. It was designed by Don Eckols of Eckols & Associates and built by The Beck Group. It's a beautiful building that brings comfort to hundreds of people each year, and volunteering there gave me the chance to experience how an extremely energy-efficient building functions from day to day. It was a real eye-opener into both the success of many of the systems (the fact that they drastically cut the energy consumed as compared to their older, smaller building and can and do serve 3 times as many families as the old Ronald McDonald House in Austin) and the challenges. Performance of these systems is highly dependent on the user, and in a case like the Ronald McDonald House, the user is often temporary. A family may stay for a night or a week or 6 months and they have access to the house's kitchen and laundry facilities, both of which are furnished with energy-conserving appliances. I learned the washing machines were often difficult for people to maneuver because they require small amounts of the concentrated detergent very different from how most families' machines operate. This lead to the machines malfunctioning frequently. The staff posted directions which were sometimes followed and sometimes neglected. I guess my point is that it may take time for us to catch up with these high-functioning buildings. On the otherhand, many of its features (like the lights on timers and sensors) were foolproof. LEED has a category called Energy and Atmosphere and a Prerequisite of it are Minimum Energy Requirements. While I agree this is highly important and should be a Prerequisite (something that can make or break any certification whatsoever), I also think it's necessary to monitor a building's future performance. Points seemed to weigh more heavily on the design and simulation of energy optimization (which happens before construction) rather than it's ultimate performance once user's take over. I recognize the intention, but this is one area I think LEED needs to pay more attention to. The earlier example I mentioned is just a tiny part of how a building functions where things can go wrong. In order for a building and it's parts to perform at the level of Platinum, many many things need to go right, and I think more effort should be made to monitor a building's future performance. I'll leave you with a photo of the Ronald McDonald House in Austin.

Your Wildest Dreams

I've been listening to The Moody Blues lately (is that indicative of my outlook?) and the title had me thinking about Dream Homes. Everyone seems to have one, right? As an architect, I find it hard to have just one, but I try and think through my ideas and sketch whenever possible so that when the time's right, I'll be a few steps ahead. I'm a list-maniac, I mean maker, by habit, but for house design, I think less in list-form and more in diagram form. That said, I try and move through the space knowing the elements that are important to me and how they'll fit together or take on different roles. Another thought occurred to me the other day- Russian Constructivism. Odd, I know, except that in the economic disaster of their time, they took to paper architecture to explore their ideas. Many of these ideas were completely unrealistic and politically-motivated, but the point is that they didn't just give up on design and become plumbers- they sought other avenues for design like the theater or graphics. Back to my Wildest Dreams theme. I've had a sketch of a house for some time- it's a two minute sketch that conveys the elements I'd like to have in a house. The sketch itself is unimpressive, but I can't help but think it's worth exploring. Maybe it's my dream house, or maybe it won't be right for my life when the time comes, but I think it'll be my foray in to paper architecture during this slow period of my career. It will take the form of digital architecture, though- I plan to develop these ideas with Sketch-up, and I'll update the blog from time to time with my progress. PLAN, with Ground floor and Upper Floor. ELEVATION By the way, that Moody Blues video is freaking hilarious and if you didn't click on it, you really should reconsider that!

Modern in the Moutains, part two

One of my favorite photos of the weekend- a well-placed window catching the light and a bit of branch, and the chandelier for a little bit of fabulous in the bathroom. Vertical penetration, as we would say in the A-school. Red trim and red leaves. I loved this take on a ranch home- the attachment of the carport to the home is divine. And we ooed and awed over their mid-century modern furniture which was so fitting. The last home we visited with beautiful detailing. This one has the fabulous bathroom chandelier.

Modern in the Mountains

Over the weekend I had the opportunity to visit Common Pond in the North Georgia mountains near Blue Ridge. My enterprising mother-in-law arranged a tour for us on Saturday with the self-described developer-slash-realtor Gary Kaupman. Though we are not currently interested in purchasing, he was gracious enough to meet us on a rainy Saturday and give us a tour of three of the homes in this "ecologically intelligent development". Gary was part of the driving force that brought these homes to life in the mountains- scouting for land, interviewing residents about what they liked and disliked about their mountain homes and bringing together architects and designers to realize his vision. In talking with him, we could see that he really has a keen sense of the balance between aesthetics (how can you make a building seem to rise from the landscape as if it were a part of it?), ingenuity, and the restraints of a budget. Many of the homes were built for less than $150/sq.ft. which makes the possibility of a weekend or permanent home in the mountains much more realistic. The footprints were kept small but the amenities were plush to say the least. It looked like those inhabiting the homes truly enjoyed them but also made use of their location in the mountains, close to hiking trails, mountain biking, white-water rafting and of course fishing in the amazing nearby rivers and streams. The houses, designed by Houser Walker Architecture in Atlanta and Gregory La Vadera in Merchantsville, New Jersey are energy efficient and low-maintenance and much attention was paid to features like natural light and orientation on the land. While each home takes from a kit-of-parts in architectural language, they are definitely individualized to their site and inhabitants. The name Common Pond refers to the spring-fed pond which all residents share (seen in the photo above). Each lot maintains mountain views without complete disruption of the trees and contours of the land. I loved that some of the red trim on some of the exteriors picked up the red in the leaves. I also liked the use of Hardi-plank applied in varying directions on the exterior, and we all loved the Hardi-plank used in some of the bathrooms, painted with a glossy finish. I think what the team has accomplished so far is very successful in terms of their mission of ecologically-intelligent. We all left saying that we would love to live in a house like one of those at Common Pond, and as an architect, I was so pleased to know that Modern in the Mountains isn't so far-fetched afterall. See my next post for more photos. Please visit their website to read more about Common Pond. My write-up hasn't done it justice as far as the amenities are concerned, but I hope that some of my photos inspire readers to visit or seek something similar in their area.