holy said:
"IT IS VERY GOOD; church can be an opinion leader.
in Germany some churches have big roofs for solar..." [read]
SteveC said:
"While one might think this is a waste of time, money and resources, so is a Bugatti Veyron. But both have been designed specifically to show that t..." [read]
Duane said:
"As to the question in the title "Will the Greenies Take Fireworks Away From Us?", the bad news answer is yes. Yes they will. The good news is tha..." [read]
LT said:
"I again repeat my comment from previous posts about poorly designed objects that design students should have some real world practical experience b..." [read]
Harrison Wills said:
"This is a beautiful quote by Mother Teresa that expresses the need to Do Good and Make Progress even when it's not appreciated. Love and Creat anyw..." [read]
Jesse said:
"I also agree for most families out there the recipies have to have a convertable property. I myself eat limited meat, aka fish, for some additional..." [read]
Larger boats can have a tremedous impact on the planet, so former prefab construction powerhouse David Ballinger has turned his attention to the water. His new design attempts to combat the conventional wisdom regarding houseboats. MetroShip is a sleek, more sustainable reinterpretation of those clunking houseboats of yesteryear.
Vodafon is sending this solar powered minihome around Spain to promote their telephone and internet services, complete with a family of four that is blogging about it at La Casa Móvil. Designers Waskman design studio, with creative space Culdesac, squeezed a lot into not much space. No doubt the glass wall makes it feel bigger, albeit without much privacy.
Obligatory Post About Green Fireworks for the 4th of July Fireworks are fun - who doesn't like explosions? - and a good excuse to get together with family and friends, but they're also not very clean. In Beijing, China, the smoke from fireworks during the new year celebrations tripled pollution levels overnight, and the toxic metals used to get the bright colorful sparks fall back to Earth, contaminating soil and water. Is there something we can do without losing the fireworks?
Photographer David Friedman appears to have solved the problem of never having enough places to plug things in. It also really tells a tale about consumption; he should stick a big meter in the middle of it.
Photos by Eric Laignel via Envision and Metropolis
The LEED Program is managed by the US Green Building Council (USGBC) and has become big business, so they needed bigger offices. The renovation of an existing building was designed by a team led by Kendall Wilson of Envision Design, who cut their green teeth doing the offices for Greenpeace ten years ago. It is clean and sleek, but doesn't jump out at you as overtly green; as Suzanne LaBarre writes in Metropolis:
It doesn’t feel green. The Eero Saarinen Womb chairs in the lobby, the sparkling terrazzo floors under your feet, the crisp white paint on the walls, glass everywhere—and more glass....If not for the oversize logo carved into wood at the entrance like a medallion, the office could easily be mistaken for the cool recesses of a fashion magazine.
The Australian Federal government are billing it is as the” largest-ever energy efficiency rollout” in the country. It’s their $4 billion Energy Efficient Homes Package designed to get ceiling insulation into the roofs of 2.9 million Australian homes, by 2012. Even in sunny Australia winter heat loss and summer heat gain through a residential ceiling is calculated to be between 25% and 35%, so there may be some truth in the government’s hyperbole.
As you might expect, given that they are giving home owner-occupiers a $1,600 AUD insulation rebate and $1,000 to landlords or tenants for rental properties, it’s no wonder that, as the Environmental Export reports, 50,000 people have already signed up for the program. Not bad considering it only officially kicked off yesterday.
But don't write the obituary for McMansions just yet. Although mass-produced behemoths more than 3,000-square-feet in size have only been common (and commonly criticized), since the late '90s, home sizes have never been influenced by need alone. The builder association's report also points out that houses ballooned most—about 1,000 square feet—during the period between 1970 and 2008, when household size dropped from 3.11 to 2.57. Homes are getting smaller now because people feel poorer, but all that will change once the recession ends and consumer confidence is restored.
Dan Gould at PSFK points us to the work of Bughouse Art+Design, where Jeff and Rebecca "love making things and finding different materials to expand the vocabulary of the way we all live and see." ...
Most of us agree that cycling is one of the most eco-friendly and healthy ways of transportation, although it can also be dangerous, even if you use bike lanes. Motorbikes swishing past, doors opening, parked cars that need driving around into the car lanes, are but a few nasty surprises you can come across even if you stay on the bike path. Most people agree that bike lanes should be separated from traffic. To make sure traffic also respects those bike lanes, Spanish designer Curro Claret (whose Hat Light was one of the very early posts on TreeHugger) designed the ZEBRA bicycle lane divider, made from recycled plastic....
Thomas Thwaites is a student at the Royal College of Art in London with an interesting project: he is trying to build a toaster. "from scratch - beginning by mining the raw materials and ending with a product that Argos sells for only £3.99. A toaster. "
Why?...
I love showing alternating tread stairs; they are a great way to save space and are surprisingly easy to use. Justin at StairPorn found this elegant one in a surprising place: A house built at the Rural Studio of Auburn University, where four students designed and built a house with $ 10,000 worth of materials and $10,000 worth of labour.
Ryan Stephenson, Joey Fante, Kait Caldwell, Aimee O’Carroll built the Loft House in the 2007-2008 season. Joey Fante writes in ArchDaily:...
Photo courtesy of Michael Jantzen
The Homestead House is an off-grid prefab concept made from recycled steel by designer Michael Jantzen.
The house makes use of prefabricated, commercially available steel which makes it both low in cost and extremely modular. In fact, it makes the size and shape of the structure completely customizable - not to mention really tough!
...
Photo by Sam Noonan via Architectural Record
Houses don't have to sit on standard foundations; it can be a lot less damaging to the terrain if you put them up in the air. Australian architect Max Pritchard built a lovely 1184 square foot house as a bridge over a stream. There is much to love besides just the treading lightly; it is small and tightly designed, has sophisticated solar and water management, and is a primary residence.
The architect tells Ingrid Spencer in the Architectural Record:
...
Marie Antoinette found the consumption at Versailles to be a bit conspicuous, so she tended to retire to her modest little pile in the woods, the Petit Trianon, to do her own social networking.
I loved this library ladder/ stairway that appears to fold up into an ottoman. That is clever design. While we usually promote transformer furniture as a way of using less space, it can also hide utilitarian functions in plain view....
$10K going once...fab reclaimed prefab auctioned on eBay. Photos by RCruger
The Reclaimed Space unit decorated by EcoFabulous on display at this weekend’s Dwell On Design conference was auctioned off on eBay and raised $75,100 for Habitat for Humanity. Lucky bidder. The 400-square-foot "rustic modern" structure featured 100-year-old reclaimed oak and pine, a full bathroom, a queen-sized Murphy bed, outdoor shower, porch, 85% recycled insulation, and retractable roof overhangs. ...
graphic from NAIOP Website
A few months ago TreeHugger reported on a silly study (That 70s Show: Developers Still Don't Know How To Make a Building Green) from the Commercial Real Estate Development Association (abbreviated as NAIOP, don't ask why) that concluded "that a 50 percent energy improvement beyond federal standards is technically impossible. A 30 percent target is achievable, but only by adding a million-dollar solar system that could take up to 100 years to pay for itself."
Interestingly, that is EXACTLY the level of energy improvements that the Waxman-Markey legislation mandates.
...
photo: Travis Hornung via flickr
I'll let you in on a small not-so secret: I've loved bamboo since I was a little kid. Fascinated with it ever since National Geographic ran a long story on complete with illustrations of all the different types, and have always had a strong visceral response to it. And what's not to like about it? It's amazingly strong, has myriad uses and is downright beautiful. So when I ran across an article in Popular Mechanics on how the Mississippi Delta could be transformed into the United States' prime bamboo growing region I was certainly intrigued:...
Zerofootprint: Reskinning Buildings
Many people are screaming that the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) doesn't go far enough; when architects, builders and building code officials get through it, there will be a lot of screaming that it goes way too far. No doubt they will complain that an industry on the ropes can't handle more regulation and higher standards, we have heard it all before. But 46% of our greenhouse gases come from buildings, so it is a key part of any attempt to reduce emissions.
And it will make a difference, because they are tough new rules....
The annual Royal College of Art Summer Graduate Show is the place to see up and coming designers in the UK. Last year we spotted Paul Thomas' bicycle carrier bags, and this year they were featured on the Apprentice. So who will be next year's super star?
Fiona Sperryn makes wall hangings out of bamboo, waste fibres, throw away bits and off-cuts from factories. Her theme is endangered species and extinct animals, like the dodo bird and certain woodpeckers pictured in her hangings. She uses a jacquard loom and also hand weaves some of these very effective pieces....
Photo Courtesy of Neatorama
Next time you're home, look around your closet. Your attic. How many pairs of jeans do you have there, unworn for months, years, decades even? I have four. Aside from the ones you keep for "some day" when you're skinny again or returning to fat, which ones of those could go? And where should they go? I'm betting your first thought was Salvation Army or some local version of such a thing. A commendable thought, but there's a problem. ...
Photo credit: Tobi
Packaging innovation this is not, but we like the jocular spin Tobi.com is putting on its latest attempt to reduce its carbon footprint: Reusing shipping boxes and drawing attention to their less-than-pristine condition.
And the online fashion retailer doesn't mince words—these boxes are U-G-L-Y. (It says so on the stamp.) But that doesn't mean they're less deserving of your love. ...
exterior photos by Kelly Rossiter
The same week that Alice Rawsthorn was writing about A Prefab House That Dazzles Still, the Pacific Palisades home of Charles and Ray Eames, I was in Paris, visiting another dazzling steel and glass house, the Maison de Verre, designed by Pierre Chareau for Dr. Jean Dalsace and his wife, Annie in 1931.
They are both seminal houses that have influenced generations of architects, but ultimately, the Maison De Verre has perhaps far more relevance to sustainable design and architecture today than does the Eames House....
We love transformer furniture that serves multiple functions; it saves space and lets you do more with less. We have shown few as complex as this desk by Giovanni Socci et fils, made in 1810 and seen at the Louvre in Paris. Note the three-legged chair on the wood slide-out base:...
Knitting and crocheting have become all the rage, with happy knitters meeting in pubs or creating monster coral reefs. Crocheting, like knitting, is an old skill which used to be the domain of ladies making doilies. Now with the revival of interest in traditional and artisanal handicrafts, artists are taking this old skill in new directions.
Kate Jenkins learned to crochet at her mother's knee and she is crocheting culinary masterpieces. In her fantasy cafe she is serving full english breakfast, complete with tomatoes, sausages and eggs, or fish and chips, little sugar cupcakes and cups of tea with saucers. Works like sequin-adorned sardines on toast, knitted tomato ketchup bottles and a box of PG Tips teabags are pleasingly real-looking but still have enough quirkiness and wit to keep you interested.
...
Park your plug-in hybrid under Phat Energy's carport. Photos by RCruger
Day two at the Dwell on Design Show in downtown Los Angeles was open to the public who came in droves, filled showroom aisles to peruse eco-friendly, modern furnishings, and listen to speakers on a variety of topics from sustainable design to the garage of the future and ideal green kitchen. On the floor, Phat Energy, a Southern California solar company, displayed their PhatPort, a solar-powered carport/patio awning and promoted its attic fan as a way to reduce energy costs and avoid paying more to utility companies.” Meanwhile, a hundred feet away, Edison, one of LA's utilities, spoke about alternative energy incentives and available rebates.
...
Photo via: Amagill
While not often a target of environmental groups due to the increased preparation and safety it promotes, a firefighters training regiment is anything but green. Such training often involves the controlled burning of vehicles, hay, and wood structures. The byproduct of such a rigorous training schedule results in thick, black, billowing clouds of toxic smoke and fumes, which not only simulates the danger to the firefighters and victims, but also the environmental catastrophe these types of fires promote....
Turn your wall into a white board with IdeaPaint. Photos by RCruger.
Gorgeous green homewares, scintillating sustainability forums, abfab prefab displays, green designs and architecture are the focus at "dwell on design," dwell magazine's fourth festival of modern design and it’s second in LA (where its biggest chunk of subscribers dwell). With lots of exhibitions, panels, interviews, home tours, films, innovative environmental ideas, and enticing events, the first jam-packed day kicked off the weekend show in green style. With so many enticing speakers, I tried to be in a few places at once, and managed to catch a batch of illustrious designers and forward thinkers. Here's some highlights:
...
We'll be working on better category archives soon. In the meantime, take a look at the weekly archive if you really want to dig around, or use the search box at the top of the page.
on 07. 5.09
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Dan Gould at 
Most of us agree that cycling is one of the most eco-friendly and healthy ways of transportation, although it can also be dangerous, even if you use bike lanes. Motorbikes swishing past, doors opening, parked cars that need driving around into the car lanes, are but a few nasty surprises you can come across even if you stay on the bike path. Most people agree that 
I love showing alternating tread stairs; they are a great way to save space and are surprisingly easy to use. 
Photo by Sam Noonan via Architectural Record
Houses don't have to sit on standard foundations; it can be a lot less damaging to the terrain if you put them up in the air. Australian architect Max Pritchard built a lovely 1184 square foot house as a bridge over a stream. There is much to love besides just the treading lightly; it is small and tightly designed, has sophisticated solar and water management, and is a primary residence.
The architect tells Ingrid Spencer in the 
Marie Antoinette found the consumption at Versailles to be a bit conspicuous, so she tended to retire to her modest little pile in the woods, the
$10K going once...fab 
graphic from NAIOP Website
A few months ago TreeHugger reported on a silly study (
photo: 
Zerofootprint: Reskinning Buildings
Many people are screaming that the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) 
The annual 
Photo Courtesy of 
Photo credit: Tobi
Packaging innovation this is not, but we like the jocular spin 
exterior photos by Kelly Rossiter
The same week that Alice Rawsthorn was writing about
We love transformer furniture that serves multiple functions; it saves space and lets you do more with less. We have shown few as complex as this desk by Giovanni Socci et fils, made in 1810 and seen at the Louvre in Paris. Note the three-legged chair on the wood slide-out base:...
Knitting and crocheting have become 
Park your plug-in hybrid under Phat Energy's carport. Photos by RCruger
Day two at the 
Photo via: 
Turn your wall into a white board with 
