Bright Built Barn is Built, Bright and Beautiful

All images by Naomi Beal via Kaplan Thompson Architects

Perhaps I should just rename these design posts the "Jetson of the Day" since I am getting so many from Preston at Jetson Green. Back in September he introduced us to the Bright Built Barn; Now Naomi Beal's latest pictures of it almost completed are up and it looks great. The designers are very proud of the "light skirt" around the building; I think it makes it look pimped out like a tuner Honda. However they serve a purpose:

The barn glows GREEN when it is producing more energy than it consumes; YELLOW indicates a borderline condition; RED means that energy usage is current higher than required to meet our yearly NET ENERGY goal. These colors are indicators of real-time energy usage, and will soon be visible on our website.

Kaplan Thompson did very good renderings, and it is remarkable how the finished building is almost indistinguishable.

The interior is elegant, restrained, looking very Japanese; the closet doors look like Shoji screens.

Preston writes:

since it can be almost entirely prefabricated off-site, BrightBuilts will be replicated and proliferated all over the country. So let's expect to see more of these in various places.

I certainly hope so. Congratulations to Bensonwood Homes, Kaplan Thompson Architects, Gibson Design Build and a very lucky client. More at Bright Built Barn via Jetson GreenMore on Bensonwood and Bright Built Barn in TreeHugger:Bright Built Barn is Net-Zero EnergyThe Wired Home Goes Green: First Pix of Loblolly HouseOpen BuildingThe Open PrototypeWhat Makes a Building Green? Kieran Timberlake Architects