University of Washington Lecture

Last Friday night we were honored to be included in an Ignite-style lecture at the University of Washington’s Department of Architecture. BUILD lectured alongside some power players like Bob Hull, Rick Mohler, Susan Jones, Peter Alspach and Sharon Sutton. The theme was “Re-envisioning Sustainability” and each speaker had a brisk 5 minutes and 15 slides to get some new ideas out to the graduate school of architecture.

Here’s the recap with some additional notes that we couldn’t quite pack into the time limit:

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Green ≠ Sensible

No doubt, the term “Green” can represent sustainable practices in the design and construction industry but the word has been abused and exploited to such an extent that, without an explanation and data, without looking at the whole picture, the term doesn’t really mean much. We’ve been designing and building houses for over 15 years in the northwest and when we hear the term “Green” without any supplementary information, we have no idea what it actually means. Ask 10 architects and builders for the definition of “Green design” and you’ll most likely get 10 different and vague answers.

We’ve all heard the stories…

–the 15,000 square foot house built with “green construction practices”. When a house of this size is occupied by a family of four (or sometimes less) there’s nothing green or sustainable about it.

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