"I'm a lawn hater," says Jamie Durie, the popular Australian host of HGTV's The Outdoor Room and PBS's Victory Garden, who gave a gracious presentation for garden enthusiasts who gathered at the 2010 Central Ohio Home and Garden Show. A founder of PATIO Landscape Architecture and Design, Durie specializes in transforming the everyday backyard into a private garden oasis. Durie is the author of multiple landscaping idea books which are full of details and design tips for a variety of spatial scenarios.
What will happen to that water bottle you just tossed into your recycling bin? According to Mohawk Industries, manufacturer of EverStrand carpeting, “One in every four plastic bottles recycled in North America becomes EverStrand."
Ana Escalante’s Greenbaum Residence
Snuggled into a delightful desert spot in Rancho Mirage, California, Architect Ana Escalante, founder of Escalante Architects, introduces an unpretentious home whose brilliant, sustainable design mimics how nature reconciles cozy shelters. In fact, one may wonder where the desert’s landscape stops and the house begins. Escalante draws from ecological ideas such as passive solar ventilation and cooling that offer her client an organic home that breathes resources back into nature.
The Project: A Carbon-Neutral Footprint
The client, Robert Greenbaum, is a film producer with very strong green initiatives for his home and lifestyle as well. He commissioned Escalante as his architect with two parameters: a carbon-neutral footprint and a lap swimming pool. Incorporating a lap swimming pool within a three-bedroom house on a tight site was Escalante’s first hurdle. “Before I went to the drawing boards, I met again with Greenbaum in a plea for him to reconsider the size of the swimming pool,” says Escalante. "Quite adamant, he insisted that his life faithfully centers on swimming daily for hours, often up to five miles per day."
Don't Mow Your Lawn
Prevailed upon by a technocratic society, people are frequently alienated from nature and social interaction. As such, rumor has it that ecological outdoor living spaces are greatly coveted safe havens. The sky’s the limit; an outdoor living space or room can take on the functions of any interior home space within the constructs and limits of any locale. This is green architecture at its best; it brings the residents and their visitors' mental, emotional and physical conditions back into sync with nature.
Homeowners are motivated to build a “greenhome” or to renovate their existing home for a variety of reasons, such as: saving money as utility costs rise, an enthusiasm and respect for nature, to achieve a healthy living space, and even to enjoy the advanced technologies associated with energy efficiency. Yet, a “greenhome” is a process more than a sum of products. Record the process, perhaps in a journal1, including websites and data about what and where the materials and services were purchased, various installations and reconstruction stages, experimental discoveries and failures, a record of costs and savings, and a record of temperatures to measure efficacies of eco-friendly materials and technologies. A journal, like that of a gardening journal or a travel journal, can help to keep the ball rolling and to act as a display of accomplishments for others who may follow in your footsteps.
We'll Have a Green Christmas with Cowboy Bob
Written by Stephanie Aurora Lewis Fri Dec 25 2009 4:50pmOne of our KnowledgeBase writers, Robert Klar, otherwise known as Cowboy Bob, is a holidays enthusiast who would like to share some of his ideas about how to make the holidays an enjoyably green experience. He shares with us a few tips about LED lights that tie into the At Home article Christmas Light Safety. As for me, I greatly enjoyed walking through the Columbus Zoo's new LED Wildlights Display, sponsored this year by AEP with over 3 million brightly shining bulbs.
While we hope to inspire families to change out their traditional Christmas stings of lights with LED's this year, like Prince Charles has done for Buckingham Palace, the greater goal is to invoke a stronger, more broad use of the new LED technology in all light sources. After all, 6% of all electricity use in the U.S. comes from lighting sources. LED's are more than twice as efficient as compact fluorescents. So, look forward to watching how LED technology progresses in the coming years.
Happy Holidays!
Rainwater can be harvested with large, sophisticated, complex systems, linked rain barrels, or a single rain barrel. A single rain barrel is typically installed under a downspout as a repository for the rainwater collected by the roof gutters.
