I turned 40 last week. As friends were asking, “How does it feel?” I was reminded of a drawing I did when I was 10 years old. The year was 1980 and I was living in a dense urban block of Philadelphia. I had already been obsessed with Architecture since I was eight, but now at 10, I had asked my parents for some real drawing tools, and they obliged with a set of pens, pencils and paper. I spent hours dreaming up a future of curvy, organic buildings that defied gravity. Ink smudges covered my fingers from sketching visions of the future.

My mother was 40 when I was 10, and I clearly remember thinking how I would turn 40 in the oh-so-distant year 2010. What kind of buildings would we be building in 2010? Surely the world would be unrecognizable. The boxy, lifeless and grey blocks of my neighborhood would be replaced with things I couldn’t even imagine.

Little did I know that we would still be building with skinny sticks of wood, held together by nails and with punched openings for windows. My younger self never would believe how I now spend my time having to convince clients not to put toxic materials in their home or fighting to get a building inspector to approve the use of recycled water.

Would my 10-year-old self be disappointed in how ordinary and un-revolutionary the majority of todays’ buildings really are? Where is the future we expected?

In the 1985 hit film, Back to the Future, the character Marty McFly travels back in time 30 years to find striking differences in fashion, automobiles and music. The buildings, however, were relatively unchanged. If Marty were to go back in time today, he would return to 1980. He would be confused by our skinny ties, long cars and the sounds of Devo, but the buildings would go by unnoticed.

In the sequel, Marty travels ahead 30 years to 2015 to a world full of imagination. The future they present is exciting and very different from the present. But as intriguing as some of their predictions are, they clearly overestimated certain developments.

Is it safe to expect the next five years will bring us hoverboards, self-drying jackets or Mr. Fusion? Not likely. But you aren’t expecting those things. However, the buildings they showed (which don’t seem so far-fetched) are out of reach to us. What slows the innovation in our built environment?

In order to move forward, we must embrace our own long-term economic success. We need to rebuild our aging infrastructure, update those outdated systems and stop clinging to a romantic vision of old Architecture that embodies wasted resources, energy inefficiency and poor quality environments. Let’s rebuild our buildings and save ourselves in the process.

And this is the reason I am so excited about the upcoming West Coast Green Conference. Of the 40 or so conferences I attend each year, it is my favorite if only because of their focus on innovation. (Disclosure: I am on the Advisory Board). Hundreds of the top thinkers in architecture, planning and sustainability join together for three days to share ideas and develop solutions on how to design our future. You can hear more of my thoughts on this here.

Incidentally, the entire Back to the Future Trilogy is available in a special 25th Anniversary Edition on Blu-Ray on October 26th.

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MORE INFORMATION:
West Coast Green Conference
September 30 – October 1, 2010
http://www.westcoastgreen.com

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—Eric Corey Freed is an architect and author of four books, including Green$ense for the Home.

I admit. In college, I often fell asleep during the art history classes after lunch. Looking back now, I realize the decision to take those classes was not particularly bright. A full stomach, a darkened auditorium and only the voice of the professor, no matter how esteemed, made for a pretty soporific mix.

Consequently, it came as a pleasant but also somewhat panic-inspiring surprise when, after lunch, our Delta hosts informed us that where the schedule indicated “Installation Sessions,” we would, in fact, be the ones doing the installing. We would be installing two faucets: a lav faucet and a kitchen faucet with Touch2O technology.

While I do not shy away from such tasks when asked, I am not particularly handy. There’s a reason why I stopped buying Ikea furniture and it’s not because I’m not cheap, because I am. I just got tired of the bottoms of drawers dropping out and bookshelves swaying back and forth whenever I retrieved something.

Thankfully, I was paired up with the excellent Lauren Hunter, of Remodeling Magazine, and we were able to install both with only a few minor hiccups along the way. Here’s a photo, again courtesy of Joe Dusel, of CFT411.com.

Between the two installations, a demonstration on the resilience of the PEX tubing used in the faucets’ Innoflex Waterways system reassured me that the installation was pretty clod-proof. The demonstration was similar to this one on YouTube, which has some geek appeal, no?

The last part of our visit was devoted to a trends report given by Judd Lord, Delta’s director of industrial design, followed by a tour of the company’s i3 studio. Unfortunately, of the latter, I cannot say much more because of confidentiality, but suffice it to say I wouldn’t have minded spending more time there.

As to the trends, Lord’s presentation consisted of five, each with words and images associated. I’ve tried to find similar images to re-create what was shown, but alas, my memory is not quite what it was, and to be honest, I had some difficulty reading my own handwriting. Anyway, here’s what I was able to make out (and I apologize if I’ve misrepresented any of the trends in any way):

• Belmont: Carriage-house feel, comfort, equestrian style, masculine influence, forged iron, white marble, stitched leather, cherry wood.

Image: Artistic Tile's Bespoke

Image courtesy of The Goring

Image: Melhulsey

Image: Russ Hamer

Image: Lorenzo Lasco

Image: Amerock’s Cypress Epic knob


• Serene Cottage: Art Nouveau, casual, peacock feathers, rosé color, feminine details.

Image: Vera Buhl

Image: Villa Nova's Greta Jade

Image courtesy of flooring2flooring

Image: Ellhoisa


• Simply Basic: Military, corrugated textures, khaki, wood walls.

Image: Spazzi's L-01

Image: Joe Mabel


• Elemental: Striations, moiré, tanzanite, desert rock, cellular patterns, natural forms.

Image: Tau Porcelanatto's NO-Stalgia by Karim Rashid

Image: Robert Lavinsky, iRocks.com

Image: Daniel Csorfoly



• Modern Vision: Optimism, Bauhaus, clean and light palette, carbon fiber pattern, bright colors, Mid-century Modernism.

Image: Charles Luck Stone's Foussana

Image: Achim Hering

As mentioned on the blogs of fellow attendees, at the end of our visit, we were offered a showerhead with the company’s water-saving H₂Okinetic technology and a kitchen faucet of our choice to install at home and try out. We’ll see how it goes…

—Alice Liao

Green Builder Magazine’s VISION HOUSE series kicks off in Orlando this year for the International Builder’s Show with two new projects that highlight the latest technologies in green building and remodelling. As America experiences a slight upturn in the economy, hope for a big swing and a return to ‘the way we were’ is still first on our minds. I don’t know about you, but the scorecard changes daily, from cautious optimism to doom and gloom, depending on whom you talk to.

Last week I visited the site of the two houses I’m working on in Orlando and met with the builder, Southern Traditions Development. This husband and wife building team work in an amazing little section of Orlando called College Park, which is about 20 minutes from the Convention Center. This neighborhood is full of adorable bungalows and “cracker-style” homes that are synonymous with Southern architecture dating back to the 1920s. Cobblestone streets and airy front porches make this area look like a Hollywood movie set.

John Plevich and Kim Foy, the owners of Southern Traditions Development, have managed to maintain the quaint feel of the neighborhood and build and remodel homes that are not only attractive and sustainable, but also affordable. Their business is flourishing and continues to evolve, even in this sluggish economy. So here’s a perfect example of what it takes to make it work. A passion for what they do, an eye for clean, simple design, and a vision for building and remodelling sustainably.

This year’s VISION HOUSE, which is new construction, is made from insulated concrete forms instead of the usual stick-built way with wood framing. Blocks of hollow styrofoam stack together like Legos for the outside shell and are filled with concrete, creating a hurricane-proof, waterproof, highly insulated structure—not unlike a thermos bottle or styrofoam cooler. The outside can be finished with traditional siding or stucco, just like any other home. The advantage, of course, is in the energy savings on heating and cooling as well as storm protection.

The other project in Orlando this year is a followup to last year’s successful RE-Vision house in Las Vegas, which was a remodelled mid-century modern home that achieved net zero energy status and still maintained it’s cool modern vibe. Remodelling existing housing stock is the greenest thing you can do, improving what’s there without creating a huge carbon footprint.

This year’s Re-Vision project is in the same College Park neighborhood. It’s a 1950s ranch-style home with no particular architectural integrity, but sits well on a nice-sized lot on a cul-de-sac. By adding a small master bed and bath wing and reconfiguring the existing space, the house will go from small cramped rooms to a more open-style plan that works well with today’s lifestyle.

What’s important to me as a designer is to create living spaces that are simple and uncluttered, and stay as far away as I can from a heavy or grandiose look that’s been so popular in recent years. This year’s house will have a California Napa-style look, with some Spanish or Mediterannean influence, but with a much easier, lighter tone. Both homes will feature many green and sustainable products, from kitchen cabinetry to flooring and furniture.

You can read more about both these homes on Green Builder Magazine’s website: www.greenbuildermag.com

—Patricia Gaylor

Yesterday I was talking to designer Cheryl Kees Clendenon, whom we’re featuring in our Favorites column for the Fall issue and she mentioned how much she likes tile. I do, too. So despite all the usual craziness going on with trying to put out a print issue, I decided to take a breather and pop in a press CD I received from San Jose, CA-based Fireclay Tile.

Glad I did. Three series were featured on the CD, all of which were interesting in their own way. But because I’m a rather shallow person, I chose to upload the images of the prettiest of the three: Debris. The name at first blush may seem kind of ironic, but I think it’s a reference to the collection’s eco-friendly makeup. The line now boasts more than 62% recycled—post-industrial and post-consumer—material, resulting in clay-body tiles with a warm red-brown hue. Locally sourced, the recycled content includes waste glass made up of baghouse dust from glass recyclers; granite dust from a neighboring quarry; and spent abrasives used in the cleaning of pipes that transport water to the City of San Francisco.

More than 112 lead-free glaze colors, as well as gloss and matte options, are available, and designs span a wide range of styles. There’s Cuerda Seca Segovia,

Caramia Medallion,

Cuerda Seca San Sebastien,

Kensington Malt Rubbed,

Circle Star

and Pinwheel.

Now back to work…—Alice Liao