This Nice Ride kiosk is about 100 ft from my apartment in Northeast Minneapolis.

Nice Ride is now the nation’s largest bike share program… it is in its first phase of development, which when completed will feature 1,000 unmistakable lime green bikes stationed at 75 metro kiosks.  Phase two will grow organically to include new neighborhoods and more kiosks. As of now, the focus is primarily on the downtown, U of MN, and uptown areas of Minneapolis.  Expansions will include more North Metro neighborhoods.

Although in its infancy, Nice Ride looks to have all the ingredients to rock some solid staying power… by its 20th day of operation, 10,000 trips had been taken.  Many of these trips were for the novelty of trying something new, but increasingly Minneapolis residents are recognizing that bike sharing is a legitimate form of transportation that can replace the congestion of urban driving.  It is extremely convenient with the plentiful locations, and can be very affordable if used properly.  The pricing structure of Nice Ride is really catered towards short trips.  Any excursion longer than half an hour kicks into an increased rate on top of the daily, monthly, or annual membership options… here’s a chart of how the subscription rates break down:

Nice Ride Minnesota was created through the Twin Cities Bike Share Project in July 2008.  It received funding from both public and private sources, with a large investment coming from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota Center for Prevention (a program funded through the Federal Highway Administration).  It truly is an extensive program, rivaling the efforts and infrastructure of many successful European cities’ bike shares… pretty cool!

But digging a little deeper for a second, I wanna throw some ideas out there about how this specific bike share program is a model example of how communities will be designed in the 21st century.  If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you’re probably familiar with the concept of thrivability (for a quick recap, please refer to this post HERE).  Basically, the premise is to redefine our goal to not only sustain and survive, but to thrive… to exchange the mindset of ‘a little less bad is good’ to truly healthy and restorative measures.  Thrivability has really captured my imagination and I’m constantly on the lookout for examples of things that might classify as  being thrivable.  I feel that this bike share has the tools to be a functioning case study of thrivability.

For starters, thrivability differs from sustainability in that its focus is exclusively on positivity and creative rebuilding, not patching and repairing existing problems.  Something that is truly thrivable won’t have any adverse effects on what I call the ‘4 P’s’: People, Planet, Profit, Philosophy.  Bike sharing can in theory hit all of these P’s… let’s break them down:

People: Socially, bike sharing increases the health of communities and enriches the fabric of urban density.  Citizens trade an unhealthy lifestyle of passively sitting in a car for one of activity and interaction.  Opposed to large expanses of concrete parking lots, cities would instead invest in the development of experiences on the street level.  Retail opportunities would grow near bike lanes and kiosks, people would be happier and healthier by exercising more, and a stronger sense of community would develop as more people interact face to face.  Also, being able to conveniently access transportation without ownership issues of maintenance and storage is a huge perk for both urban infrastructure and citizens’ peace of mind… Nothin’ but positives here!

Planet: The environment is a clear winner with bike sharing as well.  The pollution, carbon emissions, and water degradation from our reliance on cars is highly damaging to natural ecosystems and the future of a healthy biosphere.  The implementation of smart urban growth is imperative for our survival on the planet (over half of the world’s population currently lives in a metropolis, and numbers are projected to skyrocket to 70%+ in coming decades)… this development requires a heavy dose of alternative transportation, and bike shares are at the forefront of this movement.

Profit: The economics of bike sharing is a bit more subtle than some of the other benefits, but is still very substantial.  Tying into some of the social issues I mentioned above, not many understand the economic repercussions of a petroleum-based transportation sector.  The US Dept of Health estimates that the burning of fossil fuels account for $120 billion a year in health impacts on American citizens… fossil fuel companies are not liable for these costs… Then take into account the lack of exercise people get by sitting in cars, obesity, diabetes, and other lifestyle illnesses and the economic benefits of bike sharing clearly takes a huge burden off of health care overhead.

Other hidden benefits of a strong urban community are business, retail and advertising opportunities along streets that gain more bicycle and walking traffic.  Property values could also improve if located near a bike share kiosk… Additionally, another huge economic perk is that creating infrastructure for bicycles is far more affordable and adaptable than the creation of additional roads and various other alternative transportation options like buses and light rails.

Philosophy: The final ‘P’ is a fun one!  The philosophy behind bike sharing is very much thrivable.  I truly believe that the 21st century will be defined by access as the 20th century could be defined by the idea of ownership.  To truly drive the scale of change that is needed, people (particularly here in the states) need to separate from the need to own everything.  Ownership puts an incredible amount of pressure on a world full of rapidly depleting resources and often acts as emotional baggage, tying material goods directly to an individual’s sense of identity.  Sharing bikes, cars, tools, etc increases an understanding of interconnectedness while saving people money, time, and stress.  Progressive programs like Nice Ride are at the cusp of this wave, forcing individuals to rethink necessities and better define elements that promote value within a community.

So as you can tell, I’m pretty excited about having a top notch bike share program here in my home town!  Despite having 3 bikes of my own (I know, hypocrit of ownership!), I was able to effectively utilize the Nice Ride the other night.  I was at a buddy’s b-day celebration and needed to jam back to my apartment across town before others were ready to leave.  A kiosk was conveniently located right outside the restaurants door… I swiped my card, grabbed a bike and 20 minutes later dropped it off at another station 100 ft from my apt door… it was pretty choice!  I smiled and thought to myself, ‘welcome to the 21st century!’

-j

In Passive House construction, an all-star team of experts is as important as insulation or efficient windows.  The PHitW is no exception to this.  Led by a couple friends of mine, Tim Eian of TE Studio as the architect and Sean Morrissey of Morr Construction (built the first LEED Homes project in Minnesota) as the builder, the project was in good hands from the start.  A client that understands the benefits of living in a super-efficient home like this certainly doesn’t hurt either… Passive Houses, with their extensive building envelopes and upgraded windows, appliances and lighting, can add up to be about a 15% premium over normal construction, which is not insignificant.  Individuals that commission net-zero energy structures are not complacent to added costs however, as overhead from operations can be eliminated, earning their investment back over time and eventually making money from it.  But it’s not only about finances… Social factors of living with a small eco-footprint and leading by example often drive a project of Passive caliber as well…

Rendering credits go to TE Studio…

Here Tim Eian is showing off the 11″ of rigid foam insulation being installed over 11″ structural Insulated Concrete Form (ICF) walls…. yes math majors, this equals 22″ of wall width, providing an incredible R-value of 75!  The roof pushes near triple digits, weighing in at R95 and floor slab is in the R60 range…. windows with a U-value of .14 were imported from Germany, because apparently nothing in North America would get ‘er done…

Moving indoors with the tour, we were shown an interesting high-efficiency heat recovery ventilation machine that is designed to squeeze every last bit of energy from inside the house.  It was also incredible to look up into the overhead joists and see how small the ventilation ductwork was… maybe five inches in diameter?

So the building standard is not called Passive without reason… it’s emphasis is on minimizing active systems in buildings, thus minimizing operating costs.  The three bedroom, 1,940 sq ft PHitW is properly sited to absorb the passive energy of the sun, and when paired with the incredibly efficient building envelope, the residence requires the equivalent of energy drawn from two hair dryers to heat the home!  (I wonder if we could get two teenage girls to test this hair dryer hypothesis)…

The project will incorporate a 6,750 kWh/yr photovoltaic system on site to more than offset the sliver of active energy that will be used… the home is modeled to draw 4,200 kW of electricity each year.  This means that the surplus electricity can be put back into the grid… Below is a shot of the PV system in relation to the home.

The Passive House in the Woods has been picking up a lot of press throughout the country.  Many are interested in learning about the stringent German building standard and how it can be tackled here in the states.  Fortunately, the team working on PHitW has put together a fantastic blog to keep people in the loop with project info and updates. To check it out for yourself, click HERE.

-j

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The residence that Tate himself uses on the weekend has very little site impact.  It sits on 16 poles drilled into the ground, allowing trees to grow from under the house.  The structure was also designed to point at the arch of a giant puriri tree, which frames the rear entrance (pictured above).

Further contributing to the experience of natural isolation is a set of 45 steps that lead you from the garage down to the home’s level.  This forces one to fully engage with the site on a daily basis… love it!

Reminiscent of Philip Johnson’s Glass House, Tate’s work also has very minimal interior decor.  High ornamentation and clutter would detract from the amount of visual activity taking place on the other side of the windows… actual birds flying by or a painting of a bird… I’ll take reality!

As a designer, I’m very suspect of trends… to me they’re just ways to make people shop more.  This Forest Home truly defies trends because of its simplicity and because, like I hinted at a moment ago, it’s grounded in reality.  If you think about it, nature has no trends, it only has function.  Green isn’t the color of 2010, it’s the color of life.

photos taken from New Architecture magazine, credits to Patrick Reynolds.

Hat’s off to Chris Tate and everyone else involved in this project… incredibly inspiring to say the least!  It has many similarities to the Juvet Landscape Hotel in Norway that I profiled a while back.  Take a gander at that link for a little more eye candy!

-j

One pivotal moment occurred on April 18th 1977, when president Jimmy Carter delivered a televised speech urging his fellow Americans to take energy and environmental issues seriously. His words were direct,  America chose not to listen… they didn’t take too keenly to words like ‘sacrifice’ or ‘challenge’.  Instead, they committed to a deeper addiction of non-renewable and polluting energy sources, choosing not to think about long-term supplies or big picture consequences.  And here we are today… a generation later facing the same issues of energy and environmental policy, our hand even deeper in the cookie jar, with stakes exponentially higher.

Well, what can we learn from the successes and failures of the past 40 years, and how can we move forward to create timely and meaningful change before we truly pass the point of no return? I’m gonna take a couple minutes and address three main issues I feel can move the environmental movement forward in the coming years.

1. Environment vs. Economy: During the Carter/Reagan debates of 1980, two environmental ideologies clashed head on…  Individuals who sided with Reagan and conservatism felt that environmental initiatives directly related to more government regulation and higher taxes. They did not like this. They created a mindset that any effort of eco-stewardship came at the expense of the economy. Huge corporations joined the debate and funded anti-environmental initiatives… their power and persuasion grew, grabbing the mindshare of hundreds of millions of Americans along the way.

This environment vs economy struggle is still very much alive today and by the looks of it will only escalate as we continue to face tough economic times. Instead of maintaining a combative mindset, I feel environmentalists could make tremendous strides by better using the economists own game against them. When it comes down to it, sustainability almost always equals better economics (when addressed properly). A continued focus on transparency and the incorporation of externalized costs will increasingly level the playing field and make short-term profits look like really awful long-term investments.  If we can better articulate the true costs of our disposable lifestyles, it will be significantly easier to sell conservation. Let’s use the environmentally destructive fast food model as an example… instead of seeing it as an economic savior for low-income individuals, we must rephrase it as an industry that interferes with citizen’s rights to access healthy, affordable food. If we incorporate the costs of obesity, diabetes, rain forest depletion for increased grazing, carbon and methane emissions, groundwater toxification and so on into the price of a value meal, it would quickly lose its economic edge.  To this point we haven’t been able to find a creative way to portray this type of message, so this is a huge opportunity for improvement.

Along these lines, environmentalists need to do a much better job of selling the idea of natural capital (the value of nature’s services). The mindset of the past several generations has been that of exploitation = income. Cutting down trees, mining oil, and bottling water are all examples of how we take something that’s virtually free and sell it as GDP… this is the foundation of our economy and obviously it is unsustainable. A study a couple of years back looked at natural capital and determined that the services nature provides for us is the equivalent of $33 trillion dollars/yr, while the global gross national product sits around $18 trillion/yr. This certainly doesn’t mean that we have a lot more profit out there to pillage, rather that leaving it intact makes better economic sense. The same study determined that on an annual basis, preserving an ecosystem vs selling it for its parts is 82% more profitable when considering air quality, water management, property values, etc.

2. New paradigm: A second idea off freshifying environmentalism is to continually break down barriers of what is possible. Nothing articulates this idea better than Buckminster Fuller’s quote: “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” Anyone who’s paying attention to our global condition will confidently tell you that we must do more than tweak a few things here or there to maintain long-term stability. Environmentalist’s current mindset of ‘a little less bad is good’ will not alone get us to where we need to go… there is far too much at stake to rely on this. In the built environment, the Living Building Challenge is trying to rethink what is possible by creating a standard of restorative buildings, structures that have not only eliminate their negative impacts, but actually produce energy and food, treat water, and filter air. These buildings will have no operating costs once constructed… how’s that for good economics!?!

This is the type of innovation that is needed right now, and the value of creative experimentation must gain stronger support. Obviously this is easier said than done in a system that fears change… the Living Building Challenge can again be seen as an example here.  They are working with local communities on creating demonstration project ordinances, which would make it much easier for cutting-edge projects to hurdle code barriers that restrict innovation.  Basically, stronger innovation in all aspects of of sustainable development will raise the ceiling of human potential, thus pulling with it the floor. Everyone wins.

3. Personal commitments: Finally, the third area for improvement I will briefly discuss is the role of the educated individual. Ecological awareness has increased tremendously since the first Earth day 40 years ago…the tools and information that is available today is absolutely incredible… while technological advancements have grown, it seems that personal will power has diminished. Despite our increased awareness of consequences, Americans are driving more, eating more meat, and consuming more than ever before.  A recent Gallup poll studied the environmental behaviors of Americans and found that we are basically saying ‘Me first, Planet later’… no good!

How can this be with all the green this, green that being thrown around? Clearly there are thousands of reasons, but a prominent one is that what we’re fighting against is becoming increasingly invisible. The first Earth day was a protest against smoggy cities, toxic rivers, and garbage-filled streets. We’ve done a great job of eliminating many of these issues, but in the process many of us declared mission accomplished and moved onto different and more immediate issues. Supporting this notion is the concept of inverted quarantine, which states that the development of the eco-consumer market is actually hurting the greater environmental movement by distracting empathetic individuals from meaningful actions…

Certainly political polarization and corporate interests are not helping much, but I place a huge amount of responsibility on the shoulders of American citizens. Over the years, we’ve gotten really good at holding businesses like Walmart and Nike accountable for their destructive actions, but we’ve failed to look in the mirror and hold ourselves to the same level of accountability. And I’m speaking primarily to people who call themselves progressive… It frustrates the hell out of me when I sit down with someone who’s passionately talking about Life Cycle Assessments while they’re eating a hamburger, or when I walk into a natural foods store that is using incandescent bulbs for lighting, or when I’m in a yoga class where 20+ healthy-minded individuals in the studio are drinking from disposable plastic bottles. The list could go on and on… basically, the mindset has increasingly become ‘eh, not my problem… someone else will deal with it.’  Well, who exactly is that someone else? If we keep postponing that someone, we will wake up one day in the not-so-distant future to find a world that is virtually uninhabitable.  And on this day we’ll no longer be able to play the anonymous card and say that we didn’t know, that we didn’t have the tools to go a different direction… I hope and pray that we find the courage to ensure that this day will never come…

Winding down with some words from that Jimmy Carter telecast 33 years ago:

“We have been proud of (America’s) leadership in the world.  Now we have a chance again to give the world a positive example.  And we have been proud of our vision of the future. We have always wanted to give our children and grandchildren a world richer in possibilities than we’ve had. They are the ones we must provide for now. They are the ones who will suffer most if we don’t act.

And we can be sure that all the special interest groups in the country will attack the part of this plan (progress) that affects them directly. They will say that sacrifice is fine, as long as other people do it, but that their sacrifice is unreasonable, or unfair, or harmful to the country. If they succeed, then the burden on the ordinary citizen, who is not organized into an interest group, would be crushing.

There should be only one test for this program: whether it will help our country.”

-j

About two years back, I was living in downtown St Paul in a pretty rockin’ industrial loft.  The capital city of Minnesota is a decent time, but has a long ways to go to be a true urban experience.  I found it difficult to live there and not rely on my car, which is obviously not cool for someone trying to minimize their eco-footprint.  So I pulled the trigger and bought an electric bicycle thinking that it would be a fun transition into the world of emissions-free transit.  It didn’t disappoint as I found myself riding it just about everywhere… the bike was a blast!  There were several moments of pure magic on the thing, one of which involved using the electric assistance to leisurely pedal past a cyclist in full bike gear who was huffing and puffing up a hill.  Boy did I feel like champion!  Unfortunately my relationship with the e-bike would be more of an affair than a marriage… this past winter I left it uncharged for about a month when I was in New Zealand over the holidays and the battery fell asleep.  I called the dealer to see if I could troubleshoot it back to life… no love.  The lithium ion battery is kinda like a loaf of bread… once it goes stale, there’s no reviving it back to an edible state.  So I got about a season and a half of riding into my bike and the battery crapped out.  I looked into a new battery but was discouraged to discover a sticker price of $450… ouch!  The battery-less bike is now sitting in my closet collecting dust…

Obviously I’m not happy with how my first venture into the world of electric transit went down, and I’m particularly worried because my experience will be replicated by millions of others in coming years, potentially turning many off of ‘clean’ technologies.  What’s worse is that the stakes will only be higher as people will be buying not only e-bikes but electric cars, which are financially and emotionally much larger investments.

Another factor that not many seem to be discussing is the lifecycle of a battery-based transportation industry.  For starters, the mining of lithium (and other metals like lead, nickel and cadmium) is environmentally destructive… the chemicals themselves are quite toxic and daily exposure to them in our cars, bikes, electronics etc is a risk for bio-accumulation.  Lithium (the cleanest chemical of the lot) has been proven to cause fetal harm in pregnant women.  Also, the source for much of the world’s lithium lies in areas of the world that are relatively volatile, Bolivia and China specifically… and on this note, many are questioning if there is even enough lithium out there to supply the demand for millions of electric cars to hit our roads…. ‘peak oil’ could easily become ‘peak lithium’.  Disposal and recyclability become major issues in how to deal with all the batteries that are no longer functioning… And then there’s the obvious issue of electricity production… the majority of energy needed to charge batteries will come from existing coal plants…

By no means am I suggesting that electric cars and bikes are no good… they would be vast improvements over our current condition… I guess I’m just saying they should not be seen as silver bullet solutions.  I learned a valuable lesson with my e-bike that when it comes to technology, good intentions are not always enough to create a positive experience.  Simplicity and mindful design will always trump technology.  I now ride a road bike everywhere and enjoy the reassurance that not only will it never have any goofy glitches to deal with, but it truly is an emissions-free vehicle.  The same can go for transit infrastructure.  Creating communities that are walkable, bikeable or have great mass transit will eliminate the need for many individuals to have personal vehicles in the first place… these are the sort of solutions that will bring us closer to a thrivable world.

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-j

Now some people get excited when watching a competitive college basketball game… others when finding a great deal at a department store.  I personally get excited when I discover an innovation that has the chance to really change the world.  My first introduction to Affresol was one such moment where my excitement levels were high… when I discovered that a whole lot of my least favorite stuff on Earth (plastic waste) could be converted into my favorite things on Earth (modern homes), I literally yelled ‘OH YEAH’ so loud that my cat Old Scratch jumped off the couch!  I love this stuff!

And Affresol has the petal to the metal when it comes to game-changing innovations!  Basically, they’ve created a unique process of mixing polymers and resins with the plastic waste, producing what is called TRP3 (Thermo Poly Rock).  This can then be used just like concrete, and when solidified, TRP3 will be stronger than concrete! Other benefits of the product will be:

• Excellent thermal insulation characteristics
• Very durable (estimated at 80 years)
• Water proof
• Fire retardant
• Not susceptible to insect infestation
• Does not rot
• Does not leech any harmful elements
• TPR has a “Low Carbon Footprint”
• 100% recycleable

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So they’re making some affordable modular housing units out of the stuff right now… above is a pic of one such structure made from Thermo Poly Rock… I’m hoping that all TRP3 homes aren’t forced to look like this one… ick!

For more info on Affresol, check out there website HERE…

-j

Curious how big your own water footprint is?  Check out h2oconserve.org… On this site, you can access a Water Calculator, which walks you through all the areas of our daily lives that use H2O… the thing is pretty comprehensive, asking you questions like: ‘if it’s yellow, do you let it mellow?’  Seems like they have pretty much all the bases covered here.  I’m guessing you’re a bit surprised at the 1200 gallons/day number, and frankly, I was too.  But when considering not just the water that we visibly see, like showering, flushing toilets, washing dishes, hosing down a dirty dog, etc, but also the amount it takes to make our food, turn into gasoline and the like, our water footprints can get pretty big pretty quick!

So I took this quiz and my score came out to 533.02 gallons of water per day… half of the average, which is cool, but still a huge amount of water, which is not cool.

To check out the Water Calculator yourself, click this link HERE.

-j

I was jazzed from day one to work on this project when the client expressed interest in two things: clean lines and sustainability… ah yes, the two loves of my life!  We came up with a game plan and focused on a design for the kitchen/dining area of the home.  An emphasis was placed on creating a space that complimented the amazing view of Theo Wirth Park in their backyard, a gorgeous nature reserve five minutes outside of downtown Minneapolis…

The existing kitchen/dining space needed quite a bit of TLC… white Corian countertops, dated cabinets, a ceramic tiled island, and an oversized vent hood filled the space with an 80’s vibe.  Appliances and lighting fixtures matched the era of finished materials (a before picture here).  The overall layout was sound however, with a nice open plan designed for entertaining and soaking in views of the backyard…

In addition to updating finished materials and appliances, we wanted to rethink the storage situation in the kitchen.  The countertop along the back wall became the permanent home for the microwave, toaster, coffee maker and various other kitchen necessities… sure, all these elements were accessible, but the visual clutter certainly did not contribute to a piece of mind, and without that, what have ya got?… A walk-in closet next to the fridge was also an opportunity for improving storage.  The thing was nice and big, but the vast majority of its space was gone to waste by a person standing in the middle of it.  We opted for two huge pull-out pantries that held the same amount of goods as the walk-in, while freeing up enough space on the back side to create a full closet off the hall… a nice bonus!

With this remodel being primarily cosmetic, the selection of finish materials became our chief goal.  We spent several weeks going over options, from FSC-Certified woods, 3form eco-resins, metallic paints, to concrete or recycled paper countertops.  The client and I took a field trip over to the NorthStar Surfaces showroom in St. Paul to check out some of their counter and cabinet options.  We instantly fell in love with a vanity on display there that featured a richly textured bamboo material paired with a deep brown counter.  Initially we were visualizing lighter cabs and counters for the kitchen, but once we saw this display, we both felt that our search was over.  And that was a really fantastic moment, having that connection with those materials… we felt that they presented a very elegant, earthy and modern solution, exactly what we were going for!

The cabinet facing turned out to be a gorgeous bamboo product made by Smith & Fong called Plyboo… Plyboo comes as both flooring and as plywood sheets.  It is formaldehyde-free and has several finish options to choose from, but what we saw and were drawn to was the Neopolitan finish, a highly textured mix of light and dark strands of bamboo… very rich and luxurious!

The countertop we went with was equally unique as the Plyboo… it was a brand new product called ECO by Cosentino, and to say that I was excited about it would be an understatement.  ECO is an incredibly innovative product that I feel has the perfect characteristics to really bring a bright green countertop to the mainstream… it is comprised of 75% post-consumer recycled materials and is one of a very limited number of ambitious products that has reached Cradle to Cradle Certification (which means that its entire life cycle is sustainable)… It is made from bits of porcelain, glass, crystallized ash and mirror and is bound together by a corn-based resin.  Also, 94% of the water used during the manufacturing process of ECO is recycled…  An absolutely amazing product that looks, performs and costs about the same as stone slabs that we are used to using.. it could really be a game changer!

Appliances were also important elements of the remodel… basically every existing appliance was at the age of needing to be replaced.  We researched and selected an Energy Star compliant oven, dishwasher, vent hood and microwave.  For the cooktop, we were considering the uber-efficient induction option, but didn’t pull the trigger on that due to the added expense of needing a corresponding set of steel pots.  We instead went with a sleek Siemens electric top, which was quite efficient itself…

And speaking of efficiency, for lighting we selected an LED solution for under the cabinets.  I had worked with Environmental Lights on several other projects before, so I felt more than comfortable going forward with them again… their undercabinet light bar was extremely efficient (less than 10 watts for a 36″ strip!), was dimmable, and produced a beautiful warm light that in my opinion is identical to the light quality of a traditional incandescent bulb.  And meandering along the ceiling of the kitchen we placed a new track light that adds a biomorphic element to the room, helping to balance all the hard corners and right angles seen throughout the rest of the space… The plan is to eventually replace each of these track bulbs with LED MR16s, but we’re waiting for the bulb costs to drop a bit before we do so…

To best highlight the gorgeous plyboo, ECO, and new stainless appliances, we designed several features into the kitchen.  We built a nook into the cabinets to house the microwave, taking it off of the counter.  Below the microwave we added a stainless tambour door, creating a nice storage space and further decluttering the work surface from small appliances and various other gadgets.  Above the fridge, we placed a custom wine rack, because what’s a finished kitchen without a wine rack, eh?

I’m sure you won’t argue with me when I say that the Plyboo steal the show… it certainly draws a lot of attention!  In my design I was sensitive to not have the Plyboo be too overwhelming, so I offered a bit of visual relief by having the back wall of upper cabinets be made of a much more neutral material.  Aluminum and frosted glass offered the perfect solution, becoming visually weightless while corresponding to the stainless appliances…

While most of the action took place in the kitchen, the dining room got a nice splash of love as well… by lowering the kitchen island from bar height to counter height and selecting a much smaller vent hood, we successfully opened up the space separating the two rooms.  This helped to synergize the space as a whole, but we had to walk a fine line of how much attention to place in the dining room since the bamboo in the kitchen was so visually dominant.  We spent several weeks scouring the web for the perfect dining table and couldn’t find one, so the client pulled the trigger and hired our cabinet guys (Rust Brothers) to build us a custom table.  The result was absolutely dynamite!  Made from the wood of local ash, the minimal table with matching benches was above and beyond what we saw publicly available… its natural wood finish complimented the floors while the benches allow guests to sit either facing the activity of the kitchen or be apart of the table conversation… (for a view of dining are before, click here).

With a gorgeous build out as a base to work from, we needed furniture, art and accessories to be the icing on the cake.  We went with Minneapolis-based furniture company Blu Dot and selected their Knicker chairs and stools.  Their entire lineup is fantastic, but what drew us to the Knicker was its use of upholstery, which effectively pulled in the grays from the walls and stainless elements in the kitchen.  It also helped to soften the overall feel of the space as there were no other textiles used in the design… Art behind the table was provided by a homeboy of mine, Ray Becoskie… this dude absolutely wails!  Like Blu Dot, his mission is to bring good design to the masses and consciously keeps his work very affordable.  Behind the painting, we used Sherwin Williams Harmony paint, which is one of their low-VOC products, in a soft blue hue…

Photos were taken by my pal Aaron Holmberg at Holmberg Studios.

So that pretty much wraps this baby up… an awesome project, great team, amazing client, fantastic result… doesn’t get much better than that!  We reached all of our project goals, improving efficiencies, utilizing cutting edge green materials and creating a design that transcends trends.  The client’s husband was a bit cautious throughout the project, but came around to really enjoy the result for its relationship to the natural elements of their beautiful backyard.  The cabinets, table, and refinished floors created a strong sense of wood, the stainless steel represented stones or rocks, and the light blue walls created the soothing and calming effect of water… very cool!

For more information on my biz, Thrive Design Studio, to see other projects, and get a better understanding of what we do, please check out our site at thrivesustainability.com…

Have fun, be good, be green!

-j