What does it mean to be "green"?

Through my entire experience over ISP, I still find myself preoccupied with one question: What does it mean to be "green"?

I found countless websites, materials or resources that claimed to be environmentally friendly yet under close scrutiny were quite the opposite. Some environmental sites preached the need for everyone to live one certain way to have the smallest impact possible where as others approached environmentalism like an unattainable goal.

So, after weeding through all the different interpretations of what it means to be "green", I have come to associate the "green" movement in general with a holistic approach to health: mind, body and soul. Being "green" is about balancing all of your needs with those of others and not just other human beings but the place you live and all the living things that you interact with. I think of being "green" as a denunciation of the Greek idea that "Man is the measure of all things".

My biggest problem with things like LEED certification is the idea that you can put a sticker on something and call it "green" rather than approaching the building as a whole. Like the Frameworks for Healthier Neighborhoods package, I believe more in empowerment then the close scrutiny of inumberable rules. All the meticulous divsions and awarding of points seems rather trivial to me.

Being "green" is about balance and respect. I think of being "green" as a denunciation of the Greek idea that "Man is the measure of all things".

Any Excuse for a Party!

I seriously can not believe that today was my last day. This morning I came in and put the finishing touches on my spreadsheet, wrapped up some of the organizational work I was doing upstairs and then everyone suprised me with bagels and pastries and a present!

As a going away gift they gave me two incredible coffee-table books! It was so nice and thoughtful of them and they are such great books. Thanks so much!!

After the going away party I did a little more library maintenance before calling it a day.

I really can't even express how much I have learned these past three weeks.

Starting a New Buisiness

Today really brought out the challenges that face new and growing small buisinesses. I was still working on my spreadsheets but upstairs P and R had a meeting with a buisiness advisor of some sort to talk about the future of their sustainable material retail company now located in the basement and it was really a fascinating meeting to over hear.

The company is at a major cross-roads right now in terms of what service it will attempt to provide. Three architects started the company 4 years ago and it still hasn't met with much success. They aren't even breaking even with sales. Too often, clients will come in and it will because a consulting session rather than a sale. It has been really difficult to find a balance between profit and education on alternative materials. Now, they are discussing the idea of real-life retail store vs. online powerhouse. The company I think will end up making the distinct movement towards a shop with daily buisiness hours rather than an online resource but it was still cool to hear both sides of the equation.

I has been really intersting working with a company like this at such an unstable time because before I didn't really understand what is involved in becoming a successful retailer or what being a retailer even meant. Not only did I get a lot farther on my spreadsheets today but I learned a thing or two about buisiness.

Everything about Floors

Rubber, Cork, Bamboo, Rubber + Cork, Linoleum, Terrazzo, faux-Stone, Palm lumber and sustaibable harvested Hardwoods.

Those are all the basic flooring options that I've been researching today and all this week making the flooring section of my spread sheet by far the most complicated and far-reaching of them all. Both Tiles and Solid Surfaces I could condense to one-page but right now Flooring is 2 and a half pages and counting.

Strictly going by materials, I would have to say that cork is definitely my favorite thus far. I absolutely love the feel of cork underfoot and the material is suprisingly durable and resilient. On the downside of cork though, now that I think about it, my favorite warning to accompany a product warranty for cork warned against wearing stilletto heels on the cork floor because some of the impressions might not recover 100% after impact. It applied the same warning to placing furniture and such onto the cork. Every material has its pros and cons and despite its draw backs, cork is something I would love to have in my kitchen to take some stress off my feet while I am busy cooking.

Another surprising flooring option that I've actually warmed up to is linoleum. I know what you are thinking and I had the same initial reaction of disgust simply because linoleum just sounds tacky but the material has come a long way. Of everything that I have researched it is by far the most versatile and is suprisingly comfortable underfoot.

While at face value this work might seem a little boring it is suprisingly interesting to point out all the miniscule differences between the products. I pretty much decided on all the different brands that I'll include on my spreadsheet so now I starting to finalize everything. Tomorrow I think I'm going to focus specifically on the certifications of each product, most specifically LEED Credits so that potential clients can look at these spread sheets and immeadiately get a sense of the products specs.

Everything about Countertops

Today I shifted from tiles to solid surfaces which are pretty much just countertops.

Again, I noticed the same trend in terms of a great deal more sustainable infrastructure out West as opposed to here on the East coast. Washington state is an especially noticeable hot-spot for sustainable innovation. The brands Squak Mountain Stone, Richlite and Paperstone are all based out of Washington.

Of all the countertops and materials that I looked through today I would have to say that IceStone is still definitely my favorite of the bunch. In terms of color choice, sustainablility and ethical buisiness practices, IceStone beats out the competition hands down. Not only is IceStone 99.5% inorganic but uses 100% recycled glass, sustainably harvested Mother of Pearl chips and post-industrial recycled material to make up of the slabs of imitation stone. To top it off, the slabs are also manufactured in a day-lit factory right here on the East coast in Bronx, NY.

Everything about Recycled Glass

The title says it all. My spreadsheet on the different sustainable or "green" tiles available is in full swing. The three brands that I have highlighted are Sand Hill Tiles, Oceanside Glasstile, and Blazestone Tile from Bedrock Industries for recycled glass. All three recycled glasstile manufacturers are located on the West Coast which is a definite trend that I am starting to notice as I do more and more of this research.

Again, my day was mostly research broken up by errands which I am really starting to enjoy. I feel like I can really sink my teeth into these spreadsheets so I've been really careful about double checking my information.

I am still absolutely fascinated by all of the options available to people. I know if I were designing my house I would have no idea what to pick let alone how to stay within my budget once I eventually did start shopping around.

Week 2 Summary: Progress?

This has been an altogether exhausting week. Working so many hours has just been unreal so I already requested off for pretty much all of next week except for Monday night at the restaurant so with the end of this week I'm really looking forward to the next. Hopefully I'll have time to like, eat and sleep.

With everything at ISP I really feel like I'm making progress. It has been fascinating to really analyze all the different checks and balances required to deem something as "green" or not. It is such a broad label that in a lot of ways I feel like it has lost some of its meaning. So many products out there advertise to being "green" but if it has to travel half way around the world to get to you are you really making any progress?

I am perpetually shocked by the incredible number of descisions that homeowners who are remodeling or even starting from scratch have to make. Every detail counts and I mean that in ever sense of those words. It's incredible the amount of thought that has to be put into every aspect of a well designed house. Then, it becomes a matter of working with the actual construction team to make all of the nit picky design elements come true. Like, when it comes to replacing a floor, a lot of times some of the advertised "green" adhesives don't work very well or since it is an a-typical material, your average contracter won't even really know what to do with it. There is do much subtlety involved in design and making a building or room come together as it should. Until now, I never realized the true scope of all the choices that have to be made.

Product Research

My main focus today was my spreadsheet. The library has sort of been put on hold until P and R have time to go through the materials so I spent pretty much all of today on the computer researching which I thought was going to be a little dull but turned out to be really intersting. Besides that though, my day was broken up my little errands and trips to like the post office or out to grab some coffee.

My unofficial goal was to get the solid surfaces page of my spread sheet under control (I'm still dreading the Flooring spreadsheet) which has gone pretty smoothly. To sort of keep myself focused what I like to do it center on one material for like, 15 minutes, and find as much information on that one product as I can but when the time limit is up I have to stop and move one or explore something tangential to the product. For example, I spent a lot of time looking up a product called IceStone which is actually certified by Bill McDonough and the "Cradle to Cradle" certification which was kind of cool. So, I spent some time looking at this list of companies certified under the "Cradle to Cradle" label to see if there were any materials that I recognized or could possible add to my spread sheet.

So, I don't know, it seems a little dull but I actually really enjoyed myself today. I just wish I wasn't so tired. May is our buisiest month at the restaurant so I've had to work every day after I get done at ISP. I mainly just miss eating meals with my family expecially because "family meal" at the restaurant is really terrible. Working so many hours is really starting to catch up with me.

Customers!

Today I got to talk to real live customers and a lot of the facts that I've been picking up through the spread sheets really came in handy. The family that I spoke with today just got back from living in Japan (coincidence, huh?) and are redo-ing their kitchen with the help of the architecture firm.

Side-note >> a lot of the clients come directly over from the architecture firm which is a really easy transition to make

Anyways, it was really fun to talk to them. It was more of an idea session than any sort of sale taking place but it was interesting to work through some of the pro's and con's of different flooring materials or countertops.

I know this may seem random, but as I was talking to this couple and learning more about them I realized that they are in the exact same point in life that my parents were back when they remodeled our kitchen. It was sort of like deja vu because their kids were even the same age as my sister and I when my parents did our kitchen.

My days are sort of falling into a pattern becaues today again was mainly library maitenance and spreadsheets.

Oh - I completely switched around my spreadsheets so now they make a ton more sense. I condesed them all into one excel document and turned them into a Green buyers guide.

Heavy Lifting 2

Library maitenance continued...

I'm actually starting to like the library downstairs now. I spent part of the day dealing specifically with the library and the rest of the time getting together a product list in excel.

My product list in excel is actually coming along pretty well. I've divided it up into the three catagories of materials that we carry: Solid Surfaces, Tiles and Flooring. I haven't even begun to tackle the flooring side of things yet because that one will undoubtedly be the most complicated but I started on the solid surfaces and tiles sheets. I'm basically listing the features of each product hopefully the pricing but its been really hard to find that out.

As of now, my format doesn't really make sense but i'll ask P about that tomorrow. I think I will like looking a lot of this information up.

Heavy Lifting

After enjoying my lovely memorial day (no work for ISP or the restaurant on monday, aka, a miracle), I arrived at the office today to begin the lovely task of library maitenance.

The main focus today was the product sample library for the sustainable building material company beneath the architecture firm. Basically, there is this closet in the basement at the back of the material showroom overflowing with samples of different materials, some that we carry, others that we don't. My job today was to haul everything out of the closet into the show room, which pretty much took all day.

Seriously, all I did today was move things out of the closet. I don't really know enough about any of the samples or materials to know which ones can be thrown out or are old so it was kind of brainless work. Everytime I took a break I would google the different products and things like that but what I really need is for P to come down and sort through most of this stuff.

Concerning today, I didn't really enjoy myself because I felt pretty worthless. Today I really just felt like I knew nothing about anything. The closet in and of itself was pretty daunting simply because I don't know enough about the company or what sort of things we would keep rather than save which is understandable but annoying at the same time.
Hopefully tomorrow I can break the day up more with different tasks.

www.flickr.com

I have been on www.flickr.com all morning finding pictures for the "Frameworks" presentation. Patty had initially just filled the power point with images from the internet but now that we are actually going to market the presentation and put our names on it we have to find and credit all the photos and materials we used to make the presentation. So, I'm starting with all the pictures. Because www.flickr.com is a public website we are actually allowed to use any of the images posted on there for free but we aren't sure about crediting the images so I've been saving the usernames of the people who posted photos that I'm going to use.

Everyone is leaving early today for the long weekend so everyone is pretty much just tying up loose ends before they leave. I'm excited for next week and have a good weekend!

And I'm still finding links

Today will be my last day researching the "Frameworks for Healthier Neighborhoods" presentation. I'm starting to get really efficient at finding webpages and immediately finding out whether or not it will be worthwhile. I'm actually a little surprised at how poorly managed and uninformative a lot of the city websites are now that I've been surfing them for the past two days. The recycling guidelines especially are confusing and overly complicated. Also, I was doing a lot of research today about the kind of tax credits or breaks you can get for historic landmarks and energy efficiency and I was surprised by how big some of the energy efficiency tax breaks are for larger corporations. It has been fun to familiarize myself with the different standards of energy efficiency like the differences between an energy star certification or the "cradle to cradle" approval seal from private consulting firms like MDBC {I was actually surfing the MDBC website which is the sustainable design consulting firm Bill McDonough and Michael Braungart started and they are looking to hire a new civil and environmental engineer. Working for a design consulting firm like that one would definitely be a job that I would consider after college}.

Initially, I had no idea how much research actually needs to be done when determining the actual sustainability of certain materials. There are so many misconceptions about what is actually good or bad for the environment. I've found so many online forums debating local vs. organic and similar topics but every time I popped one up I couldn't help but think, what is the point of this? I seems ridiculous to me to be arguing over such insignificant parts of the environmental movement when it is common knowledge that when attacking ecological or environment problems a holistic approach is really the only option.

I also had a meeting with Rob and Patty today to talk about what I'll be doing for the rest of my ISP. The way that the different projects we are working on will be timed and the fact that most of the architects go on vacation next week means that I will be working primarily with Patty from now on on the various marketing endeavors for the firm and their sub-company that distributes recycled and sustainable building materials. Patty really needs the help which makes me feel useful rather than Rob having to make up random jobs for me. Its not exactly what I expected but I'm actually excited to help more with the sub-company. Hopefully next week I'll get to organize the showroom and help Patty out when clients come to see the different types of bamboo flooring and recycled tiles. I also will get to revamp the inventory and see if I can find any products that I would like to add.

Know what I realized

We don't turn on any lights. We simply don't need them. I haven't spent a cloudy day in here yet so I don't know whether that is always the case, but I was looking around today and I realized that not a single light bulb is turned on. I really like it. We also barely have the air conditioning on but you can tell that its really hot and bright outside vs. in here where it is so cool and refreshing. I think it is kind of nice that this building is so nicely regulated temperature-wise even though it is so old.

Anyways, I'm still researching for "Frameworks for Healthier Neighborhoods" and I'm starting to get frustrated. I'm not really sure what is expected of me at this point. I've gone from quality to mere quantity in terms of links and I'm not happy with the results but it seems like that is what Patty wants me to do... I don't know. I just have to add a few more links before I turn it in to her so that she can sift through everything I guess.

I was mainly researching bike trails today and I've found some really cool ones that'd I'd like to try if I ever have enough time. The farthest reaching system that I've found so far is called {or will eventually be called} the East Coast Greenway. Its not anywhere near finished but this organization is trying to connect a trail system for hikers and bikers from Maine to Florida along the East Coast, very similar to the Appalachian trail. The website is www.greenway.org, its pretty cool. Right now it lists a bunch of trails through various states that all connect to reach Maine. The Baltimore-Annapolis trail goes right by my house.

Everyone in the office is complaining right now because the people next door are using this awful oil-based paint that is releasing toxic fumes up here {especially up here where I sit}. Rob called the people next door just to let them know about their detrimental effect on our indoor air quality. It was one of the funniest conversations I've ever heard. Whew, the fumes are really getting to me and if you can't already tell, its definitely time for my afternoon cup of coffee.

Unhealthy Neighborhoods in Baltimore

Brace yourself, because things are about to get really exciting.

Well, maybe not but I did really like what I was doing today until about 1:30 when it started to get a little bit boring. Not so much boring as underwhelming but I'll get to that. Today, my job was to continue finding local links for a presentation called "Framework for Healthier Neighborhoods". Thus far I've been doing mostly doing marketing research and organizing elements of their marketing campaigns (like resizing images) which has been cool. It's a really interesting presentation that deals with five different focus areas for a grass roots approach to urban community building. The five focal points are environment, architecture, economy, agriculture and society. So, I've been searching the web since about 9am this morning for sustainable infrastructure in the Baltimore area and I've been decidedly underwhelmed by the result. I've been searching the web for topics ranging from water and air quality to bike routes and local farming indexes and Baltimore has a long way to go before they fit into the framework set-up of this presentation. Actually, this presentation is really similar to the "Cradle to Cradle" model developed by Bill McDonough and Michael Braungart which I find intriguing. I've had so much fun today signing up for all these obscure eco-friendly, environmentally minded e-newsletters and such. I mean, there are a lot of fun things to do in and around Baltimore I just wish that transportation wasn't such a huge issue.
Finally, for my random note of the day, I have spent a lot of time eavesdropping on the various calls and conversations of everyone beneath me. As I described yesterday, I spend my time on the second floor so I can sort of listen to everyone all the time which is fun but also makes me feel a little bit like a creep. Like, one of the houses that we are working on is having serious issues with the windows and ArchiCad keeps acting up. I think that tomorrow I'll see in Rob has anything more architecturally oriented for me to do. I'd sort of like to know the process start to finish of what at architect actually does. Actually, on second thought, that is more of a Monday morning staff meeting topic for conversation. I think I'm going to make a running list of interesting things that I overhear that I want to know more about. Like who is Olmstead? I think I'll use the rest of my time here today to research more of Baltimore's architectural history.

I'm about to take a walk for some coffee, then I'll re-tackle the never-ending search for a sense of community in the Baltimore area.

My First Day

I really like the flexibility of working in an office this small. I got here at about 11 o'clock this morning and did a quick meet and greet before immediately getting to work. Patricia or Patty, my official ISP advisor and marketing director of the firm, pulled out a giant laptop and led me to my new work space. The building is a small yet open rectangle and I sit on the lofted second floor at a round table that acts as a conference room of sorts. My first official task was to resize professional images {hold your applause}. It sounds a little bit boring but it was actually kind of fun because I started to familiarize myself with the general design philosophy that Rob and Carri stick too. The four projects that I managed to resize before the office meeting were definitely different but all adhered to the same basic principles. It was fun to sort of analyze the images from an art historical perspective. One of the remodels that Rob (or maybe Carri) worked on was heavily influenced by Frank Lloyd Wright, complete with cantilevers and car ports. The other three I looked at ranged from post-modern to the truly green architecture.
After I spent about two hours resizing images everyone came upstairs to my little work area for the weekly office meeting where Rob, the principal architect, outlined the projects and basic goals for the week. The meeting probably lasted for an hour and a half and was chock full of tangential threads and general lack of focus that I found sort of refreshing. In general, the office has a really focused, individualized atmosphere so it was nice to come together for a general meeting so that even though everyone is off doing there own thing you know what they are generally trying to accomplish.
On a more random note, everyone here is really soft spoken which makes for a very different environment for me simply because I can't think of anyone I interact with right now who is so... quiet. I definitely don't consider my parents, my friends and teachers at garrison or anyone that I work with at the restaurant soft spoken so it is an interesting change. The office doesn't fall into an awkward silence but I just find it noticeable that the traffic outside is louder than anything going on in here.

Well, that's all for now....

Pre-ISP Expectations

I don't have many concrete expectations for my ISP. I mostly just want to take advantage of this experience. I'm really glad that it is so close to home and also something at face-value that I will find really interesting. The people that I am working with like Rob, Jan, Patricia, Carri, Meredith and Lilly are all really intelligent so I think I'll end up learning a lot from them.

Basic Questions:
1. What exactly does an architect do?
2. Where do engineers fit into the equation?
3. What are the main elements of a successful small business like this one?
4. What are this firm's basic marketing strategies?
5. How did this firm get started?

Mini-Goals:
1. Getting more in-touch with the architectural history of Baltimore
2. Be open and questioning
3. Get enough sleep
4. Take advantage of this opportunity

Concerns:
1. I hope I won't get bored.
2. I'm a little nervous about the fact that I know nothing about architecture.
3. I hope that I get a good sized lunch break.

Hopefully this will be a good connection to have in the future!