With the European counterpart to the Solar Decathlon now complete, the team from University of Florida walks away as winner of the Internet Award based on online voting open during the competition. Their home, Project RE:FOCUS, blends three elements from historic Florida houses — a covered open porch, a breezeway oriented to prevailing winds, and a porous breathable skin — in a striking way.
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This tiny house — the L41 House — has been sneaking around the internet over the past few months. It was on display at the Vancouver Olympics and visitors seemed to take a liking to the 220-square-foot beauty. Designed by Michael Katz and Janet Corne, L41 House is small, energy efficient, and sacrifices nothing but extraneous space.
Kjellgren Kaminsky Architecture recently let us know of a newly completed Passive House in Borlänge, Sweden. It’s beautiful, prefabricated, contemporary, and, stating the obvious, circular. The 1,700 square-foot home features an interior atrium, lake-facing kitchen and living room, and more private bedrooms and bathrooms on the other side of the home.
I'm fascinated by Second Glass, a product that was recognized on Sustainable Industries' Top 10 Green Building Products list this year. Second Glass is a recycled glass product made in Portland of junk or damaged windshields using a patent-pending cold-melted process.
As the magazine does every year, Sustainable Industries has just published its list of the Top 10 Green Building Products of 2010. Selections are chosen by an esteemed panel of judges — Michelle Kaufmann, Barry Giles, Kris Kimble, and Liz Dunn — based on design aesthetic, environmental performance, compatibility with LEED, and value, scalability/market impact, and innovativeness. This year, the judges took interest in products that reuse resources or reduce energy. Here are the top ten:
