I’ve been noticing some chatter about Zamore Homes, an online company that provides ready-to-assemble kit-homes that are built with off-the-shelf components.  Zamore Homes is looking to capture the market that wants high design at a low price.  They do that by flat-packing and shipping components to a home site, all of which seem to come from various different places with the lowest possible transportation costs.  They also claim to provide simple instructions for contractors to put all the components together.  With simple designs and flat-packed parts, Zamore Homes estimates that their affordable, energy-efficient kit homes can be put together in under 20 weeks!

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There’s some stunning green work being featured on Dwell right now as a result of the "How Green Are You?" competition.  The basic idea of the competition, co-sponsored by Dwell and the AIA, is to find inspiring entries assessed on their sustainability, functionality, originality, cost effectiveness, and design.  Entrants can provide up to four images and a simple, 250-word description of the project — about all you need to find some incredible designs.  I understand 100kHouse (pictured above) just entered their project, but I didn’t see it on Dwell yet.  Below are a few of my favorite entries so far. 

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Sometimes the images just don’t tell the whole story and that’s where some quality video will do the trick.  I stumbled upon this video while doing research for a prior story and was blown away by the modern, green home.  It’s ridiculous — probably a dream residence for many of you out there.  The passive design, combined with good insulation, high performance glass, solar thermal panels, radiant flooring heating, and an efficient system, keeps this home operating very efficiently. 

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Recently I was able to speak with Matthew Linden of ConsciousBuild, a San Luis Obispo-based company that’s trying to make an eco-friendly contribution to the luxury home and lifestyle market.  ConsciousBuild is ramping up a website to be launched in July that aims to provide podcasts, videos, and access to information on green building practices, techniques, and materials.  Their first project, ConsciousBuildOne, or CBOne, was designed in the vernacular of Contemporary American Farmhouse and flies in the face of the notion that a green building needs to take any one particular form or shape.  Serving as both a residence and office, Linden hopes CBOne will be used as an educational model for the latest in eco products, techniques, and technologies.  Here’s what’s planned for the building:

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The team at Diseño Earle was kind enough to pass along some info and images of their stunning design of The Eco Home — a knockout that’s aiming to be the first ‘zero carbon’ footprint home in Andalucia, or even Southern Spain for that matter!  D Earle designed the home with two objectives in mind: (1) zero carbon footprint, and (2) reduce operating costs to almost a self-sufficiency level.  The 6995 sf home, which is absolutely enormous, will be built with 75% less waste than a traditional design and operate 80% more efficiently than a similar sized home.  And although the home design was constrained by the narrow, non-flat site, you can tell there was no restraint in creating the ultimate, luxury, green pad. 

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