From the category archives:

process

Wireless Light Switches + Floor Outlets = Tighter & More Insulated Home

October 15, 2010

Earlier this week we posted on cutting labor costs associated with Cellulose insulation installs. It occured to me in some of the comments that we have never posted on our “magical” electrical strategy to help improve the insulation and air tightness of our homes. The truth of the matter is that we actually don’t use [...]

5 comments Read the full article →

Cutting Cellulose Insulation Install Costs?

October 12, 2010

As you may well know, we are big fans of cellulose insulation. The Skinny project was the first time we used cellulose and we learned some valuable lessons that we plan to apply to future projects like Avant Garage that Nic has been telling you about lately. As always, we are attempting to continually improve [...]

34 comments Read the full article →

Tezuka Architects Japanese Design Inspiration

March 11, 2010

I had the pleasure of seeing Mr. Takaharu Tezuka of Tezuka Architects give a lecture at UPenn recently. Tezuka is one of my favorite Japanese firms that has been producing amazing homes for about two decades and is getting into some interesting larger commercial commissions as they have grown in the past 5-10 years. If [...]

5 comments Read the full article →

Postgreen Homes Stair Designs

July 17, 2009

The Postgreen Homes team has been kicking some ideas around with ISA for a couple more stair options for the new homes.  With the release of the new customizable website coming very shortly, it’s important that there are plenty of options for people to choose from.  In terms of the stairs, you may recognize the [...]

13 comments Read the full article →

Results of the LEED Design Charrette

March 6, 2008

So I just returned from today’s LEED Design Charrette and everything went very well. The bottom line is that we found out that reaching Platinum is possible with our design, but we have a few issues to clarify and iron out. Rob from MaGrann was extremely knowledgeable and taught us all a lot about the [...]

6 comments Read the full article →

LEED Design Charrette Today

March 6, 2008

Today is a big day for the project as we are having our LEED Design Charrette. The very first category in the LEED for Homes rating system is “Integrated Project Planning.” We are required to conduct a preliminary rating with our LEED Provider in order to target the level we want to reach (Certified, Silver, [...]

7 comments Read the full article →

Second Design Meeting (this time with our builder)

December 9, 2007

On Friday we had our second design meeting for the 100k house. This time we invited Scott from Level 5 to join us in order to give initial feedback from a cost standpoint on our initial design. Overall the meeting went very well and we all agreed that we got a lot accomplished. We left [...]

15 comments Read the full article →

Design Day

November 29, 2007

Today is an exciting day for the project as we get to sit down and spend a few hours at Interface Studios Architects (ISA) working on the design of the house. As seen in earlier posts we have the basics of what we want down and have a few ideas for floorplans already. Today will [...]

1 comment Read the full article →

House Requirements Draft

November 9, 2007

A preliminary list of needs and wants for the design of the house. Notice which is longer. Needs 2 bedrooms (one for owners and one for guests and/or children) 1 bath open kitchen dining and living space with double height for a significant portion study/office area lots of natural light storage for books patio that [...]

5 comments Read the full article →

Feasibility Meeting

November 7, 2007

A couple weeks ago on Thursday, October 25th the team had its first meeting to discuss the feasibility of building a modern and green home in Philly for $100K. Prior to this meeting the 100k house was nothing more than an idea or dream in the heads of myself (Chad) and Brian (Brian Phillips – [...]

0 comments Read the full article →