Friday, August 31, 2007

Re: [papercreters] ugly eco home debuts at West Coast Green

Weeeelllll, Dirtcheapbuilder, that house does not appeal to me either, but it does coincide with current minimalist trends in trendy housing. Which is deliberate to try to lure those stylish folks who assume green housing has to look like mud huts built by weird hippies. Try to cut 'em a little slack. Most people don't have the nerve for individuality. Besides, how many "orthodox" houses have round edges and softness? And those simple computer illustrations also appeal to the minimalists. I'm glad to see attempts to bring high-tech types into green efficiency. If we let them have their cake, maybe they'll eat it, too.
 
As for whether people in the future will still want that, of course not...right away, but later. Trends and styles and tastes CHANGE over and over. That's why they're called trends and styles! Think of it as a pendulum that swings from kitchey - like the Victorian dictum that too much is never enough, and the current rage for scrapbooking - to minimalism - like Art Deco in the 20s and 30s and this current push, and back again. So what? Like the song says, everything old is new again.... and again..... and again. And nothing dates a painting, book or movie like an attempt to predict future styles.
 
We subscribe to a slick mag called Dwell that often showcases green building anywhere in the world. We have also explored CEB construction, looked at a straw bale house, and fo course, natural adobe. The key to making a house popular with the public is making it look normal, ordinary, and safe. You don't have to paint your face green to live green.
 
By the way, MY dream house is a recycled warehouse with enormous windows, wood burning stove, and a roof covered with garden - NO LAWN.
 
Pepper
 
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 10:50 PM
Subject: [papercreters] ugly eco home debuts at West Coast Green

I try to keep up with events to the public that push green build or new products..very commercial some of them , but this is the business side of green that has to exist too since not all ' influenced' by greentech will build a cob house, or recycle a tin can in their life. But they have to buy lightbulbs, or choose paint, and buy homes. so there is hope to have some influence on conservation, wasting less, consuming "better"

http://www.westcoastgreen.com/program/showhouse.php

OK that said the West Coast Green show is in San Francisco in Sept 07 and hosts TV stars : Ed Beagley Living with Ed; Susan Susanka "Not So Big House" author, lots of eco products, and a prefab type house made of SIPS with a living roof called the mkLotus, but I see nothing lotus like about it.

Now take one look at the house illustrations ( poor computer ones) in the URL and I think you will agree how ugly and hi tech 'locker room' it looks. there are no round edges, no softness or eco-cool about it. just techy looking- it looks like "1984 " ( the book & film) come to life if HOUSING was the issue, not politics/freedom.

Is it me? or do all/any/some of you not like this trend in "green" building? These "shelters" no matter how efficient & green they ARE underneath they look MORE like Katrina Evacuee quonset huts than any home I would like. Look at any COB or alternative design, and you see something alive, not this hard edged TIN Army shack.

MAYBE these are the ---- sudden realization-- ugh! !! ----- CITY SLICKER "green" buildings people in high-density areas must have???...
OH !NO! MR. BILL!!! say it isn't so!!?? How can 250 "renowned speakers" and 12,000 attendees who will come to West Coast Green LOVE this design, or will they, like me, hate it? or, are we really being "prepared" to accept this as "good housing" in a future resource -starved nation?
Besides the current streamlined look, the ultra Chic slim to bare nothing colors, skinny furniture, will people in the future STILL want that? will it be a choice? what will all the kitchey home decorating, fabric, and furniture stores do to fight back?

the designer M Kuffman did a great looking, albeit techy cold design I like better a year ago- nice shed style roof, more cabin looking, less icy called the glide house-- see it at the site

Charmaine Taylor Publishing << flouncing off to read more books on privacy invasion, and watch X-Files reruns....trust no one..... I mean it!

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