By Mariana Pickering
Living Future unConference 2015 Recap and REGENERATION Italy
A couple of weeks ago I attended the Living Future unConference in Seattle, Washington, USA, organized by the International Living Future Institute, the managing body for one of the most ambitious and visionary environmental building certifications available in the world – the Living Building Challenge. Two weeks later, I was again fortunate enough to attend the introduction of this certification here in Italy at the REGENERATION competition and conference hosted by Macro Design Studio in Rovereto, Italy. Here are my impressions from both events…
Shedding some light on Earth Hour and the like.
Imagine what would happen if everyone knew as much about insulation as they do about energy saving bulbs. The light bulbs in our homes have changed drastically in the past ten years. The walls, however are the same. Enrico and I decided to take a look at exactly how much energy we can expect to save on a night like M’illumino di meno or Earth Hour. And then, just for fun (!), we decided to compare that saved energy with how much we’d save by adding one single square meter of insulation to the external wall of our outdated apartment building. Here are our results…
Passive House Window Talks 2015
Last week Enrico took part in the 2015 Passive House Window Talks in Nova Lehota, Slovakia, a two-day event on the benefits of high-performance Passivhaus windows. It was organized by ProPassivhausFenster, a group of small European window manufacturers well known for their award-winning Smartwin windows, but it was far from the usual company-sponsored workshops designed to sell product. Architects and engineers gathered together to discuss and learn more about the technical specifications and the fundamental need for high-quality windows in everyday design.
The blackout-proof home: Passive House with high time constant
Last week, our region (Emilia, Italy) was pounded with what locals are calling “The Big Snow”. With it came very tangible proof of just how fragile is our infrastructure, particularly our electrical grid. When my husband wrote this article, originally in Italian, FOUR DAYS after the February 6th Big Snow, more than 1000 homes in the province of Reggio Emilia alone were still without electricity, leaving 4,000 people to brave the cold, many without sufficient heating. How can we fix this problem?
The potential benefit of an early ‘Blower Door Test’.
In December we ran a ‘Type B’ Blower Door Test on our CasaClima Class A project, “Conte Re”, under construction near Albinea (in the province of Reggio Emilia, Italy). Many of our colleagues wondered why we decided to run the test so early in the construction process. Here is a brief overview of the benefits…
Trends in Ceramics at CERSAIE 2013 (Bologna, Italy) | Houzz
Larger, thinner, and lighter. Textured, patterned, and combined. The overwhelming feeling from this year’s edition of CERSAIE Bologna was that the ceramics industry is successfully launching this versatile material into place as a sustainable, cost-effective, technologically superior, and aesthetically pliable substitute for many other traditional building materials.
What does a Passive House look like?
After you’ve done your research, evaluated your options, and settled on passive design as a valid and worthy goal for your dream home, you usually arrive at this very important question: “But what will my passive house look like?!” The possibilities are limitless! Almost. Why almost?
Students from Boston Architectural College visit to discuss sustainability in Reggio Emilia
Last Thursday we had the pleasure of hosting a group of students from Boston Architectural College for a day of site visits and discussions about the ways in which modern and sustainable construction techniques are making their way into the traditional setting of rural Italy.
Green roofs and facades: discussing an alternative approach to landscape heritage in Italy
For fear of stepping too far outside of the box, we have remained in it for far too long. With this little article, I would like to remind you of a modern and beautiful way of continuing to respect the landscape that has made Italy so famous: vegetated roofs, or “green roofs”.
Three examples of Italian green roofs that reinforce the natural landscape.
We are interested in the idea of using green roofs in landscape heritage areas to reinforce the remaining historic structures, while returning all newly developed surface area into natural vegetation and effectively hiding the new building in the landscape.
