HOW we'll COLLABORATE
... sure of ECONOMIC BUILDABILITY
An ongoing project for me has been to design the cost and difficulty out of EcoBuilding -
while much of the industry still makes premium-price earnings from keeping it as a daunting
'Black Art'.
Whether it's called Green Building, Sustainable Building or Eco Building,
I aim to demystify all that,
for you my clients,
for willing and competent builders and tradesmen,
and for DIY self-builders alike.
A rethought 'Radical' EcoBuilding,
design-optimised over the years in team with buiders, can be
simplified and foolproof to build - cut and fit, glue and screw -
and its lifetime EcoPerformance robustly resistant to damage in use.
By contrast, the 'Black Art' popular idea of Eco Building is
slow, tricky and fragile to build - sophisticated membranes and sticky tapes, of unproven durability and requiring perfection even in 'impossible' corners -
and its Eco Performance easily damaged in use.
Sheathing relocated outboard - makes a robust 'tea cosy' of the airtight layer
Basic carpentry
Handsome - homegrown sawn untreated durable douglas fir, mellows beautifully
Airtight layer of expensive hi-tech fragile plastic sheet,
conventionally located inboard, punctured by multiple joists etc, imperfectly sealed by fiddly hi-tech sticky tape (how long will that last?)
The difference is that 'Black Art' EcoBuilding applies expensive finnicky bandaid products to make brainless familiar routines sort-of work;
while this 'Radical' EcoBuilding rethinks, turns the layers and order-of-work inside-out, to elegantly fulfil the requirements of EcoBuilding Technology.
It's not rocket science, uses the same basic trade skills and eliminates the over-clever bandaids -
but assembles all in unfamiliar ways that often simplify,
even compared to standard non-Eco Building.
I mentioned "willing and competent builders and tradesmen".
There's plenty of competence but "willing" is a challenge. The modern building industry is a frantic gig economy where taking time-out to grasp the unfamiliar (even if easier) seems to threaten tradesmen's livelihoods;
or in larger firms requires allocation of quality staff who could be more profitably utilised elsewhere.
There's also a lot of plain conservatism.
But there are many firms and individuals out there who know, or want to learn, how EcoBuilding is their future.
For you, there's an invitation at the bottom of every page of this website.