Sustainability That Goes Right Down The Toilet

Inspiration comes in the strangest places. For this blog post, it was the bathroom.

Following a client presentation this week, I made a quick stop in the men’s room before walking across town back to the office. This client is a multi-billion-dollar global organization run by some pretty smart folks – but even they appear to have fallen victim to some silliness in terms of sustainability. The proof was staring at me across the stall.

On the wall hung a placard that read something to the effect of: “This toilet was designed to be environmentally friendly. It may require flushing more than once.”

Okay, so maybe overall it still saves more water than a standard toilet. But it sure doesn’t make things sound terribly effective in saving water if you have to flush twice to do the job of one flush – nor does it send a great message about corporate sustainability and performance to provide employees with such a seemingly paradoxical placard.

It’s becoming imperative that employers offer workplaces with sustainable, green practices/processes if they want to remain competitive in attracting and retaining talent – but this placard was just another sign to me that companies large and small still have a long way to go in terms of both walking the walk and talking the talk.

What do YOU want when you come to work?

So I started off the morning thinking I was going to write a post about all of the awesome things we’re about to launch this month. Then I decided it wasn’t the right time to get the hype machine into over-drive. Rather it was time to learn something. One of the core beliefs at Build2Sustain is that sustainability is born in part out of meeting the needs of a building’s occupants in a flexible and on-going way. It comes from building creators and renovators really listening to the people who will be living and working in these structures on a daily basis and constantly reassessing to bring them the best possible living experience.

Now we haven’t started our specific renovation project yet, but I want to hear from all of you out there. You work and play in commerical space, what do you wish your office space had or did? What makes it a pleasurable place to be? What makes it a difficult place to be? The comment section awaits.

Building a Brand: Avoiding The Greenwash

Hello, everyone who’s started to follow this incredibly new project called Build2Sustain. I’ve had the honor and pleasure of partnering with James on this bold adventure, and I’m thrilled to start opening up the process from my POV as the creative/communications pro on board.

As a quick bit of introduction, I’m an advertising/marketing communications professional for one of the top b-to-b agencies in the U.S. I’m proud and excited to bring my experience working in such verticals as technology, media, education and real estate to the B2S drawing table. I’ve had the honor and pleasure of working on several green brands and products, from construction to commuter benefits. I’m also thrilled to be a part of something that has the potential to be a powerful, positive force of change for business and social good.

So…where to begin on branding Build2Sustain?

How about Top Gun? Who doesn’t remember Top Gun? Well, for those who don’t, there’s a scene in which (spoiler alert!) Maverick (Tom Cruise) crashes into the ocean and sadly loses his co-pilot or “rio” Goose (Anthony Edwards with hair). The cause? They flew through a fellow pilot’s exhaust or “jetwash.” Creating the Build2Sustain brand, I feel we have a lot to learn from Gooses’s tragic demise.

For us, we have to avoid the “greenwash.” We’re not a fad brand. The very essence of our mission is to transcend green as a trend and establish it as a way of sustainable business. To me, our voice and messaging have to be highly substantial to gain traction and truly spark meaningful conversations with the community. That said, because we’re a challenger and media brand, bucking the status quo, there has to be a spirit imbued in our communications. This balance is at the root of our challenge – substance vs. style. Isn’t that always the case?

At the same time, we can’t look like other green design/construction brands who’ve tried to make themselves contemporary and relevant. The Web 2.0 fashion is going the way of Crocs shoes. We can’t expect to put a flashy reflection on some bright green and orange logo art and expect to be seen as innovators. Importantly, we need to create strong differentiation that carries innovation.

What green brands do you think do a good job of breaking through? Of being stylish and substantial? Of getting through the greenwash to real relevance? Leave your comments, we’d like to know. Hopefully we’ll be added to your list in the weeks and months ahead.

Building a Business out of an Idea

The concept for Build2Sustain came to me about 2 months ago. It’s continuing to mature in my mind conceptually, but the world won’t wait for an idea to become perfect. It’s got to move out there as fast as it can.

As such I am rapidly developing a business model with my friend and partner Michael Ruby. Mike is an Associate Creative Director at Stein Rogan + Partners, he and I have been friends and co-conspirators in the  theater business since 2004. Mike is taking the lead in building the brand ID and collateral for Build2Sustain. As our next steps will involve building the larger team of sponsors, Mike’s been leading the charge in defining what B2S is to the outside world. But he’s been more than that. Coming to the process so early on, his leading questions have pushed me to answer questions I didn’t even know to ask about what makes Build2Sustain a business rather than just a cool idea.

He will be contributing to the blog and giving us some insights into his process. In the meantime, we’ll keep on asking thought-provoking questions. As always, the comment section awaits.

Can Growth be Efficient?

Here’s a question that needs answering if we are to deal with our energy crisis. Is growth raw growth of individual wealth, a corporation, or even a nation’s GDP detrimental to sustainability? Is there such a thing as sustainable growth. At what point does a person or corporation become too big to be sustainable? I’ll give an abstract example. Let’s say a retailer owns a single store. She hears about a more efficient light bulb and decides to switch all her lighting to utilize it. She has accomplished a lower carbon footprint, less energy consumption, and lower energy costs, all for a manageable initial investment.

What happens when she owns 5, or 10 or 100 stores? At what point can she not simply order new lightbulbs? What happens when she’s gone global?  What happens when  the new light bulb only works in the UK, but she needs her stores to look consistent all over the world?

At some point a company becomes too big to make efficiency it’s core, both operationally and ecologically. What are your thoughts on this? Any examples? The comment section awaits.

Earth Hour, let it begin

Lights are going out across the globe today in honor of Earth Hour. Organizers describe turning your lights out as “a vote for Earth…over global warming” What Earth Hour is for me, visible symbol of conservation making it’s way around the globe.

It all began in Australia today, as lights at the Sydney opera house, as well as homes an businesses across Australia went out.

As a lighting designer, I love that my principle medium of design (and the lack of it) is a symbol for what we can conserve as a global community. Follow the action at earthhour.org and don’t forget to take part. Make sure to turn your lights out, and post a photo/blog post at the Earth Hour website in support of global conservation.

How Open is Your Process?

One of the key tenants of build2sustain is openess, breaking down the barriers in the industry to find the best practices in afforable, sustainable design. We believe that by opening the process to the outside world from the outset we will fundamentally change the way people see the building process and create a better future for design build industry. While we’re still strategizing our launch, I wanted to put this question out to the design/build community.

Architects, designers, consultants, how open is your process? How much of your work and yourself do you share with the outside world beyond your collaborators and your clients? Where have you learned best practices outside of school? Leave a note in the comments below. I’d love to hear from you.

The Recession and Our Generation of Hope

I woke up this morning and went about my normal routine but today was different.  I could feel it building inside me. A sense of hope springing forward as I began to think about the generational challenges we are faced with and why this generation, our generation is ready for them. I look at what we can do, and what we are already doing and I realize that we will overcome not just this economic crisis, for those come and go. But we will overcome the crises of education, of healthcare and of energy within our lifetimes. Before I start to sound like too much of a salesman for the current administration, I want to share why I think our generation-the new professionals are uniquely suited to the age we were born into.

1. People are the new profit. If you read the commentary on web 2.0 and the future of the internet there is no end to the hand-wringing that goes on among the older set. The old saw goes “that’s great, but how do you turn a profit?” It’s not that we are a generation of socialists unconcerned with profit and loss, it’s that profit isn’t the driving force behind our motivations. Facebook began in a dorm room as an experiment in connecting people on campus. Google strove to create the better search engine. Netflix changed the way we rented movies. The list goes on, but profit wasn’t the driving force behind any of these ideas at the start, in the beginning it was about solving consumer’s problem. These companies have created new verbs, “google it”, he “friended” me, oh just “netflix” it. Fundamentally changing the way we do things, by solving a problem, rather than selling a bill of goods.

2. Small is the new big. If there’s one concept our generation is reflexively against it’s the concept of “too big to fail” entrepreneurship is something we all have a stake in now. We are a generation that maintains blogs and tweets to the world. We are our own ventures, our personal and professional lives are no longer as separate as they once were. For our generation ideas move as fast as you can type and hit the send button, so work happens wherever, whenever. Perfect for when the problems are global in scale and complex in nature.

3. Forget the suit, just bring your brain. The people at companies changing the world come to the office in sneakers and a sweatshirt. Power isn’t the currency anymore. We’ve changed the game, now it’s ideas and collaboration that build the better mousetrap.

4. This isn’t an age thing. Our generation is the most blind ever. Race, color, creed, gender, these matter less than what you bring to the table as a person and as a professional it doesn’t matter how old you are, it doesn’t matter where you grew up. Our generation looks to leaders like Google, like Ecko, like Apple, you know what all of their leaders have in common? Nothing, and that’s exactly how it should be.

5. Not afraid to dream. Rare is the person of our generation who can’t quote Star Wars, or didn’t watch Sesame Street and the Muppets as a kid. Those kids grew up and gave us Lord of the Rings, and Pixar and Slumdog Millionaire. We’re a generation that’s not afraid to dream big, we’ve been doing it since we are little. The naysayers see us a generation afraid to grow up. They’re wrong. We’re a generation that remembers what it is to dream, what it is to want something better, and will always work to make it happen.

6. Apathetic we are not. Young people fueled a political campaign and elected a president. Faced with eight years of leadership that completely rejected the values they hold dear this generation rose up and elected a new face to the scene. He might have been untested, but it was his ideas and rhetoric that drove President Obama to the oval office. His campaign’s ability to make every voice matter, to make every volunteer action important and open the halls of power to the masses that made him this generation’s choice for the Presidency. President Clinton had to beg young people to go vote, President Obama was their champion.

It’s not that I am arrogant about who we are and where we’re going, it’s not that I hate the ‘boomers or resent having all of these problems to solve. It’s that I think our generation is uniquely suited to problems that lie ahead. Ones where millions of brains will be needed to fundamentally shift our way of life from waste to sustainability, from consolidated power to diverse networks, from me to us. Our generation will spend the better part of our lifetimes calming the seige of global warming, ending the world’s carbon addiction, finding better ways to educate our kids and making sure we can all grow up healthy. We will lead the nation to a brighter day, one brilliant idea at a time.

So what is Build2Sustain?

The world is at the intersection of two global crises. The first is relatively short term, but could none the less threathen quality of life for the people of the world for a long time to come, that being the growing economic crisis. The second threat is much more dire, that of global climate change. These problems are not unrelated, the global demand for energy is only going to grow as the economy rebounds and businesses and people begin to be able to afford more goods and services. What can the design/build industry do? The nation needs to rapidly change the way its buildings consume energy in the US in order to save the planet. This project promises to be a step in that reform.

Build2Sustain will break down the barriers of popular acceptance to green design and building. One of the barriers to acceptance green building is lack of best practices or established ROI. Many developers and tenants simply don’t understand what going green means and what the short and long term benefits are. The bulk of our commercial (non-manufacturing) carbon footprint lies in typical office space occupied in our major cities and suburban business centers. Indeed, most of the green movement should center retrofit projects, yet the public only sees examples like the NY Times building-a brand new construction. We hear about myriad “green” products and alternative energy sources yet have no way to channel all this collective knowledge into a final product. It’s a little bit like teaching people all about the best car parts, but never showing them a Porsche.

Build2Sustain will build the Porsche, or at least get it in the lab. We will seek out the next generation of leaders in the green build space to begin a renovation project dedicated to finding a small-medium size office space in a geographically temperate area. Build2Sustain will fundamentally change the way we renovate real estate by opening the process up outside of its design and construction team. We will harness the power of social media tools like youtube, flicker, facebook, and twitter, as well as an in depth and focused website that will document the design/build process in as transparent a way as possible and open it up to comment, opinion, and scrutiny. The online documentation and discovery process will work to help the industry create a set of best practices and ROI data that will serve as a model for improvement in the coming years. There are millions of square feet of developed real estate that needs to lower its carbon consumption. We’re going to activate the industry’s minds and make it happen one project at a time.

Welcome to Build2Sustain

Welcome to the blog! Build2Sustain is a venture dedicated to reshaping the way we approach building and design. This blog is our temporary home while we get Build2Sustain.com off the ground. For now this is the place where you can track our progress and get involved as we get ready for official launch. Future posts will delve into how we are building our team, the formation of our brand ID, and how we define our processes going forward. So if you’re a design/build professional. Check in and leave comments. B2S is dedicate to open-source thinking, we need you guys and hope you will join us.