From Brown to Green

As architect Randy Croxton is fond of saying, a building built strictly according to minimum code standards is the worst building you can legally build. This is what I call a brown building in this blog and it describes about 97% of the current building stock in America. These buildings, in which we spend 90% of our lives, often are impediments to our heath, comfort and productivity rather than enhancements and they wreak havoc on our natural ecosystems as well.

What happens if you design a building, and its site, for optimal performance instead? What if you invested in features to improve comfort, health, material and energy efficiency, durability, flexibility and productivity? In other words, what if you went for the best building value instead of the worst building you could legally build? What if you used as your model, natural systems that have evolved over millions of years. By emulating the best practices in nature and the best practices in the built environment you could move from brown to green.

This blog will explore that journey from brown to green buildings and communities as we build a better future together.