I quit architecture because a hospital replaced a healing garden with a TV. That decision crystallized something I’d been observing for years—the disconnect between what research showed about human-environment relationships…
You know what gets me fired up? Walking through someone’s backyard and seeing plastic patio furniture that’ll be in a landfill before their kids graduate high school, sitting right next…
Three months ago, my friend Sarah called me in tears about her bathroom renovation gone wrong. She'd spent months researching "eco-friendly" fixtures online, dropped nearly $8,000 on what she thought…
Three months ago, I found myself sitting in a windowless conference room in downtown Portland, surrounded by twenty-three other professionals who looked just as confused as I felt. We'd all…
Last Tuesday I was reviewing specs for a residential project when my phone rang. Contractor from Charlotte, frustrated as hell. His client wanted sustainable materials for their whole house renovation…
The contractor stared at me like I'd just suggested we install a waterfall in the bedroom. "You want what on the walls?" he asked, adjusting his cap and squinting at…
So I went down a bit of a research rabbit hole last quarter that started with me trying to optimize my own workspace and ended with me buried in academic…
You know what really gets my blood boiling? Walking into a "green" building supply store and watching someone shell out three times the normal price for bamboo flooring that was…
Walking through a downtown Portland daycare last month, I couldn't help but notice the smell. You know that particular cocktail of industrial adhesives, synthetic carpeting, and whatever coating they'd sprayed…
Standing in the courtyard of Singapore's PARKROYAL Pickering for the third time this month, I find myself doing that thing again – photographing the same green terraces from slightly different…