Truck Tarps – and Other High-end Upholstery
Furniture makers are taking the recycling trend to a whole new level. Just say you heard it here first: Truck tarps and old Army tents. That’s what we’re finding on high-end upholstery these days.
Let’s start with Thomas Bina, the designer I wrote about yesterday with a new collection for Four Hands. Most of his work is done in wood and metal, but he has a few upholstered pieces with fabric from Brazilian truck tarps.
“After it’s been on the back of a truck for 40 years, it’s pretty much waterproof,” Bina said. They boil, treat, and dye those tarps into a soft, almost suede-like finish, but it’s all cotton. And, Bina adds, “these patches are all authentic, original patches. We didn’t do a thing to them.”
Here’s a close-up of the hastily-sewn patches, which look oddly artistic.
While we’re in Brazil, let’s visit a company called Será O Benedito, or SOB for short. The environmentally-oriented fashion company that makes items such as shoes and handbags also has a small line of small furnishings, including this “Puff Mike,” which is also made from what must be ubiquitous truck tarps down there.
Um, well, this might be great for a bachelor pad, maybe? Put it this way – spilled beer stains might even enhance the look.
Moving back to the United States, I couldn’t help but think there might be some giant conspiracy going on when I saw a chair at Central Station Interiors that was upholstered with old Army tents. The company buys surplus military camping tarps – with all their labels, patches and pockets – and has them sewn by hand into upholstery for the Cargo Chair.
And over at Cisco Brothers, a company that has been green from the very beginning, its new lines include Army-tent upholstery, too. They also have pillows embroidered with old Army patches. Drab green never looked so good, for sure.
“We’re using every scrap of the tent,” said Rosie Pinedo, who does the fabric and product buying for her brother Cisco Pindeo’s company. They used scraps of tents on pillows, including the grommets, stitching, and lettering.
“Part of our society is being so negative on the war. It was our way of supporting the troops,” she said. “Cisco saw these tents at the Rosebowl. Some of these are from the early 1900s and were never used. Some are even from the late 1800s.” She added that the sofas, chairs, and pillows covered in the canvas tents will be sold as one of a kind. “The details are part of the beauty and a little of history.”
I knew this all sort of felt like déjà vu, because when we were in High Point in April, we saw the first evidence of this new trend. Vanguard Furniture debuted its Bloomsbury collection of furniture, which included the Campden Settee, upholstered with patched and stamped – let me guess! – truck tarps.
Vanguard Marketing Director Diane Hubbard notes that the tarp is available on “almost any” upholstery item – “so sustainable!” she wrote in an e-mail.
As an end note, for your viewing pleasure, I’ll include this picture of a mannequin dressed up to look like a goddess in the Tritter Feefer showroom at High Point. Her toga? Recycled drop cloths.
The CharityWorks Dream Ball
Ten years and $10 million raised to support education, housing, and military families in the DC region: Hats off to Founder Leah Gansler, who was feted at CharityWorks’ annual fundraising ball Saturday night for all the work she’s done for her cause.
CharityWorks Founder Leah Gansler is flanked by Washington Spaces Editor in Chief Trish Donnally, left, and Associate Publisher Heather Heider, right, at the National Building Museum.
We were lucky enough to be a part of the festivities as a media sponsor for the soon-to-open CharityWorks GreenHouse, the charity’s first designer show house and one of the nation’s first green show houses. It’s the cover story of our current issue, and will be open Oct. 10 – 30. Proceeds will benefit the Friendship Public Charter School, which targets children in some of DC’s most underserved communities, and the McLean Project for the Arts, a non-profit visual arts center.
Trish Donnally stands with Mark Lowham, right, the senior vice president of West Group, which purchased the land in McLean, VA, for the GreenHouse. On the left is Lowham’s partner, Dr. Joseph Ruzzo, a dentist.
Deanna Belli, co-director of the CharityWorks GreenHouse, stands with husband Pedro Belli.
Interior Designer Barry Dixon, chairman of the GreenHouse design committee, stands with Heather Heider and her husband, Scott Van Pelt, to the left, and to the right, Trish Donnally and Dixon’s partner, Michael Schmidt.
Besides all the kudos to CharityWorks, there was a big silent and live auction at the Dream Ball, with an incredible array of items. Washington Spaces Associate Publisher Heather Heider and husband Scott Van Pelt made out well, buying trips to a house in San Miguel, Mexico (complete with two servants), and to the Ritz Carlton Laguna Niguel in California. Each trip is for more than one couple, so I think Jim and I need to start getting a lot more friendly with Heather and Scott…
Heather Heider and Scott Van Pelt
Moi, Jennifer Sergent, and my husband, Jim Sergent
Saturday evening was also a great opportunity to mingle with some of the GreenHouse designers, including:
Interior Designer Barbara Hawthorn stands with her significant other, attorney David Harrison.
Architect Ernesto Santalla with his partner, attorney Glen Ackerman
We also sat with Daniel Steinkoler, owner of Superior Home Services, whose gorgeous green home we featured last year, and his mother, Ronnie Steinkoler, a Manhattan stockbroker.
Daniel and Ronnie Steinkoler
And through Barry Dixon, I had the pleasure of meeting Malcolm Robson, the fifth generation in a family of master faux finishers. His work can be seen at Mount Vernon, the U.S. Capitol, the Supreme Court, and the Kennedy Center, among a dazzling list of other public and residential spaces.
Robson, who is originally from London, stands with his daughter, Hannah Robson, a teacher in Fairfax County, VA. (His son, Paul, is the sixth generation in the family business.)
Everyone feasted on creamy gazpacho with a crab and avocado “tower” in the center, beef tenderloin you could cut with a spoon, and delicious heart-shaped bread sticks, biscuits, and cookies that represented “The Heart of CharityWorks” theme. After dinner, we all hit the dance floor.
The band came out into the crowd for Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies.” I still can’t get it out of my head.
And the best part of all: We slept in on Sunday.
Go Green With Bo Green
“The Money Pit should have been based on this house,” says Architect Bo Green of B. Green Design. He and his wife, Anne du Vivier, bought a house in northwest Washington, DC, about 10 years ago, and ended up virtually replacing the entire house. “I literally started just to replace the kitchen cabinets,” Green says. But when he went to replace the cabinets, he discovered eight burned wires behind them and realized trouble was brewing. “I unpeeled layers of an onion and found one thing wrong, then another. It took us almost two years to find out everything that was wrong with the building,” he says. As time went on, Green essentially rebuilt the whole house – in a sustainable, thoughtful way. He wanted to make the house cutting edge in terms of energy efficiency, and he succeeded.
After years of considering every detail, Bo Green rebuilt this house in Forest Hills, which is environmentally intelligent inside and out. All photography is by Matthew Dandy.
“People think green houses are tutti frutti, up in the mountains, off the grid houses,” Green says. “People think it has to look a certain way. But the materials and the approaches are what make a house green, not the form.”
Green approached his house keeping the principles of Vitruvius, an architect who lived around the time of Christ, in mind. “Vitruvius used three words – firmness, commodity, and delight,” says Green, who laments the fact that the element of delight has often been overlooked, especially in tract houses. He built his house to last 100 years, thought through the use of each space carefully and used non-toxic materials, and added playful touches when least expected.
Among the highlights in the new house, which was just sold last week, are:
• 32 roof windows and skylights
“This way, you don’t need electric lights to read in most of the public rooms,” Green says. This house overlooks Rock Creek Park, which makes the views out the windows delightful.
A second floor window overlooks Rock Creek Park.
Another window brings the outside in.
Seeing daylight throughout the house can give a lift to your day. This window has a blackout screen, in case darkness is desired.
• If the pocket doors in the hearth room, which is adjacent to the kitchen/living/family area, are closed, windows can be opened, and the space will become a three-season room.
“In the fall, on a crisp autumn day when you want to feel the fresh air, you can open the windows without letting all of the heat go out of your house.”
• The hearth room includes a Tulikivi soapstone fireplace.
“A traditional fireplace is only about 30 percent efficient, but a Tulikivi stove is 95 percent efficient. It’s advertised that it ‘only pollutes as much as the tree rotting in the forest.’ ”
The hearth room can be closed off and converted into a three-season room.
One exceptional view on the first floor of the house is a 90-foot enfilade that flows from the kitchen/living/family room area, to the dining room, to the central hall, to the living room, and into the media room or north wing of the house.
Flooring is made of certified sustainably harvested lumber – acacia wood.
The new kitchen includes eco-friendly appliances and countertops.
Other key sustainable features include:
- Radiant heat throughout the house
- Non-toxic paints, coatings, and glues
- A roof made of Vermont green heavy weight slate
- Windows with aluminum exteriors so they don’t have to be painted
Green built an apartment over the garage, seen here through the window over the front entrance.
Keeping your house dry is critical, says Green, who installed hardscape – flagstone – around the perimeter of his whole house. “Most people could use gravel… Moisture means mold.”
He advises keeping bushes, mulch, and anything that will hold moisture away from your house. In addition to helping to prevent moisture from getting into the house, Green says, “Termites will not cross hard surfaces.”
The architect says, “Indoor air quality in our buildings can be anywhere from 10 to 100 times more toxic than air quality outside, according to some government statements.” So he encourages people to go outside and get fresh air.
“A properly placed bench is something to look at from the inside to invite you to go outside. This bench faces the southern sun. You could sit there on a winter day and be quite toasty.”
A ribbon of water flows from a lovely fountain in the front yard.
“If you make the building delightful, you’re probably going to want to spend more time there,” Green says. “The silver lining to the Great Recession is it has us focusing on a simpler lifestyle, which is perfect timing for the Greening of America.”
NY Gift Show: It's Easy Being Green, Part II
So many green products, so little time…
There were several items at the gift show this week that attempt to limit waste from our endless paper cups of coffee and plastic water bottles.
EarthLust bottles eliminate your need for disposable plastic water bottles, and they are so much prettier. They are made with food-grade stainless steel, safe and unlined, painted with non-toxic paints, and have BPA-free caps.
The title says it all. It looks like any cup from the coffee shop, but I Am Not A Paper Cup is made from thermal porcelain with a silicone top.
And if you’re looking for a reusable sleeve for that hot coffee cup…
Kwilty has these lovely embroidered fabric sleeves.
The Cozy Cuff doubles as a bracelet when you’re not drinking coffee.
Have you ever given a gift packaged all pretty, only to think that all that packaging is going to end up in a landfill? Vanishing Creatures has the answer for that: Buy chocolates molded from endangered creatures, where part of the proceeds goes to support their conservation, and the packaging for the chocolates converts into either a candle holder or bird feeder. How green is that?
Next, Urban General recycles old silver into funky new colorful items:
Urban General also converts old doilies into pockets for aprons.
Want to be a friend to the environment? Check out the Friend Boxes from Shine Labs. The tops are bamboo, certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, and the bottoms are 100-percent wool felt. They are fabricated with no-VOC adhesives.
And speaking of bamboo, I would think that a bamboo dry-erase board in your kitchen is much more attractive than the typical white variety. From Three By Three.
I also found some wonderful objects crafted from recycled paint cans and oil cans – they look much better in a living room than in a landfill.
These sculptures, which can take up a huge portion of your wall, come from The Roberta Schilling Collection.
These pieces were crafted in the same style as Iman Deco’s regular collection, only they come from oil drums recovered from Africa.
NY Gift Show: It's Easy Being Green, Part I
If there was any doubt the green movement has taken hold in a big way, it was erased in New York this week as manufacturers turned out hundreds of gorgeous, sustainable products for the home. Green is so hot, the gift show organizers held an exhibit in front of the convention hall at the Jacob Javits Center to showcase the best. Here is Part One of my favorites. (Note that most of these companies are wholesalers – go to their Web sites to find retailers who sell their products.)
This is the ultimate: a dollhouse made from sustainable bamboo, with a working solar panel. Start ’em young, I always say. From HaPe Intl. Inc.:
Next, the Zaishu, is artwork and furniture at the same time.
They are crafted with sustainable Australian hoop pine and printed with water-based inks and varnish. It’s sold flat to save shipping volume, wrapped in biodegradable plastic, and packaged in a reusable cotton bag.
They can be used as chairs or accent tables.
And can’t you picture this one in a contemporary house out in horse country?
Moving right along…
These “pebbles” from Bambu would look fabulous in a glass bowl. They are made from scrap material.
These adorable farm plates from J.K. Adams are laser-engraved on Vermont maple cut from managed forests.
Bamboo-inlaid tray from Zen Zen Garden & Home
Serving pieces made from citrus wood from the citrus industry’s waste, from Canvas Home.
Recycled glass from Shiraleah, left and Esque Studio, right.
Recycled foil baskets and a decorative object made from nipa pods, from Lazy Susan USA.
Recycled cotton and burlap from Michaelian Home
Eco-friendly hand-woven textiles from Sustainable Threads
A children’s “wish frame” made from recycled cardboard, from Cardboardesign
Stay tuned for more green fun tomorrow.
CharityWorks GreenHouse Earth-friendly Landscaping
The CharityWorks GreenHouse (CWGH) being constructed in McLean, VA, continues to inspire. The house, sustainable in terms of the actual structure and the interiors, will also feature eco-friendly landscaping. I stopped by this morning and loved the transformation from the bare dirt that was there last week to the lush, low shrubbery, bushes, and grasses that have since been planted.
The CharityWorks GreenHouse will set a standard for sustainable landscaping.
This is the latest update in a series of blogs on the CWGH. For past stories, click here, here, here, and here.
Designed to be low maintenance and drought tolerant by Greg Brandon of Skye Design Studio Ltd., who collaborated with John Clime of T&J Lawn Service, the property is filled with materials native to the mid-Atlantic region, including hydrangeas, viburnums, and rapanden yews. It’s not a traditional landscape; it looks new and natural. I imagine lots of wildlife – chipmunks, squirrels, rabbits, birds, and butterflies – building homes on this property.
“It’s such a nice extension of the whole theme for the house,” says Mark Lowham, senior vice president of West Group, which is building the green house with GreenSpur Inc. “That design won’t require any chemicals, fertilizers, or additional water once all those regional plants are established. It’s both beautiful and responsible.”
A side view of the house shows the landscaping in the foreground and the green roof on top of the one-story dining room beyond.
Workmen were busy finishing up the sod and planting this morning, so things will have time to take root before the CWGH opens for tours from October 10-30.
The front walk, flanked by native plants, is composed of permeable pavers with pea gravel.
Old-growth trees were saved where possible on the half-acre site, including this evergreen in the front yard.
Mark Turner of GreenSpur says they shifted the house seven feet within the setbacks of the site to save the grand silver maple.
The property is dotted with dozens of hydrangeas, including these oakleaf hydrangeas, which should be spectacular next spring.
Lots of native plants fill the front yard and a side yard. The other side yard will include a lap pool and wonderful outdoor living space. Washington Spaces is proud to be a sponsor of CWGH. See our upcoming Fall issue for a preview of the green designer show house.
My opinion about going green? Thumbs up, naturally!
Cool Green Shopping: Bambeco
Lots of my friends in journalism have been migrating – by necessity – out of journalism lately. Lucky for me that my former reporter colleague Jeff Miller just landed as VP of marketing for a start-up company called Bambeco, an online shop for green – and beautiful – home goods.
The Soleil Trays are made of 100-percent recycled materials and feel just like wood.
“The Bambeco name celebrates bamboo, the planet’s most renewable and versatile resource, and ecology, the essential relationship between people and the natural environment,” according to company literature.
This welcome mat is woven from the fibers of coconut shells.
Bambeco CEO Susan Aplin, a former executive with Williams-Sonoma and The Gap, decided to start the company after a trip to Alaska’s Prince William Sound, where she saw the erosion of its glaciers “up close and personal.” She then spent months hunting down fashionable home products that were also environmentally friendly, such as goblets made from recycled wine bottles or wallets fashioned from reclaimed truck inner tubes – what a great use for all those rubber scraps we always see by the sides of highways.
These reclaimed wood salt and pepper shakers were made using wood from furniture-manufacturers’ waste. The salt shaker was painted with eco-friendly milk paint.
Besides its cool products, I also love that the company is close by. It’s based in Moorefield, WV – about three hours west of DC.
The Soji Modern Solar Lanterns require no electricity and, more important, no ugly cords to turn them on.
Check out Bambeco’s creds: “The merchandise is made with earth-friendly processes from materials that are all-natural, biodegradable, nontoxic, organic, recycled, reclaimed, and/or renewable.”
The organic dragonfly sheet set is made from organic combed cotton, certified free of all harmful chemicals.
The company’s goods are shipped with eco-friendly materials, and the company also donates one percent of its revenues to environmental charities.
This bike chain looks much better as a bowl than it would lying in a landfill, for sure.
Ta ta for now – I’m off to the site to go get that Bird Welcome Mat.
Visual Voltage: A Design and Art Perspective from Sweden
If you’re looking for creative and stylish ways to get “green” in your home, check out the Embassy of Sweden’s latest exhibit, Visual Voltage: A Design and Art Perspective from Sweden, which explores various forms of electricity and its consumption. Brought to you by the Swedish Institute and the Interactive Institute, this installation combines the talents of some of Sweden’s best known artists, designers, and engineers to show you electricity as you’ve never seen it before.
Energy and sustainability are center stage this weekend at the embassy. Visual Voltage Weekend includes an evening of green dialogue “Pecha Kucha” style (meaning rapid-fire presentation – each presenter shows 20 images for 20 seconds apiece, which prevents death by PowerPoint); a designer’s talk on the importance and benefits of sustainable design; and a day of family environmental awareness.
Energy AWARE Clock
Energy AWARE Clock
This clock may look ordinary, but instead of telling time, it visualizes the daily energy rhythms of your household. It’s designed to make energy awareness a part of everyday life. You can even compare your electricity usage on different days.
AWARE Laundry Lamp
Since 95 percent of the electricity used in traditional light bulbs is transferred to heat, why not hang your wet laundry around a bulb and capture some of that wasted heat to dry your clothes? That’s the concept behind this “lamp,” which combines three functions: lighting, drying, and conserving energy. The lamp’s design encourages hang-drying instead of tumble-drying clothes, an alternative that drastically reduces electricity consumption. Try different design statements with each load of laundry you put on display.
Flower Lamp
Flower Lamp
This lamp rewards its owners when they use less energy by slowly “blooming” and releasing more light. If, on the other hand, energy consumption increases, the lamp contracts, which affects the quality of light emitted. Like Pinocchio’s nose, the light and form of the lamp reflects your energy behavior.
Energy Curtain
Energy Curtain
The Energy Curtain collects sunlight during the day and saves it to be used later at night. The only downside is that in order to collect energy, the curtains must be drawn during the day – an easy task when the family’s away at work and school.
Power AWARE Cord
Power AWARE Cord
This power cord is a tool to monitor energy in your home. When an attached appliance consumes energy, the cord glows. For instance, it glows brighter or dims when you change the volume on your stereo. The cord will also glow when appliances on standby are silently stealing electricity. With this ambient reminder, you won’t as easily forget to unplug those energy thieves.
About Visual Voltage Weekend:
Pecha Kucha vol #8
Friday, April 17, 2009
7:30 p.m. (presentations begin at 8:20)
An evening of green dialogue with music by DJ Adrian Loving.
Speakers:
Reena Kazmann, Director/Owner of Eco-Artware.com
Jeff Lee, Landscape Architect
Steve Ma, President and GEO (Green Executive Officer) of Live Green
Brought to you by Embassy of Sweden and Pecha Kucha DC.
Family Day at House of Sweden
Saturday, April 18, 2009
1 pm - 6 pm
A day of films, quizzes, treats for kids, and interactive workshops that teach you about the greenhouse effect and climate change. Guided tours of Visual Voltage begin at 1:30 and continue every hour.
Brought to you by Embassy of Sweden, the Swedish Institute, Interactive Institute, and Wolfgang Brunner.
Designer’s Talk
Sunday, April 19, 2009
3 pm - 5 pm
Discussing the importance and benefits of sustainable design solutions.
Speakers:
Craig Provost, former industrial designer, global design manager, and sustainable design advocate for Gillette; Current professor of industrial design and a sustainable design researcher at Rhode Island School of Design.
Christina Öhman, manager of strategic development and innovation at the Interactive Institute with over 20 years of experience in design and innovation.
Hosted by the Embassy of Sweden in collaboration with The Swedish Institute.
Russell Versaci's Pennywise House
Middleburg Architect Russell Versaci is on a tear. He’s taking advantage of the depressed housing market to preach a new gospel for homebuilding, called the Pennywise House. It calls for smaller homes, better design, and green, factory-built modular construction. With the McMansion era blessedly over, Versaci says, these homes also need to be affordable to an average homebuyer.
And he’s not just talking. In partnership with Haven Homes, a Baltimore-based modular homebuilder, he’s created a series of 10 cottage designs born from “the colonial cradles of home.” They are classic American styles, from Chesapeake tidewater to Carolina lowcountry, whose histories Versaci traces in his recent book, The Roots of Home (The Taunton Press, 2008).
Versaci, who’s designed high-end custom homes for 25 years, has come to this point after realizing “over the years that those homes have become increasingly expensive and further and further out of reach,” he says. The cottage designs are “the product of a fairly long time spent trying to figure out how to bring home building in line with people’s pocketbooks.”
After touring modular-home factories around the country, Versaci reached the conclusion that factory-built homes are not only more cost effective, they are inherently green. He ticks off the green benefits in a slideshow he prepared on the Pennywise concept: “Better engineered than stick-built [where it’s built on site]; faster assembly in ideal conditions; shorter completion schedule; uses less energy, water, and natural resources; lowers operating costs; improves air and water quality; creates less waste.”
Versaci’s only problem, he says, was finding a modular home builder that had design visions beyond the double-wide. “Until recently, modular building was associated with low-end houses and trailer homes – it has had a big PR problem,” Versaci wrote this winter in New Old House magazine.
Enter Haven Homes, which builds nothing but modular homes, and partners with top architects to create custom designs. “We can bring some of the best names in residential architecture at prices that are attractive to our customers,” says Jerry Smalley, Haven’s CEO and president. He explains that the majority of homes they build are customized for each buyer. “Ninety percent of [the plans] we build, we don’t build again.”
Where most custom homes start above $1 million, Versaci’s cottage designs cost around $250,000. All the buyer needs to supply is land and a foundation. “It’s time for architects to reconnect with homebuyers to bring good traditional design within reach,” he says in the slideshow.
Versaci’s vision through these modular plans is nothing less than restoring American homebuilding to its original glory.
“The recent and now certain death of the suburban subdivision and its cookie-cutter production methods opens up home building to a new dawn,” he writes in New Old House.
Architects “are ready to reclaim the turf of the small house from builders whose industrial-strength solutions drove the charms of the American home into suburban tract-mansion purgatory.
Interactive and Eco-Friendly Sinks
The term “going green” is fast becoming one of those clichéd culture trends that people hardly pay attention to anymore. (Add to that list: bank bail-outs and any celebrity reality show on VH1.) But because this year is all about change, we’re scouting out new ways to be environmentally (and financially) responsible. And while Hybrid cars and fluorescent light bulbs are good ways to, ahem, go green, we’ve found that water conservation is another great way to express eco-friendliness, and it’s easier than it sounds.
Just take a look at these environmentally-conscious sinks and accessories.
The Plugless Sink
Although this product is not yet available for purchase, we feel the concept is worth the, uh, plug. The Plugless Sink, by Polish designer Maja Ganszyniec, was designed to awaken your water-usage consciousness. Without a plughole, you must tip the bowl over toward a drain slot to dispose of the used water. The concept forces the user to be aware of how much, and how often, they dispose of the water. The minimalist design and functionality promotes water re-usage and brings awareness to how much water we have the ability to waste. Check out Maja’s website to learn more about her original designs.
Removable Kitchen Sink
In a similar (though perhaps less stylish) vein, Hughie of Australia has created the Removable Kitchen Sink. More than just capturing your water-usage consciousness, this sink actually saves and recycles waste-water. It saves 80 percent of grey water that would otherwise be sent down the drain, and instead preserves the water for other uses such as watering plants or washing your car. Made from biodegradable plastic (and available in a range of colors), the sink is lightweight and fits virtually all kitchen sinks. The portable sink can also save water during an array of activities like bathing pets or collecting rainwater.
Fashion Plugs
The sink plug may not be the most glamorous of kitchen adornments, but these tastefully designed plugs from the Japanese company Cina add elegance to the ordinary. If you’re not quite willing to go totally plugless, using these plugs is another way to conserve water. Fill the sink while washing plates to reduce the amount of water used. And while most conventional sink caps have a knack for disappearing, these aesthetically pleasing plugs will stand out from the kitchen clutter.
Pedal Valve
The ultimate sink accessory: hands-free faucet controllers allow you to have a more convenient control over water use. With this pedal installation, after you turn on the faucet, simply step on and off the pedal to control the water. With the hands-free faucet, you’re less inclined to keep the water running. And once the faucet is turned off, the pedals are disabled.
Touch-Free Faucet
This EZ Faucet automatic faucet not only benefits the germaphobe; its automatic sensor means you can feel guilt-free when it comes to using water, because it’s only on when something’s under the spout. It saves up to 70 percent of water, and during flu season, may even save you a trip to the doctor.
Garden Tours at the White House
If you’re like me and weren’t able to score online tickets for the annual Easter Egg Roll, there’s still a chance to tour the White House grounds.
The White House just announced its annual Gardens and Grounds Tours to be held from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on Saturday, April 18, and from 11:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. on Sunday, April 19.
Visitors will be able to view the Jacqueline Kennedy Garden, the Rose Garden, the Children’s Garden, and the South Lawn of the White House.
The White House Kitchen Garden, a new addition to the South Lawn, will be viewable from a distance along the tour route.
Instead of making people try their luck online, the National Park Service is giving out free tickets the old-fashioned way – you need to get in line.
Go to the Ellipse Visitor Pavilion at 15th and E Streets on each tour day beginning at 8:00 a.m. Tickets will be distributed – one ticket per person – first-come, first-served.
If it’s rainy, the tour will be canceled. Before you head downtown to wait in line, call the 24-hour information line at 202.456.7041 to check on the status of the event.
Kitchen Gardening at the White House
Not since Eleanor Roosevelt planted a victory garden at the White House during World War II has there been a working garden there. But First Lady Michelle Obama is about to change all that.
White House photographer Joyce Bhoghosian
As the first day of spring arrived clear and cool, Obama gathered 26 fifth graders from DC’s Bancroft Elementary School (which has its own vegetable garden) to help prepare soil in an L-shaped, 1,100-square-foot patch on the South Lawn. In a couple weeks, the first seedlings for what will be around 55 vegetable, herb, and berry plants will go into the ground.
Can you just imagine walking through this garden along paths lined with zinnia, marigolds, and nasturtiums to pick lettuce, shell peas, herbs, carrots, broccoli, spinach, rhubarb, and onions? Oh, and they plan to keep bees there, too, to make their own honey.
Obama is giving the organic garden movement a huge boost. And it makes so much sense to do it at home:
“The whole point of this garden for us is that I want to make sure that our family, as well as the staff and all the people who come to the White House and eat our food, get access to really fresh vegetables and fruits, because what I found with my girls, who are 10 and 7, is that they like vegetables more if they taste good, right?” Obama said, according to a White House transcript.
White House photographer Joyce Bhoghosian
“You wanted to taste it, right?” she told one of the students. “And that’s what I found with my kids. Especially if they were involved in planting it and picking it, they were much more curious about giving it a try. So I’ve been able to have my kids eat so many different things that they would never have touched if we had bought it at a store, because they either met the farmer that grew it, or they saw how it was grown. They were curious about it, and then they tried it, and usually they liked it – and then they’d eat more and more of it.”
To that end, we talked to local garden experts and looked for great kitchen garden images to inspire us to do the same thing.
First, the numbers:
A new report in U.S. News quotes this research:
- $50 of seeds and fertilizer yields $1,250 of produce, according to the Burpee seed company.
- A National Gardening Association poll shows that the number of households planning to grow their own food in 2009 has increased by 19 percent from 2008.
Photograph by Ralph Anderson from Southern Living magazine
Next, some inspiring words:
Kitchen gardens “grow really well here. You can grow at least three seasons of the year, and with a few tricks, you can grow four seasons,” says Cindy Brown, assistant director of Green Spring Gardens in Alexandria, VA, who has lectured and taught about vegetable and kitchen gardens for 15 years.
This raised-bed garden makes use of a narrow space formerly used as a dog enclosure. Photograph from Flickr.
Brown says “there’s no excuse” not to create a garden, even if you live in an apartment. Containers, window boxes, roof tops – even kiddie pools – all make great gardens. You can get lots of local resources and online camaraderie through DC Urban Gardeners.
A rooftop fruit and vegetable garden. Photograph from Flickr.
If you’re like me, and would love to have your own kitchen garden but have no desire whatsoever to get your hands dirty, Joshua Wenz of My Organic Garden will do it all for you. Wenz, who is a budget analyst for his “real job,” is slowly transitioning into My Organic Garden full time because there is so much demand for vegetable gardens. “There’s just been a huge uptick in the number of people who want to do it,” he says, for reasons Michelle Obama noted today.
Still nervous? Start with a tiny, four-foot-by-four-foot plot with some tomatoes and basil, “and every year expand a little,” Wenz counsels. Well, that seems doable.
If you’re still looking for inspiration, check out these projects by one of our favorite landscape companies, Graham Landscape Architecture. Graham’s Arthur Balter describes each project:
This kitchen garden was built around a historic outbuilding. The client wanted herbs for the kitchen, flowers for the tables, and fresh berries. The fence was designed to enclose the garden to create its own space. Rails were added within the garden for the clients’ raspberries. Photographs by Victoria Cooper
This garden features an historic smokehouse that was relocated from elsewhere on the property to create an anchor in the kitchen garden. This client wanted a kitchen garden that would offer a variety of flowers that could be cut and used in the house, as well as herbs for cooking. A profuse variety of perennials and bulbs provide an abundance of flowers to be cut through extended seasons.
As part of a renovation process, the client restored the historic root cellar to become a wine cellar. Because of the clients’ culinary interests, they wanted an herb garden. With an objective to keep the profile low to the ground so the roof of the cellar would not be concealed, and so the shape of the mound would offer an additional sculptural quality, a variety of low-to-the-ground herbs and plantings were used. Photograph by Erik Kvalsvik
Green Designer Show House Now Under Roof
The impressive progress continues at the CharityWorks GreenHouse in McLean, VA. I visited late last week and was amazed to see the walls up around the whole house and garage. I stopped by again this morning and three-quarters of the house is under roof. The energy-efficient windows were delivered today, too. This is the third installment in an occasional series Washington Spaces is writing about this sustainable house. You can see the first two here and here.
It’s exciting to see the house begin to take shape. The kitchen is going to be a great room with a ceiling that will soar roughly 24 feet from the finished floor to the top of the cupola when it’s completed. The dining room will have a much lower ceiling for a more intimate feel. The owner’s bedroom will have a direct view of a swimming pool – ahh.
Last Friday, the cupola above the kitchen was being defined with timber trusses from Cabin Creek Timber Frames. Photograph by Carrie Russell
By this morning, the cupola was up with the clerestory windows defined and the roof added. “We’ll have motorized windows with ventilation. This house is so [air] tight, you want to introduce fresh air,” says Mark Turner of GreenSpur Inc. “We’re putting roofing material on to get this watertight,” he adds. Photograph by Trish Donnally
Continue reading to see more progress.
When you walk in the front door, the architects, Cunningham | Quill Architects LLC, have created a view straight through the front area, past the stairs, past the dining room, through the kitchen and into the mudroom.
The east- west axis will look from the front door, which is shown, through the kitchen and beyond. Photograph by Carrie Russell
The owner’s bedroom, which is on the first floor, will have a direct view of a swimming pool. Photograph by Carrie Russell
Three bedrooms will be upstairs. Photograph by Carrie Russell
The blue ductwork being installed is for air conditioning. It has an R value of 10. “It’s compressed foam so you don’t get any heat loss, it’s very efficient,” Turner says. “Metal duct work is at the mercy of how well the joints are sealed and most duct work doesn’t typically have a significant R value.” Photograph by Carrie Russell
Aluminum-clad, double-paned, Kolbe windows were delivered this morning. “Kolbe windows are about as good as money can buy,” Turner says, noting that the rating on these is low-E 366 and the color is “Truffle”. Photograph by Trish Donnally
Meanwhile, Barry Dixon and Victoria Neale met with more than 40 designers and their teams last week to review the guidelines for green design and explain how designing with sustainable principles can make a significant difference in the world. For some, this is new territory. “Some designers are having an epiphany,” says Deanna Belli, who is co-chairing the CharityWorks GreenHouse with Victoria Sabo.
Stay tuned to learn who will be selected to decorate this show house, which will be opened for touring this fall.
Rowe Furniture Gets the Green Nod
It seems like everyone these days, from architects to builders to interior designers, is going green.
Well, the entire city of New York is going green, too, and the Museum of the City of New York is running an exhibit to illustrate Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s ambitious five-borough plan for sustainability by 2030. The exhibit follows a “green” day in the life of a typical New Yorker.
Photograph courtesy Museum of the City of New York. Photographer: C. Bay Milin
The home is obviously a part of a New Yorker’s day, and McLean-based Rowe Furniture populates an apartment living room in the exhibit. Pictured is the Caren Settee, upholstered in a bamboo/cotton-blend fabric; the Nelson storage/serving tray mini ottoman; and the Arcadia accent chair in cotton fabric.
Rowe, a founding member of the Sustainable Furnishings Council, uses cushion filler made from recycled plastic bottles, and the ticking material is no longer bleached with harmful chemicals. The springs are made from recycled iron ore. The nails and screws are uncoated, instead, a water-based lubricant is used. Wood is from replenished and domestic forests, and the cotton comes from 97-percent recycled materials.
Oh, and their furniture designs are really fabulous, too. Go Rowe!
Designer: John Houshmand
We run into so many interesting designers in this line of work that it feels necessary to shine a spotlight their way every once and a while. Hence, our blog is starting an occasional series of designer profiles.
This living room is anchored by John Houshmand’s black walnut and glass cocktail table.
I’m starting off today with John Houshmand, who left a 24-year career in high-end construction in 2003 to start designing with wood. His sculpture, furniture, and architectural installations are arresting and beautiful. (We have featured some of his work in Washington Spaces) His showroom in New York’s SoHo is definitely worth a train trip north. And even if you don’t want to travel, he says, “you can send me a drawing on a napkin,” and he can make it.
Houshmand, a Yale graduate who has dabbled in art, architecture, design, and music over the years, says his current work started – literally – with a dream. Several dreams, actually.
Shelving
“I was having all these dreams that were very geometrical,” he says. “It was an unfolding of geometric forms and shapes, and somehow they folded into the natural forms of these slabs of wood … I just put a notebook by my bed and started drawing sketches.”
A cocktail table made with black walnut, metal, and glass
Finally, Houshmand retreated to his farm in upstate New York, bought a saw mill (yes, he bought a saw mill), and started milling and building with a load of logs salvaged off his 950-acre property. After many weekends of moonlighting, he ended up with 30 pieces, and the collection took off. “It was really fun. I got lit up like a house on fire,” he says. He went back to the city, quit his construction job, turned his loft into a showroom, “and I just sort of ran with it.”
The black walnut Epic bed and side table
He recently finished a commission for the niece of the Emir of Kuwait, and he outfitted much of Robert de Niro’s Greenwich Hotel in New York. He described another job where he will install “bent trees wandering up and down the walls” of an 8,000-square-foot space in an office building. He’s built a workshop in Hobart, NY, where 17 craftsmen fabricate his designs.
A stairway in the Greenwich Hotel with antique heart pine treads and hand-carved rail
Houshmand recently completed work at an entire house in Mexico that includes sofas, tables and chairs:
Houshmand uses only American hardwood in his designs, and each tree he uses is salvaged, either from diseased trees, trees whose lifespan has ended, or trees that are not straight enough for the mass producers. “If it’s not straight enough, if it’s not true, if it’s not the right size, it’s firewood,” he says. And as his Web site states, “We allow grains to spill. We love crumbling bark. We welcome wormholes.”
John Houshmand
31 Howard Street
New York, NY 10013
212.965.1238 www.johnhoushmand.com
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