apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I think it's fantastic that people are choosing to build properties green, but 6000 square feet? Since they were going to build it anyway I'm glad it was done in a green way, but it's so excessive and unsustainable to build that much space that it's hard to call it a "green" home.

can you be green and glamorous? YES.
can 6000 sq. ft.(actually 7400) be green? NO (not as a single family dwelling anyway).

it can be beautiful and thoughtful, and conscious of the environment in it's own way. it can be a source for ideas and inspiration. it can be eye opening and well crafted and resourceful.

BUT IT IS NOT GREEN.

buying floor models? not green.
demolishing existing structures except for roof tiles? not green.
succumbing to the market forces that say you have to build 6000 sq ft because it's hillsborough (or anywhere else), definitely not green.

it's a beautiful home with alot to teach, but it's owners (and all of us) still have alot to learn.

Can't imagine who's going to dust all those dark floors... dust drives me nuts...

They don't post more photos because newspapers are dying and the Chron is probably lucky enough to have new content let alone photos.

As far as the size goes, I have a hard time thinking anything that large is green. Beautiful and glamorous yes, but green?

While it is a beautiful home and clearly received much thoughtful planning, any home that requires the consumption of 6000 square feet worth of materials, whether they are sustainable, renewable resources or not, is by nature NOT green. I would like to see much more re-use of structures, materials, and furnishings in our world rather than the sell, sell, sell and consume as much as possible attitude we've found ourselves in. I am glad environmentalism and green design has become the popular issue it is today, whether you believe it to be a trend or not. Either way, it is receiving much needed and long overdue attention. Congratulations for the homeowners for the effort.

"Concern for the environment is, among other things, an upper-middle-class privilege and a status marker."

from a relevant slate.com article: http://www.slate.com/id/2193469/

i'm pretty tired of hearing about how "green" upperclass lifestyle can be, when overconsumption--of any sort--inherently is *NOT* (as others have stated above). i'll stick with methods that 95% of the US can practice.

Concern for the environment is also a way for middle-class people to feel morally superior to the upper-middle-class people who dare to have more than them.

i don't understand how buying everything brand new is green? that sunset green house just puzzled me. this house is the same. how is this green? l

At the end of the day it doesn't matter for what reasons you go green or are green, if it is to be hip or because you are really concerned for the environment.
But I have to agree that a 6000sft. house for a small family is not green, on the other hand is anybody 100% green?
You might have a small apartment but fly several times a year.
Your car might be fuel efficient, but it's still a car.
Maybe you recycle, but use the 'wrong' soap.

Even if everyone goes just a bit green, be it for whatever reasons, it would still make a big difference.

elvedon:

why does criticism of this brand of "eco-consciousness" have to be about jealousy or moral superiority? is that all you know?

the idea - environmentalism as privilege - is worth exploring in an age of global warming, $5 gas, SUV-hybrids, and carbon offsets...not to mention the foreclosure problem or midwest flooding (both of which have environmental, economic, and home ownership entanglements at their roots).
economics shows that public goods (like the environment) are very hard to value, protect, and regulate. that said, we're going to have to try.
the federal government is now poised to spend $45 billion dollars, in the everglades alone, to remove flood controls and irrigation diversions we spent billions installing in the 1950-60s. expect the midwest and california's central valley to follow.

i don't think anyone "dares" to have more. having more, hoarding, accumulating, striving are all human nature.

what you do with it, after you have it, is the issue here. can one "dare" to have less?

healthyhome:

I'm not sure how the slate article and comments here about how a 6000-square-foot home is by definition not green relate to removing flood controls in the Everglades or the fact that gas prices here are remarkably cheap compared to the rest of the developed world (except, perhaps, not at all).

But I digress. My opinion, however snarkily phrased, is not that "green" isn't a popular trend for upper-middle-class, privileged, and sometimes amusingly dim people. That's pretty obvious. My opinion is that it is perhaps just as often (witness: AT) people who aren't as privileged carping on how rich people spend a lot. Moral platitudes like consumption = bad is no better intellectually than feeling "green" because you install solar panels to power your dog's air conditioning.

As you say, it is worth examining a link between privilege and environmentalism - but I believe that examination will be most productive if it thinks hard rather than sliding into easy, class-driven generalizations.

elvedon:

while i agree that carping on the cost of someone's expensive sofa is petty, i view it as background noise....not class warfare. i tend to be more of the "your money, your choices" school, try to focus on the aesthetics, and am genuinely thrilled when i see something beautiful, novel, efficient or clean.

this is, however, GREEN Month, and the choices posted this month really do effect us all (hence my "digressions" which tried to frame the scope of the problem, unrealized consequences and costs of bad choices, and some of the heuristics in play).

while not of the consumption=bad crowd, i have no problem criticizing OVER consumption and wasteful consumption. i just don't think that because one can, one should. i believe we need to live better with less. and we need to be aware of how our choices effect those around us.

as i said in my original post, i think this house is beautiful and has much teach. it may even be "greener", but it's not green.

I'm sick and tired of seeing people build monster "green" homes and thinking they're being good to the environment. No matter how you look at it, no matter how "green" the construction, the larger the house the more wasteful and product consuming the house AND as a result NOT green. You could build a 1,000 square foot totally NON-green home and it would be MORE green than this house. Being truely green is not consuming more than you NEED to.

uh, elvedon, if you'll read my original post i said that it's OVERconsumption i have a problem with. uh, yeah, i think OVERconsumption is bad. not simple "consumption" which, by virtue of entanglement with free market capitalism, pretty much none of us can escape.

so uh, go back and read my comment. please.

I would have liked this house a lot better if it was designed and built to look exactly like a brontosaurus. I believe those were about 6000 sq ft, ate vegetation, and were AWESOME!