Entries Tagged 'Architecture' ↓

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A grant of 3 million dollars by Baltimore developer John Colvin and his wife will be used for a new green real estate program at the University of Maryland.

I am not a big fan of environmentalism for the sake of environmentalism. What I am a fan of though is taking the best of technology and applying it to reduce the energy usage by innovation without sacrificing the quality of life for typical Americans. Those that fly around in their private jets, Al Gore, to tell us to stop global warming really drive me batty.

But for a developer to donate money for green innovation I think is great. As long as the pointy headed academics do not take over the program and politicize it, I think the potential to add to innovation and energy saving features in homes makes a great deal of sense.

It is a win win situation, we use less energy, we save the homeowner money, and the technology that is developed can be shared across the world. That is the right way to be green in my book.

The donation from John Colvin and his wife, Karen, will be used to create the Colvin Institute of Real Estate Development in Maryland’s School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. The donation will be used to create a new track in the program focusing on green design, sustainable development and energy financing.

Colvin, a University of Maryland graduate, is a principal at Baltimore-based real estate development Questar. The new institute will be the academic home for the university’s master’s degree in real estate development track.  via Washington Business Journal

The housing starts stats have come out and they are not dropping anywhere near the level they should be. I have heard all of the stories about how once the pipeline is started they can not stop, but the glut of inventory is not helping.

This reminds me of the airlines after 9/11. With the airlines hemorrhaging money none of them wanted to cut flights as they were still obsessed with market share and not profitability. It was not until they started cutting flights and reducing inventory did they become profitable. The home building companies are hemorrhaging money and it will get worse until they balance their inventory with demand.

Housing starts rose 2.3 percent to an annual rate of 1.467 million, led by an increase in apartments, while construction of single-family homes fell, the Commerce report showed. The government also revised May starts down to a 1.434 million pace.
The rise in starts was led by a 9 percent increase in the West. Construction also rose in the South, by 2.4 percent. It fell by 3.7 percent in the Midwest and declined 2.4 percent in the Northeast.
Rising mortgage rates and stricter lending rules are impeding a rebound in housing, even as builders lower prices and add incentives. A glut of unsold properties will probably continue to drag down construction and the economy for the rest of the year, economists said. via The Boston Globe.

I was emailed by an associate with WNYC to spread the word on the Leonard Lapate show tomorrow on the stories behind New York City buildings with Christopher Gray, writer of the Streetscapes column in the New York Times.

What intrigued me about the show was that they are using the internet to facilitate it. Instead of the writer and host choosing the low hanging fruit and pontificating on the radio as most of these show happen, they will be working with user submitted photo’s of New York City via Flickr.

And in my eyes that is very, very cool. So check out the show tomorrow between 1 and 2 PM Eastern on WNYC in New York on 93.9 FM or 820 AM, or listen online to the live stream from their web page.

While one may disagree that the ranch house is one of the great architectural achievements of the 20th century in America, I do, an interesting article in the Washington Post talks about the influence of future building styles that was created by the ranch house.

The ranch house is ubiquitous in surburban America. It does come in many styles and flavors, but the homes never have done much for me. I have been fortunate to have gone upstairs for bed my whole life excluding the apartment years. However, it is a predominant style of architecture in the country, and this is an interesting read on the genesis of the ranch home in America.

A small number of architects working in California and the Southwest during the 1920s and ’30s designed the first suburban ranch-style houses. These were based on the simple, one-story houses built by ranchers who lived in the harsh climate of the plains and mountains of the West. For young architects seeking forms that were defined by their function and not layers of Victorian bric-a-brac or the Colonial-style treatments popular in the East, the ranchers’ houses had particular appeal.
The architects also admired the way the casual lifestyle of ranch families was reflected in their houses. All the rooms opened onto a shaded veranda, which functioned as a hallway and as an important living area for much of the year.
On their drawing boards, the young architects re-created the solitude of the vast prairies by arraying the living and dining areas around a private back yard from which no neighbors could be seen. Even more startling to the homeowners of the time was the way some of these designers merged indoor and outdoor spaces. Drawing on the work of Frank Lloyd Wright, they used multiple windows and French doors on the walls that faced the landscaped back yard, an innovation that made the outdoor area appear to be part of the indoor living space.
Another Wrightism was using the same space for multiple functions, as in a living-dining room or an eat-in kitchen. Placing the bedrooms in the front of the house was also unusual.

Read the rest at the washingtonpost.com.