piper: decoding healthy & regenerative design

What does it take to bring natural building out of the dirt road context and into the urban fabric? For natural materials specialist Massey Burke , that question has shaped two decades of work.  From her first encounter with integrated natural building as an intern at a nonprofit permaculture site in northern California, Massey knew natural building was in her DNA. She felt an instant connection a...

In the 1970s, Brutalist-style architecture and the use of concrete in its purest, raw form were the name of the game. It was a demonstration of innovation, cost effectiveness and service to the public good. But now, 50 years later, priorities and needs have changed. Some of the Brutalist structures from half a century ago no longer suit the needs of their occupants or the environment. And that was...

Making reuse and circularity repeatable, scalable and efficient is not without its challenges. Especially in an economic model and an industry like the built environment, that was set up to move linearly. But after seeing how much waste construction produced, the team at the design-build firm 180 Degrees was motivated to do something about it. Where there were barriers, they saw opportunities––opp...

Thirty years ago, out on the Carrizo Plain just east of San Luis Obispo in central California, 30 or so natural-building enthusiasts met at a deserted motel to explore the formation of a California natural building group.  This initial gathering was a byproduct of the Natural Building Colloquium-Southwest, a touch of serendipity, and a few too many in-flight cocktails shared between three Californ...

After a wildfire destroyed their half-century-old family home in Sonoma County, architects David Arkin and Anni Tilt ( Arkin Tilt Architects ) set out on the journey of rebuilding. Rather than focusing on the tragedy, they saw it as an opportunity to not only flex their architectural and natural building muscle, but also design a place that was resilient, regenerative and as fire resistant as poss...

Let's travel back to the late 1800s to Tombstone, Arizona––a boomtown where gunslinging, gambling, saloon brawls and shootouts like the Gunfight at the OK Corral were the norm. Where outlaws, vigilantes and "lawmen" like Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday wrote the rules of frontier justice. It was where vice and violence met. It was the Wild West. At least that's what the Hollywood myth-making machine a...

On a November morning in 2023, more than 60 individuals across the bio-based construction value chain descended upon the MASS Design Group office in Boston to address one question: How can we begin to rapidly scale regionally produced, renewable building materials across the Northeast? This intrepid group, which included designers, developers, builders, farmers, foresters, educators, suppliers, ma...

Writer, photographer, filmmaker, grassroots organizer…Joel Caldwell dons many titles, but at the heart of it, he is a storyteller––and a powerful one at that.  An avid outdoors person, Joel grew up in rural Washington, worked on a dude ranch in Montana for a bit, then moved to Colorado, where, as he puts it: was a backcountry-skiing, motorcycle-riding, mountain bike guy in full send.  Eventually,...

In talking about the embodied carbon and waste burden of the built environment, much of the focus has traditionally been on the structure and enclosure––or the core and shell––of the building. But in more recent years, some of the attention has shifted to the interior. And early studies show that interiors can actually surpass the embodied carbon impact and waste burden of the initial building ove...

For a material as seemingly straightforward and simple as wood, it has a very complex, layered and often opaque supply chain. While certifications like FSC, SFI and PEFC may tell you the wood came from responsibly managed forests, it's a very small part of the story. Like organic labels on produce, these certifications can offer some peace of mind, but they don't tell you the lineage, where specif...

Like many of today's architects and designers, Lona Rerick wasn't taught material health in school. She had some exposure to sustainable design in college at the University of Oregon, which seeded her interest, but it wasn't until a lecture she attended as a young practicing architect that she was exposed to the idea of materials as nutrients. The talk was presented by none other than William McDo...

For the composer, conductor, songwriter Steve Hackman , life has been a journey through parallel realities––or maybe, parallel dualities. At a young age, he developed an appreciation for music. And, it was all music. Whether Beethoven or the Beatles, Mahler or Pink Floyd, they all got equal playing time. To Steve, music was an art form that had the power to reach the soul, actuate change and bridg...

According to the US Forest Service, 36 million trees are removed from urban areas every year. These trees offer a tremendous opportunity to reduce some of the demand on forests. But, this quality wood that could be used in furniture or the built environment, is more commonly chipped, incinerated or landfilled. Luckily, there are people working to change that. Paul Hickman, founder of the urban woo...

What do a battery-operated induction range, hemp insulation, a straw-based structural insulated panel (SIP), a whole-life carbon visualization tool, and product transparency software have in common? Well, for starters, they were all at this year's Greenbuild conference. But more importantly, they're all key pieces of the puzzle when it comes to reducing the carbon footprint of the built environmen...

In 2009, the American Institute of Architects launched the AIA 2030 Commitment, a strategy and framework that takes direct aim at reaching net-zero emissions in the built environment.  Naturally, design and building materials are bedrock to achieving that goal. And so, in 2018, the AIA introduced the Architecture & Design (A&D) Materials Pledge and formally adopted it in 2020. Since then, more tha...

Responsible material selection and procurement is keystone to lowering the environmental impact of the built environment and improving occupant health over the entire life cycle of the building.  In recognizing this, most green building certifying bodies are continuously evaluating how to rate and measure materials, and how to reward projects for prioritizing the use of those that are multi-attrib...

The badlands of North Dakota, much like a library, are rich with story. The layers of mineral deposits visible in the buttes and hoodoos that make up the region are like raconteurs of the ancient inland seas, floodplains and volcanic ash that once covered the area 28 to 75 million years ago. But while the badlands are now cherished for their beauty and history, they were given that name long ago f...

Can buildings be circular systems? Unlocking overlooked opportunity If we were to think of buildings as living beings, how might that change the way we approach their design? Rather than thinking of them as static objects, they might become dynamic, responsive and adaptive systems––designed to continuously evolve and regenerate. They might have metabolisms in which their resources are reused in a...

Are we too quick to turn to technology and novelty to solve today's most pressing challenges? Perhaps history and nature hold the answers to modern-day dilemmas––particularly those related to environmental degradation.  That is the stance architect, past AIA president and now author, Carl Elefante takes. Though he's been preaching that message for more than a decade now, he didn't begin his archit...

We need forests. They're the lungs of the earth. They're also home to more plants and animals than any other terrestrial biome. They protect watersheds and mitigate flooding. Provide us humans with recreation, inspiration and well-being. And, of course, they contain vast amounts of carbon and the ability to draw down much of the carbon currently in the atmosphere.  And it's because of this carbon-...

Andrew Ellsworth seems to have an incessant appetite for risk. But dig a little deeper and you see that that appetite is fueled by a profound desire to drive the positive changes that will support environmental health. And he's using the built environment as the entry point to create that change. In addition to launching Doors Unhinged, the first US company to reclaim and resell commercial door sy...

It's difficult to capture all that the multi-hyphenate Felix Heisel has achieved and created in the world of circular architecture in the past 15 years. Since graduating from architecture school in Germany, circular construction has been a central focus of his career.  He's authored numerous books and papers on the topic, created and now directs the Circular Construction Lab at Cornell University,...

In the structural engineering of buildings, concrete and steel are among the most widely used materials. Concrete is actually the most abundant manufactured material on earth. But for all of the tremendous qualities these commonly used structural materials provide, they come with high environmental costs in the form of embodied carbon. And many structural engineers are starting to take note...and...

Michael Orbank began his career as an environmental field technician, sampling soil and water to better understand the implications of petroleum contamination. But through conversations with subcontractors while on various job sites, Michael began to see an alternative pathway that could position him to make a bigger impact in the world of sustainability. So, he went back to school, earned a maste...

The seemingly benign act of curiosity actually has a very bold undercurrent. It has the power to conquer fear, challenge the status quo, propel innovation, and cultivate solutions. Curiosity is what drove Albert Einstein to revolutionize modern physics, and Walt Disney to produce the first feature-length animated film, which forever changed the industry.  And curiosity is what has led interior des...