Say “green home,” and most people will think of a beautiful, contemporary structure in the midst of a pristine, unspoiled landscape. Where did this image come from? You certainly don’t need acres of open space to create a green home.
AT On... The Aesthetic of Green
Still, it’s a powerful aesthetic: many images of green homes, including those we’ve taken ourselves and published here at Re-nest, feature a verdant, expansive setting. (That, or the photos are taken in such a way that you can’t see the neighbors 10 feet away; we’re certainly guilty of that!)
Either way, we’re wondering if the Garden of Eden imagery is hurting the cause. We can see people in a more typical urban or suburban environment thinking that their house couldn’t possibly be green, simply because it’s not surrounded by green.
There’s a long tradition of the garden aesthetic in architectural Modernism. Self-named French architect Le Corbusier made famous pronouncements about “the machine in the garden.” And now, we see green houses set in an idyllic swath of green, ringed with forest, no neighbors in sight.
It might be that all this dallying in the garden is leading us astray: some argue that a return to densely populated cities is the only way the world’s population can live sustainably. Others argue that our dispersed suburbs are the perfect landscape for a solar energy economy, with plenty of space for PV panels on each roof.
Is your green dream home in the city, the country, or somewhere in between?
image of Kelly Woodford house (Oregon) via JetsonGreen
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What I want is my own house, retrofitted at a cost I can afford. That's my dream.
view Eucritta's profile
my green dream is simply the honest use of the term... there was an interesting story in the SF-chronicle today and it made me realize that the pages given to "green" homes that are 4000 square-feet and well-beyond the economic reach of even the upper-middle-class are hurting the cause more than anything else. first, the spirit of "green" should not be about LEEDs point, but about a mentality of living within means... and not the means of your bank account but within the means of the planet. sure, you might be able to afford a mcmansion and a golf-course-quality lawn, but can the earth afford it? should we be putting you on a pedestal because your greener-than-the-neighbors mcmansion uses imported bamboo floors? secondly, past this glamor-home-mentality, using "green" in this manner erodes the term -- and the concept. perhaps we need a few different terms to distinguish "better than the alternative" from "what we should all be striving for". tacking the word "green" on products from clorox or mcmansions with solar panels is essentially greenwashing and satiating this carbon-guilt that does not deserve to be satiated. the media's telling us if we buy this or that with "green" on the label that we're saving the planet... nothing could be further from the truth. we'll have used 2 billion years worth of fossil fuels in less than 2 centuries of our industrialized society. buying cucumber-scented cleaner in a HDPE bottle isn't going to change that... should we stop trying? should we not take baby steps? of course not. we need to do all we can... but we can't think that the HGTV-version of a "green" lifestyle will get you into eco-heaven... if there even is one.
view redneckmodern's profile