Gottfried Green- Green building and sustainable living in Southwest Fl.

April 22, 2008

Sticking to the Pink

While I am still being kept away from this blog taking care of other things, I couldn't stay away on Earth Day. My goal for the blog is to begin tracking my progress to get the house certified green by the Florida Green Building Coalition but family matters, a loan refinance and needing to buy a car keep things up in the air. I want to be grounded when I begin the process and have all this organizing and routine in place. SO hopefully next week I can begin the hard core credit crunching involved with the FGBC checklist. Being all over the place didn't stop me, however, from putting down FLOR tiles in little Miss Gottfried's room. I originally hated the shade of pink I picked for the walls (I still do) but I decided to make the best of it for now because there is just too much more to do overall. The tiles feels great to the touch and make her play area much more comfortable. My housemate in Brooklyn actually turned me onto FLOR when she used them in her place back in 2005. It couldn't be a better fit for the floors here in FL.

Labels: flooring, interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 12:36 PM 0 Comments

February 07, 2008

Rethink the pink

The only input little Miss Gottfried, who is 4, had on the project was that she have a pink room. I took this literally with no questions asked and somehow ended up with Barbie pink. She loves it of course because it is pink afterall but when you look down the hall or down the lanai there is a pink glow emanating from the room distracting from the otherwise natural vibe of the green surroundings. If I have time I am going to repaint before the floors are finished in that room this weekend. Maybe I can come up with a compromise where I can keep a little pink on the walls but turn it down overall.

Labels: interiors, paint

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 11:27 AM 2 Comments

January 24, 2008

Seeing white

After doing the stainless thing already in Brooklyn, we were a bit over the hard to keep clean stainless appliances and decided to full high gloss white with appliances and cabinets. The stainless would spot and would never come clean for us even with stainless cleaner. At least the white when dirty or smugged is smooth and we can use less harsh cleaners to give it back its shiny sheen. The white Bosch oven I think has a great look with its white buttons popping out of the black.

Labels: appliances, interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 10:30 PM 0 Comments

Paperstone

I finally found a company in Tampa that offered Paperstone and was able to deliver on short notice. Tampa is about an hour and a half from where we are. They were training someone new and so I was given 3 different price quotes and they tried to add on an extra shipping charge even though they already had the piece I wanted in stock. It was a 12'x5' slab of Obsidian and it arrived weighing 500 lbs. The retailer decided to forgo giving me all the details about the weight because I was already upset that the price quote went from 1600 to 2k. So instead of telling me all the details of just how heavy it really was, he decided to let me find out the hard way. A terribly run business with some sort of juvenile demeanor and I will find paperstone needs elsewhere. So once that was over a local fabricator my contractor knew was able to take the piece to his shop and them fabricate it for our needs. We love the material. It is basically compressed paper and resin. It has a great look and even better feel- somewhat like soapstone.

Labels: countertops, interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 10:19 PM 0 Comments

January 14, 2008

Bamboo floors

I just ordered the flooring today. I really did look into all the affordable green options but in the end we really like the bamboo and feel that the interior needs a floor to anchor all the open space. Plus the decking will be dark and so the indoor to outdoor might flow better together. The darker bamboo sample I found online at Eco-Friendly Flooring. The lighter smaller bamboo was from Home Depot. I was shopping for price and color. Both of these came in at $4 sf but the one from ecofriendlyflooring.com had the darker color we liked. This was going to be an expense for after we moved in and caught up on cash but as with anything in building it is less of a hassle to have the flooring in now for when we move in our things. there is some criticism of bamboo as not being green. I pick my battles with the budget and resources we have available but we really think in this subtropical vibe down here the "wood floor" look still works. We'll shall know for sure soon enough.

Labels: cost, flooring, interiors

Link
posted by Mrs Gottfried at 8:15 PM 0 Comments

A 360 view of hall and pantry

Labels: interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 7:44 PM 0 Comments

Interior painting

The pace has picked up for us as the final things are awaiting there place. Much of putting things in place requires the painting be completed. We painted over the weekend using an interior paint from Scott Paint's EcoCare line. We are painting everything white to keep it simple. Since we are doing the painting ourselves it adds to the pressure of timing but so far we should be able to keep up.

Labels: interiors, paint

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 7:09 PM 0 Comments

January 07, 2008

Kitchen Cabinets

Before the painting begins, we set up the cabinets to make sure they fit. We did opt for Ikea cabinets mostly based on price and look. They will be high gloss white fronts which we hope give the kitchen a clean open look.

Labels: interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 2:28 PM 0 Comments

December 13, 2007

Interior kitchen walls

No not really. With a bit of nostalgia for nyc I posted this picture of a newly discovered graffiti wall with drawings by original graffiti subway artists Fab Five Freddy, Futura 2000 and some traces by Jean-Michel Basquiat. Ironically, it was discovered on a building that is set to be turned into luxury condos. It looks like there is a spot for the dishwasher right there in the center.

Labels: interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 9:18 AM 0 Comments

December 09, 2007

More 360 interior

We have the windows in and the framing in place.

Labels: interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 3:35 PM 0 Comments

December 01, 2007

Gottfried 360

Labels: floorplan, interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 4:18 PM 0 Comments

Inside the box

Here is the view from the southwest corner of the house looking across what will be the deck and then back into the ac space through the openings where the glass doors will go.

Or you can walk through this door from the same space to enter the main space.

Labels: building envelopes, interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 3:29 PM 0 Comments

October 22, 2007

U of MD's LEAFHouse-

I was hoping in the future to have a green wall vs. the green roofs.. University of MD won 2nd place in the 2007 Solar Decathalon. If I could have their LEAFHouse- shipped here and put on our lot I'd be happy to move in. They explain everything they've used and done on their website so I'll have a reference for all the details. They use their exterior green wall for rainwater mitigation. "In typical housing developments, water from rooftops and paving is allowed to run offsite; storm sewers must be constructed to carry the water to the nearest body of water, carrying with it all the contaminants it picks up along the way. The LEAFHouse includes a rainwater management system that minimizes run-off and the associated environmental impacts.

Rainwater collection at LEAFHouse is a multi-layered system. At the roof level, downspouts collect rainwater that, at the post-competition site of LEAFHouse, will be directed to a cistern from which the water will be used for garden irrigation. The Green Wall will likewise act as its own downspout, directing water from the roof down to a rain garden. Finally, our decks are equipped to catch the rainwater that passes through them and direct it to a cistern for on-site non-potable uses (irrigation, car-washing, etc.)."

Labels: building envelopes, design, interiors, materials, water

Link
posted by Mrs Gottfried at 12:19 PM 0 Comments

October 19, 2007

mkLotus^TM Bathroom

I couldn't find a picture on her website of the bathroom but the bedroom looks almost exactly like ours will look with the high windows over our bed.

Eco-Friendly Bathroom Features:
- FSC certified wood cabinetry
"Not sure we'll be using cabinetry in the bathroom."

- Floor and wall tiles contain 55% recycled glass
"I think this is going to be Home Depot small, hexagon white tile on the floor. The recycled glass can be pricey."

- Eco-friendly plumbing fixtures, low-flow shower head, mixer, and dual-flush toilet by Kohler
"Yes."

- LED lighting
"Yes."

Labels: cost, interiors, materials, prefab

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 12:21 PM 0 Comments

mkLotus^TM Kitchen

Eco-Friendly Kitchen Features:
- FSC certified wood cabinetry
"We're doing Ikea so it is what it is."

- Fly ash concrete, rice hull, and recycled porcelain aggregates countertops
"Looking into recycled counters of some sort but haven't decided which one."

- Eco-friendly/low-flow plumbing fixtures by Kohler
"Yes."

- LED lighting
"Yes."

- EnergyStar appliances
"Yes."

Labels: cost, interiors, materials, prefab

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 12:16 PM 0 Comments

mkLotus^TM Interiors

Interior:

- Sustainable layout for maximum cross ventilation and natural lighting
"We tried our best here but we think we pulled it off."

- No-VOC paint
"Yes."

- Interior sliding door panels comprised of 40% post-industrial reclaimed material
"Tough one but we'll see what's out there."

Labels: cost, interiors, materials, prefab

Link
posted by Mrs Gottfried at 12:10 PM 0 Comments

July 31, 2007

Refrigerator box

Our contractor said our house looked like a refrigerator box. I can see where he is coming from. I mentioned that we had considered the container house (here's one someone built in Canada) so this wasn't a far stretch. We placed high operable windows along the bathrooms and kitchen because we are hoping the breeze coming through the glass doors openings along the waterfront will help circulate the hot air through the house and up out of those windows.

Labels: design, floorplan, interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 11:49 AM 0 Comments

Some doll house views

The BHG software I've been playing with offers furnishing options to place in the rooms. You can control the measurement exactly of your furniture and make sure everything fits. I've done a few rooms specifically but we don't have a lot of stuff and if we do we'll donate it. One of the things we want to accomplish overall, is to clean house and live with less. I know the bedrooms seems tight but they do open up to the outdoor space as well. We had a revelation that we never spend anytime in our bedrooms except to sleep and change our clothes. So we devoted more sq footage to the areas where we spend most of our time.

Labels: design, floorplan, interiors

posted by Mrs Gottfried at 11:38 AM 0 Comments

June 13, 2006

Mid-Century Modern in Miami still makes sense

I have a lot of catching up to do with past articles I still need to post. I found this link on www.organicarchitect.com about a mid-century modern house designed by Chuck Reed Jr. that still exists in Miami. ''It gives me a sense of time and place,'' says James String, 76, a land surveyor who, with his first wife Lydia, hired Reed to design the home. ``It belongs. I thought when it was built that my neighbors would see it and want to build more like it, but then the builders came with their stock plans and that was that. Maybe I'm not being modest to say it's a work of art. I am liking the bare cement walls. One of the options we'll be looking at even in light of the new wall systems available in hurricane zones.