I doubt that I need to explain why The Right Cottage should be a “Green” project. I think everyone is on board with the goal of lessening our impact on Mother Earth, and I’m sure we’ve all heard and read umpteen ways to save our planet through sustainable building practices.
The trick here is to marry the concept of sustainable design and building methods with the affordability factor. This is turning out to be quite a challenge actually. “Affordable” and “Green” do not naturally go hand-in-hand. It’s definitely do-able, but it’s taking great restraint to not specify the most exciting (and sometimes amazingly costly) green products out there.
I cannot even begin to tell you all the awesome products I have researched for this project and other projects in the past. Unfortunately what I often find is that the really cool products with the Oh-S0-Green label are considerably more expensive than their less Earth-friendly counterparts.
Yes, sometimes the products are offering energy savings and operating cost savings that will pay for themselves in the not-so-distant future. The use of these items are easy to justify because we know they are going to pay for themselves.
The problem (from a financial perspective) comes with the items that don’t offer any long term cost-saving benefits – even though they certainly offer planet-saving benefits. Unfortunately, many people simply do not have the financial luxury of spending twice, three, four…times more for these items than they have to. I’m talking about various flooring, wall covering, tile, solid surfacing materials (for counter tops and such), cabinetry components – the list goes on and on.
There are some really amazing products out there, and I am in the midst of determining which ones are affordable enough to incorporate into The Right Cottage. But rest assured, we will find the right balance between “Green” and “Affordable”.
Stay tuned for the final results!
– Connie Allegra, ASID
TravelBug Architecture & Design 