Unison Networks’ Windsor Substation proves the possible—Petal Certification for landscape and infrastructure projects.

Living Building and Petal Certification are often sought by environmental centers and office buildings, but the program is organized for a wide range of building and project types— including industrial and infrastructure buildings and landscapes. Last fall, the New Zealand energy company Unison announced that its Windsor Substation switchroom had become the world’s first landscape and infrastructure project to receive Living Building Challenge 4.0 Petal Certification through the International Living Future Institute. 

The substation is a new structure on an existing substation site in Hastings, New Zealand, that originally targeted Core certification but achieved the Energy Petal. The project forms a new blueprint for sustainable modular design and construction of future substations on Unison’s electricity distribution network that extends to the regions of Hawkes Bay, Rotorua, and Taupō in New Zealand’s North Island. In early 2023, when the region suffered a major cyclone, the substation stayed up and running to provide its community with power during the storm. It was designed and built to reduce its carbon footprint and utilize eco-friendly materials. It harvests its own electricity and captures and stores water.

“We knew we needed to do an upgrade, and we were looking for ways that would be low cost, modular, and sustainable,” said Jason Hartley, Risk Advisor with Unison. “We looked at a range of certification systems and became interested in the Living Building approach, which seemed ambitious and holistic.” 

Aryero Kothroulas, Group Risk and Sustainability Manager with Unison, explained: “A substation is an important building for our business but also for our community. It is critical for resilience. We wanted to show what was possible with this typology. We wanted to create something that can withstand earthquakes, is beautiful, and gives back to the community.”

When Unison engaged Tricia Love Consultants and architect Charissa Snijders, the Living Building framework idea went into high gear. The team started with the idea of aiming for Zero Energy, but soon, the momentum of what was possible grew. “We decided that we could go further,” said Hartley. “We decided to push for Petal certification. We found that the structure of the [LBC] challenge was such that it helped us continue to push the boundaries.” 

We decided to push for Petal certification. We found that the structure of the [LBC] challenge was such that it helped us continue to push the boundaries. 

It was a first, however, for a small utility building — a piece of energy infrastructure — to go through the Living Building process. It was completely new for the team and the standard. “New things can be hard,” said Kothroulas. “Change is often met with some resistance, and we introduced a modular design along with new approaches to energy, water, and materials. The whole team had to help stakeholders and suppliers understand what we were doing, but once they could see what was possible, they got on board because they could see how we could provide more benefits to more people. We could see the project ripple throughout the supplier network and the community.” 

Concrete block construction was the norm for this building type. The team’s desire to use cross-laminated timber (CLT) instead of concrete and other materials presented some specific challenges in procuring FSC wood for their remote region and finding a resin coat that met safety standards and was not on the Red List and contributed to the small embodied carbon footprint that the team was targeting. When they sourced the CLT, no CLT was being produced in New Zealand (they got theirs from Australia), but that has since changed. 

“We began to understand our little project as something that could make a shift in the market,” Kothroulas said. “We have released the design of the building publicly. We want people to understand what we did and how we did it.” The company has had many people touring the project for an up-close look, too. “We are incredibly proud to have shown proof of concept and helped build a market.” And the transformation is not just within the industry and the trades: The Community Day tour and information event was well attended, opening pathways for how members of the public understands buildings and infrastructure in their neighborhoods. 

The ripple effects at Unison are quite evident: The team is already working on other substations and applying what they learned about modular construction, resilience, waste, energy, CLT, and making sure that the designs are supportive to the community. And procurement policies at Unison have shifted, too – these now include specifying FSC wood for power poles, for example. “Achieving Petal Certification opened our eyes and has made us strive even harder for sustainability,” said Hartley.

“Achieving Petal Certification opened our eyes and has made us strive even harder for sustainability,” said Hartley.

For more details about this project and the team, see the ILFI Case Study. You can register to download the blueprints for the project here on the Unison website.

Cover photo courtesy Unison Networks.

Your donation supports community impact

Do you want to be part of making lasting change? Around the world, there is a community of people working towards a living future every day. In ways great and small, they are changing minds, overcoming obstacles, and bringing ambitious projects to life. Individually, they cause ripples that show what’s possible. Collectively, they envision the regenerative future that we all want. Will you join us in this transformative work? Your donation to the International Living Future Institute equips us to assist this community with programs, technical support, events,  education, and more.  Your donation will help us realize the possible together.

Semans-Griswold Environmental Hall, Photo credit: ©Tom Holdsworth

ILFI celebrates 5 new certified projects this quarter including the 34th Living Building and the first Core certified project! 

• Class Of 1966 Environmental Center At Williams College, Williamstown, MA – Living Certified 
• Semans-Griswold Environmental Hall, Chestertown, MD – Petal Certified (Energy)
• The Living Homes on Mill Creek, Moab, UT – Petal Certified (Energy, Water)
• 1042Highland, Oak Park, IL – Zero Energy Certified
• Muhlenberg College Fahy Commons, Allentown, PA – Core Certified

Another three projects have achieved Ready Designation by completing the Ready Audit after construction. These projects will undergo a Final Audit after a 12-month performance period:

• Microsoft SV Campus, Mountain View, CA – Petal Ready
• Oak Park Community Recreation Center, Oak Park, IL – Zero Energy Ready
• SERA Portland Office, Portland, OR – Zero Carbon Ready

To learn about these projects, we invite you to check out our Project Map and Case Studies. Additionally, if you would like to follow in the footsteps of these certified projects, we encourage you to visit our Project Registration page or email sales@living-future.org to learn more about how to register a project. 

Cover Photo: Carmen Villegas Apartments. Image courtesy of Magnusson Architecture and Planning

Editor’s note: Join us for the Affordable Housing Lunch Meet-up at Living Future 2024 on Wednesday, May 8! This event will take place on site at the conference venue during Wednesday’s lunch break and will be an opportunity to socialize, network, and connect with fellow affordable housing professionals, designers, and advocates, as well as ILFI staff supporting ILFI’s affordable housing work. RSVP here. We hope to see you in Atlanta!

The International Living Future Institute (ILFI) is thrilled to announce the launch of our newest affordable housing cohort, with seven affordable housing projects pursuing the Living Building Challenge, Core Green Building, and Zero Carbon certifications! These projects will join a supportive peer engagement network of other ILFI Affordable Housing cohort members receiving dedicated access to additional information, resources, technical assistance, and opportunities for peer-to-peer exchange of knowledge around achieving the world’s most ambitious green building standards.

ILFI’s Affordable Housing Program is premised on the belief that everyone deserves to live in healthy, resilient, and regenerative buildings. Over the last decade, ILFI has demonstrated this commitment by providing dedicated support to affordable housing projects and creating a hub where project teams can support each other, celebrate successes, build on lessons learned, and inform the development of valuable resources such as the Living Building Challenge Framework for Affordable Housing, the Materials List for Affordable Housing, and the Best Practices Guide for Red List Free Affordable Housing. 

The central goal of the Program is to demonstrate that Living Affordable Housing is possible. With the launch of this newest cohort, there are now 62 affordable housing projects in 28 states pursuing certification under ILFI’s programs. ILFI strives to build on the innovative work of these projects to scale impact and cultivate success for future project teams. Through the Affordable Housing Program, ILFI creates resources and empowers advocates so that each project moves the entire affordable housing sector further towards a future that is socially just, culturally rich, and ecologically restorative. 

Through June 2026, the new cohort will meet quarterly to dive into specific topics such as healthy materials, carbon, and water, and participate in office hours with our team of project coaches to check in on their progress, discuss barriers, and collaborate on solutions. In addition to this, project teams will have access to mentorship opportunities with members of previous affordable housing cohorts who have generously agreed to share their knowledge and experience in pursuing ILFI programs. 

These seven new projects represent a diverse range of locations, scales, and building types. With the launch of this cohort, ILFI’s Affordable Housing Program includes projects in four new states and provinces – Hawaii, Iowa, Connecticut, and British Columbia. It also includes the Program’s first project in New York City,  its tallest one to date at 28 stories. In contrast, the smallest project in the cohort is a 1,000 square foot prototype home designed to be a replicable model for sustainably rebuilding a displaced island community.

The projects are being created by five developers, a government housing agency, and a religious organization, all of whom are committed to creating place-based, regenerative solutions for addressing the needs of their communities. In addition to providing housing for cost-burdened residents, several of the projects will also provide spaces dedicated to community services such as wrap-around support and healthcare facilities, community gathering spaces, and even an innovative food hall aimed at promoting local culture and expanding economic opportunities in its neighborhood.

Most of the projects in the cohort are pursuing Living Building or Core Green Building certification, citing the alignment of these holistic standards with the broad vision of sustainability embodied in their project goals. Notably, two projects have registered for Zero Carbon certification, signaling the growing importance of embodied carbon for affordable housing developers. Project teams are exploring a number of different carbon reduction strategies, such as using low-carbon structural materials like mass timber, prefabrication, and adaptive reuse.

Project Highlights

Rebuilding Lahaina with Living Buildings 

Regen Maui has set out to develop the first Living Building Challenge certified affordable home in Hawaii, to be replicated in rebuilding efforts for Lahaina, a town recovering from a devastating fire that destroyed over 2,000 homes in 2023. The project team envisions Living Buildings as a symbol of healing: through a participatory design process, the team intends to establish a shared sense of ownership as stakeholders come together to create a vision for rebuilding their community. In a state with some of the highest housing and utility costs in the nation, rebuilding with resilient, sustainable homes that harness the renewable power of the sun and the healing power of nature through biophilic design will lead the way to a regenerative future for Maui.

The design team is led by Rothschild Doyno Collaborative, who has participated in ILFI’s Affordable Housing Program previously through their work with Hazelwood Community Land Trust, an affordable housing project in Pittsburgh, PA that is currently in construction and on track to achieve Core certification. As in the Hazelwood project, the team is also exploring prefabrication in Lahaina and hopes to lay the groundwork for a future manufacturing facility to build capacity for local builders and designers rooted in Hawaii.

Chilliwack Housing Project

The Chilliwack Housing Project in British Columbia, Canada will include 40 units of supportive housing for vulnerable populations and 20 units of second-stage (or transitional) housing for women at risk of domestic violence. Developed by BC Housing, working with StudioHuB Architects and the Ann Davis Transition Society, the project will provide spaces for in-house support services and incorporate culturally sensitive, trauma-informed design with a strong emphasis on Ecology of Place. Located in a community with a large indigenous population, the design team has engaged with local indigenous groups and elders to collaboratively develop a facade design inspired by Stό:lō weavings that reflect the ‘wrap-around’ support offered to the building’s residents.

The project is currently targeting Core Green Building certification. 

“The form of the proposal is based around the symbol of a woman and child being wrapped in a protective, loving blanket. At the center of the building is an open-air courtyard, symbolizing a sheltering womb, where residents are able to connect to nature and are given a chance to grow and rebuild in a place of love, understanding, and wisdom.”

-Sarah Bjornson, studioHuB Architects

Carmen Villegas Apartments 

Named after a prominent local activist, the Carmen Villegas Apartments (CVA) is a 28-story, 211-unit senior housing development that will offer affordable studio and 1-bedroom units in East Harlem, New York City. With the goal of creating a “high-profile testament to the vibrancy of the neighborhood, and an enduring space of support for those who have spurred the area’s vitality for so long,” the building will also contain ground-floor retail spaces and community facilities for LGBTQ+ seniors in East Harlem. Led by Magnusson Architecture and Planning and developed as a joint venture between the Ascendant Neighborhood Development Association, Urban Builders Collaborative, and Xylem Projects, CVA is targeting Zero Carbon certification while also integrating other LBC-inspired strategies. This high-density project is an excellent opportunity to apply Living Building Challenge principles at scale, with healthy materials and a healthy indoor environment of particular importance given the building’s senior population.

Saint Mark’s Affordable Housing 

Saint Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral is collaborating with Atelier Jones to develop a 115,000 square foot multi-generational affordable housing community on its centrally-located campus in Seattle, Washington. The project is a testament to the religious organization’s commitment to both social equity and environmental stewardship, aligning well with its current initiatives to support the unhoused and its goal to have a carbon-neutral campus by 2030. While the Core Green Building certification best reflects the project team’s holistic approach to sustainability, they are also particularly interested in reducing embodied carbon. In addition to leveraging Atelier Jones’ many years of experience in advancing the adoption of mass timber in the US, the team is also investigating the feasibility of adaptive reuse for the historic St. Nicholas School building on the project site as a potentially significant carbon reduction strategy.

Star Lofts 

Star Lofts is a 20-unit mixed-use development offering affordable rental apartments for households making between 30% and 80% of the area median income in Des Moines, Iowa. Led by Cutler Development, it will include commercial spaces on the ground floor and set aside a number of units for vulnerable populations who will have access to supportive services provided by operations partner Anawin Housing. The project is halfway through construction as of March 2024 and is anticipated to be the first Zero Carbon certified building in Iowa, with a 28% reduction in embodied carbon. 

Townhall Apartments and Food Hall

Also located in Des Moines, the Townhall Apartments and Food Hall is being developed by Ntontan Real Estate and Newbury Living to help activate and showcase the vibrancy of the River Bend Neighborhood, one of the most diverse neighborhoods in Iowa. The 33-unit, 30,000 square foot building will feature an innovative food hall and community gathering space that will foster neighborhood cohesion, celebrate local culinary heritage, and empower small businesses by connecting them with local consumers. The project team recently won the Iowa Finance Authority’s inaugural Housing Innovation Competition, and they are committed to scaling their impact by pursuing Core certification.

Church Street Commons 

The Church Street Commons is a 52-unit mixed-income development that aims to address the lack of affordable, multi-family housing in the rural community of Hebron, Connecticut. The project is being developed by the Commons Community Development Corporation, with Dorgan Architecture and Planning leading the design team. Through a long-term lease of a portion of a 33-acre church campus in downtown Hebron, the project will include a combination of new construction and the adaptive reuse of an existing historic building on the property. The Church Street Commons project team is currently pursuing Zero Energy certification.

You can read more about ILFI’s Affordable Housing Program and the other projects we support on our website. 

Inspired by these stories and want to join them? ILFI still has space for a few projects in the 2023-2026 Affordable Housing Cohort! For more information, please reach out to affordablehousing@living-future.com.  

Monmade Supports Product Pipelines

In almost every sector and industry, especially as they are undergoing change, gaps in the flow are revealed. Monmade, a network of small manufacturers and makers in Pittsburgh and the surrounding area, is an example of an organization that sprang to life to fill such a gap—to become the connective tissue in the material flows that are crucial to the built environment community. Monmade cultivates a network of artisan makers and small manufacturers who produce furniture, fittings, and other products that are designed and made with sustainability and equity in mind—and fueling the local and regional economies. 

According to Monmade’s Director, Katie Schaible, “Monmade is a consultancy for developers and architects. We help elevate their work by sourcing things that are made in an equitable and sustainable way. There is tremendous demand for these goods, but owners and design teams don’t have time to seek them out one item at a time. That’s where we come in. We go beyond what furniture dealers would supply. We have a tremendously rich network of businesses, artisans, and makers.”

“Monmade is a consultancy for developers and architects. We help elevate their work by sourcing things that are made in an equitable and sustainable way.”

Monmade began with a vision to create a regional marketplace that activated a network of craft businesses producing products that add value to new building projects. Monmade grew out of emerging trends in real estate development, workforce development, revenue-generating potential of modern manufacturing, and an increased consumer desire for transparency in production. “We bring artisan design to market and support regionally sourced, responsibly made, and environmentally conscious products for design and development projects,” Schaible says. “We believe that when creative businesses contribute to transformative design projects, their businesses expand and help diversify the regional economy.”

Monmade specializes in custom design solutions from our network of artisan producers. We offer planning, procurement, and integration services to help architects and developers maximize impact and minimize the challenges of working with a variety of specialized small businesses. This is nourishing the pipeline of makers, and even nourishing their communities, too: “many of the makers in our network operate studios in low-to-moderate-income neighborhoods,” Schaible explains, “which is helping them to revitalize organically.” 

Working closely with ILFI over the past several years, Schaible and her team have helped nurture a number of Declare labels. The most recent batch these came through Monmade’s Green Leap program. A cohort of maker businesses joined the program to learn how to make sustainable business decisions and how to tell those stories. “We are thrilled that ILFI has a desire to help make the Declare label process more applicable to small manufacturers,” says Schaible. “We hope the collaboration will continue.” The four Declare labels that came from this program are: Steel Plant Holder by Safran Everyday, Hardware Collection by Tenderwerks, Acrylic Light Lines Shade by Jessica Alpern Brown, and Reilluminate Pendant Glass Shade by Spacapan. These products will be used in the affordable housing project (learn more here and here) in Pittsburgh’s Hazelwood neighborhood by Rothschild Doyno Collaborative for the City of Bridges Community Land Trust. 

“We believe that when creative businesses contribute to transformative design projects, their businesses expand and help diversify the regional economy.”

ILFI’s Materials team supported Monmade’s cohort of businesses to teach them about the Declare process, collect ingredient data, input and submit for approval via Toxnot, and finalized Declare labels in time for an exhibit last year featuring Monmade’s Green Leap collection of products. “It takes some time to ramp up companies on new processes,” Schaible says. “There is a learning curve on synthesizing the information and translating things into viable applications for Declare labels. Partnering with ILFI has been critical as we bring these businesses into the mindset of transparency and clarity around their environmental and social practices.” ILFI is also supporting artisans through the renew process this year. This recent work, building on the ongoing collaboration between Monmade and ILFI, continues this year through support from The Heinz Endowments. 

The Heinz Endowments seeks to help our region thrive as a whole and just community and, through that work, to model solutions to major national and global challenges. The foundation is devoted to advancing its vision of southwestern Pennsylvania as a vibrant center of creativity, learning, and social, economic, and environmental sustainability. Its work is supported by reliable data based on equitable, results-focused goals to cultivate a world where all are treated with fairness and respect and have the opportunity to reach their fullest potential. 

Cover photo courtesy of Monmade.

Your donation supports community impact

Do you want to be part of making lasting change? Around the world, there is a community of people working towards a living future every day. In ways great and small, they are changing minds, overcoming obstacles, and bringing ambitious projects to life. Individually, they cause ripples that show what’s possible. Collectively, they envision the regenerative future that we all want. Will you join us in this transformative work? Your donation to the International Living Future Institute equips us to assist this community with programs, technical support, events,  education, and more.  Your donation will help us realize the possible together.

DONATE NOW

Do you remember the first time you entered a building and it changed you? Perhaps it was a building that brought on a sense of awe. Perhaps it was intimidating. Perhaps it looked and felt and smelled like something you’d never experienced before. 

I have come to understand that buildings change us in many ways. Buildings teach us things, both tacitly and actively. When I was 18 years old, I became one of the first students of a trailblazing building on my campus. I went to Oberlin College in Ohio; I went to study this building. The Adam Joseph Lewis Center opened the year I started college, and it was an unprecedented experiment at that time. Built to produce more clean energy than it needs, to clean all of its own wastewater through an elaborate constructed wetland called a Living Machine, and to touch the earth lightly. Indeed, it was built to give back more than it took. It was the brainchild of my mentor and advisor, Dr. David Orr, an environmental educator and writer who was determined to prove that the act of design and construction could serve as its own pedagogy. He wrote an essay describing his intentions for the project in 1993, Architecture as Pedagogy: 

The process of design and construction is an opportunity for a community to deliberate about the ideas and ideals it wishes to express and how these are rendered into architectural form. What do we want our buildings to say about us? What will they say about our ecological prospects? To what large issues and causes do they direct our attention? What problems do they resolve? What kind of human relationships do they encourage? These are not technical details, but first and foremost issues of common concern that should be decided by the entire campus community. When they are so decided, the design of buildings fosters civic competence and extends the idea of citizenship. …. 

These questions cannot be answered without engaging issues of ethics. How are building materials extracted, processed, manufactured, and transported? What ecological and human costs to various materials impose where and on whom? What in our ethical theories justifies the use of materials that degrade ecosystems, jeopardize other species, or risk human lives and health? Where those costs are deemed unavoidable to accomplish a larger good, how can we balance ethical accounts?

These questions were raised at Oberlin for the building that would rise on campus in the years to come, as Orr worked with the design team from William McDonough + Partners on the design and realization of the project.

The Lewis Center is now a profound learning experience for thousands of people and generations of students who learn and engage with the building. It is a lesson in what we are capable of, how we can live in balance with our communities, our ecological resources, and how that has incredibly positive impacts on our health, our learning, and our relationships with each other. It is a teacher who will never retire, it is a book in the physical “public library” of a campus landscape. Just walking into the building and learning how it works shows the visitor that a regenerative future is possible, and indeed, it is here in this small space in this particular community, because they made it so. Today, the Lewis Center is a grandmother of a family tree of buildings that have emerged all over the world that are teaching similar lessons. 

The Lewis Center was completed before the Living Building Challenge was launched. At its heart, the Living Building Challenge and all the programs in its orbit are driven by the idea that every building has the potential to be a dynamic hub of learning — for its users, owner, stakeholders, community, design and construction team, and others. Each building can teach us how to use less energy to heat and cool our buildings, how to use non-toxic materials to build, and how to landscape without potable water. But it can also teach us about how to live in balance with the world around us, it can teach us about native plants and animals, and ecosystems. It can teach us how to care for each other just through the act of buying and making things. It can teach us that our opinions matter, that our values matter, and that we have a hand and a responsibility in the infrastructure around us.

To learn more about the Living Village project, join our next Living Future Member webinar on April 2nd.

This piece was adapted from a talk that Lindsay Baker delivered at Yale University’s Divinity School in 2023. The School is engaged in a Living Village project. 

Cover photo: © Barney Taxel, courtesy William McDonough + Partners.

The Living Future Conference’s Journey from Humble Beginnings to Critical Hub for the Regenerative Movement

In 2007, a pivotal moment marked the inception of a transformative journey with the launch of the Living Future unConference. With a modest assembly of around 100 attendees, this event illuminated a path for those fervently committed to green building and design. It served as a rallying point for practitioners, students, and architects, united under a shared cause: Moving beyond incremental improvement in sustainable design to boldly ask “What does good look like?” and pushing the industry towards net positive performance.

Fast forward to our 18th year, and the Living Future Conference now proudly stands as the International Living Future Institute’s (ILFI) flagship event. It has metamorphosed into the preeminent gathering for regenerative design professionals, positioned at the forefront of climate action, health, and equity in the built environment. Attendees are drawn not only for the cutting-edge technical expertise embedded in the sessions but, more significantly, for the lifelong connections forged—a catalyst for transformative change in the built world.

Inspiring Voices, Bold Visions

Year after year, the Living Future Conference becomes a magnet for global leaders and visionary voices emerging from the environmental and justice movements. Past conferences have featured luminaries such as Paul Hawken, Pliny Fisk, Majora Carter, Naomi Klein, Bill McKibben, and Janine Benyus. These leaders have brought forth the critical questions, ethos, vision, and calls to action for the holistic vision of a LIving Future that encompasses climate, health, and equity for all.

The Urgency of Our Mission and Movement

We are acutely aware of the threats posed by the continued warming of our planet and the rapid degradation of our natural environment due to fossil fuel consumption. Now, more than ever, the Living Future Conference is not just relevant but essential. Fortunately, our fundamental belief remains unshaken: we hold the solution. Our goals remain as they always have been — to provide a platform for learning from this community, forging deep connections, and catalyzing bold, visionary transformations in the built environment.

The Living Future Community is unlike any other. It comprises practitioners, nonprofits, educators, developers, manufacturers, builders, architects, sustainability professionals, artists, and individuals from diverse industries. All are united by a common purpose: a deep commitment to sustainable practices and a shared vision of creating transformative and scalable impact. The Living Future Community has made excellent progress on adopting regenerative practices as seen in the increase of both registered and certified projects within Living Future building programs. We have witnessed exciting growth in materials transparency labeling through the Declare program as well as a growth in Just organizations as well. This community comes together not only for the much needed inspiration, but to take the critical action needed now.

Now drawing ~1000 attendees per year representing over 300 leading and emerging change making organizations in the regenerative movement, one fundamental theme is apparent year over year: 

Convening together to celebrate the advances in the movement and gaining new connections, inspirations, and insights to face the challenges of tomorrow is critical to sustaining and scaling the impact of the regenerative movement.

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) has had a very long relationship with the International Living Future Institute. This is not surprising, because the missions of both organizations are aligned. To understand how ILFI and the Living Building Challenge have impacted CBF, we spoke with Mary Tod Winchester, who worked with CBF, first as a volunteer, and then on staff for more than 40 years before stepping down a few years ago. CBF has been focused, since its founding in 1967, on bringing together the community to address environmental issues and empowering the next generation of citizens through environmental education programs in the Chesapeake Bay.

Raising the Bar 

CBF has been manifesting its vision in its own facilities for years. Its first education center was a log cabin, built with donated logs. In the late 1990s, the team wanted to build a new headquarters, The Philip Merrill Environmental Center, opening in late 2000 and designed by SmithGroup, broke boundaries and proved a leading-edge example. In the years that followed, the organization continued to grow and learn. Its programs were expanding to the Hampton, Norfolk, and Virginia Beach area, and soon, the idea of a second environmental center in that area began to take shape. This eventually became the Brock Environmental Center, the home to the CBF’s lower Bay programs — education, outreach, advocacy, and restoration initiatives. The center is located in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where the Chesapeake Bay meets the Atlantic Ocean, an ecologically vital area to the Bay ecosystem. 

A New Paradigm

Winchester began to explore the Living Building Challenge program as CBF began to look at properties in the Virginia Beach area with their SmithGroup design team. Winchester also brought Jason McLennan, then leading ILFI, and Beth Heider, then with Skanska, CBF’s owner’s representative, to see the site. “That was the beginning of our relationship with ILFI,” Winchester says. “They were so helpful as we went through the entire process to design and build the facility [that would become the Brock Environmental Center]. We bought 10 acres, and sited the building back from water and up high for resilience. ILFI helped us realize that this is more than ‘reducing our impact on the environment’ it is about giving back. We harvest more green energy than we use, and this feeds into the grid.”

One Building’s Ripple Effect Potential

Winchester remembers Beth Heider talking about the idea of a pebble in a pond as the concept for how this building could have an immense ripple effect. “The Brock Environmental Center is our pebble in a pond. It has done more than any of us could have imagined at the time.” 

Winchester recalls that funders were inspired by the plan to create a facility that would be an icon — and have a resonating impact. “They all want to be a part of that,” she says. “ILFI was a big part of helping to create the vision.” The team included key champions such as Greg Mella, FAIA, of SmithGroup, and Tyler Park of Hourigan Construction. “We learned with Merrill before that when you are pushing boundaries, you need a team that really works well together,” she says, “and believes in the vision. Our board supported the notion that we would break a lot of boundaries. Will Baker was president at the time and he helped us keep asking ‘what if we did this’ — to keep pushing harder. We all knew that we wanted to create the best building we could, and we couldn’t have done this without ILFI. They were the backbone of the effort.” Testimony to the immense effort of the team, the Brock Environmental Center was fully certified under Living Building Challenge 2.0. It was, at completion, one of the only commercial buildings in the world to achieve Living Certification and create its own drinking water from rainwater.  

Facility as Teaching Tool

The building’s ripple effect is still in play. Winchester says that it’s not just individual visitors who learn and take away things that make a difference. “Until recently, we didn’t realize how many businesses and universities are using the Brock Center as an example of the leading edge.” CBF runs tours of the building and now the City of Virginia Beach has a classroom there for their Environmental Leadership Program for high school students. “We are thrilled that the facility itself has become a teaching tool,” she says. “And the building itself is performing better than we had imagined it could. It’s helping us all keep learning.”

Learn more from our Case Study and this Ecotone book, Brock Environmental Center for a Living Chesapeake. 

Cover photo: ©️ Prakash Patel

Your donation supports community impact

Do you want to be part of making lasting change? Around the world, there is a community of people working towards a living future every day. In ways great and small, they are changing minds, overcoming obstacles, and bringing ambitious projects to life. Individually, they cause ripples that show what’s possible. Collectively, they envision the regenerative future that we all want. Will you join us in this transformative work? Your donation to the International Living Future Institute equips us to assist this community with programs, technical support, events,  education, and more.  Your donation will help us realize the possible together.

Each year, the Living Future Conference serves as a dynamic hub where key leaders, change-makers, and advocates in the regenerative movement converge. Beyond celebrating achievements, the conference becomes a forward-looking platform, anticipating future challenges. It’s a space where we not only share critical questions, new insights, and innovative tools but also engage in collaborative learning that empowers us to take impactful action from the very next Monday morning. The collective discourse fostered at the Living Future Conference serves as a wellspring of inspiration and compels us throughout the year as we continue tackling the big challenges we face at the intersection of climate, health, and equity. 

The key collective questions we are asking at LF24 are:

How are we revolutionizing climate action?

How do we design and manufacture at the nexus of human and ecological health?

What are the key issues to illuminate for designing an equitable future?

In the spirit of continuous innovation, this year’s conference introduces a new element to further elevate our critical collective discourse in the regenerative movement: FutureFlow. FutureFlow injects a burst of dynamism into the mainstage by featuring inspiring leaders in a concise presentation format that centers on delivering key messages on climate, health, and equity through compelling storytelling. As we anticipate the upcoming Living Future Conference in Atlanta in May 2024, here’s a glimpse of what we eagerly look forward to experiencing together.

FutureFlow
Biogenic Materials x Generative Justice

Mae-ling Lokko
Yale University

From plant fibers to peat, cellulose to lignin, fungi to carbon-neutral concrete– the use of a broad renewable material ecology from the field is becoming the feedstock of the 21st century materials revolution. On one hand, the design of renewable material streams are framed within today’s carbon framework as ‘substitutes’ within a hydrocarbon material economy and on the other, such materials are proposed in direct resistance to these very systems, as ‘alternatives’ to such ‘development’. Using case study biogenic materials, this talk aims to evaluate the pitfalls of historical and contemporary transformation of biogenic building materials using a “generative justice” framework.

FutureFlow
Designing for Disability Differently

Since the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was established 32 years ago, thinking in the disability world has evolved. Disability is seen as natural – not merely a problem to fix, but part of the human experience, seeking greater visibility and inclusiveness. The Core Imperative 17 – Universal Access in the LBC 4.0 Standard requires buildings to only meet ADA and/or other accessibility codes. The session, targeted to architects and designers, advocates the need for the LBC to incentivize design thinking and provisions that go much beyond merely meeting accessibility codes, and are integral to the design process, from inception.

Ganesh Nayak
Metier Consulting, Inc

FutureFlow
Accelerating Low-Carbon Procurement

Josh Jacobs
WAP Sustainability

How do you make sure that low-carbon material procurement becomes a priority…you write it into laws and spend money. Buy Clean laws and the Inflation Reduction Act were historic in many respects, but they have electrified the low carbon procurement conversation to another level even beyond the pace that it was progressing. Writing something into law is simply the first step though…what happened after the laws were written and how does the low carbon procurement work going forward.

FutureFlow
How Biophilic-Driven Development Shifts Community Wellness

How has Serenbe’s founding pillar, biophilic-driven development, impacted the community’s overall wellness from childhood to later in life stages? Given the current climate of the economy, political affairs, the actual climate crisis, stress is at an all-time high & mental health is at an all-time low. Session attendees learn how biophilic-wellness communities, like Serenbe, are affecting their residents’ overall wellbeing. Steve takes attendees through Serenbe’s Biophilic principles – personal well being, community engagement, national security, and global balance, & showcase how this intentionally designed community & a biophilic approach boosts mental & physical wellness.

Steve Nygren
Serenbe

FutureFlow
Is Climate Action a Human Perception Problem?

Upali Nanda
HKS Architects

Let’s start here- I am not a sustainability professional. I am, however, a student of human perception and believe our challenges are foundational because of the way humans think, feel and act. I am often exhausted by how hard it can be to corral around the critical issues of our time. I argue that three things are at play: 1) Ability to truly understand climate change- psychologists have explained why building empathy for the planet can be hard. 2) Ability to build trust with people who may have divergent view points, and 3) Disciplinary arrogance which results in exclusive language and polarization. This session will unpack these issues anchored on the art and science of being human.

FutureFlow
Impact Beyond the Property Line

The green and healthy building industry suffers from a last mile problem. Regulations, financing, and best practice toolkits all orient our efforts firmly within the property line. Meanwhile, we know that all of our actions contribute to larger systems – such as the urban heat island, the flood plain, regional air pollution, transportation options, economic opportunities, and structures that perpetuate historic segregation and redlining. This FutureFlow talk will demonstrate how you can use co-benefit design to bridge that gap. When you reorient your practice outside of the property line, new possibilities open up for making tangible contributions to neighborhood climate, health, and equity.

Adele Houghton
Biositu, LLC

FutureFlow
Unlocking Abundance with Methods to Discuss a Regenerative Future

James Kitchin
MASS Design Group

The world we live in has been fabricated on a zero-sum economic system centered around fossil fuels that prioritizes never-ending growth over the health of people and the planet. We have been made to believe that we never have enough and that we need to consume more, a scarcity mindset, when, in reality, we’re surrounded by abundance. This session is for thought leaders that want to demonstrate how the future we’re creating together, through our practices and built environment, is more abundant than the one we’re leaving behind.

FutureFlow
Your Voice & Our Common Future

This community is designing the future. How we communicate about what we do (making places, policy, and organizations) and what we are working towards(a common living future) is as important as the work itself. It is our role to help people see, understand, engage in, and value this work in ways that invites them to join as fellow advocates. Without cohesive communication, we will not have opportunities to manifest the results of our vision. But conveying information can be fraught: contemporary communications ecosystems are noisy and fragmented, hyperbole and signaling are rampant, and many actors are stoking chaos and confusion. Kira will share key concepts about communication that can help those working towards a living future be clear, be heard, and be powerful. This includes defining terms and articulating value authentically for multiple stakeholders.

Kira Gould
Kira Gould CONNECT

As we look ahead to this journey of FutureFlow talks, our anticipation is fueled by the knowledge that these sessions will not only inform but inspire action. The Living Future Conference, through initiatives like FutureFlow, remains a testament to the power of collective discourse and collaboration. It is a space where questions become catalysts for change, and ideas transform into actions that shape a regenerative future for all. Together, let us continue to evolve, learn, and create a world where Living Buildings and regenerative development redefine the very fabric of our built environment. Change starts here, and the journey is bound to be transformative.

I have a small confession to make. I am a chronic sufferer of a very common but pernicious syndrome: FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out). As a youngest child and part of the first generation to experience the internet in our youth, I have had a life-long anxiety that I’m being left out of something very important and very fun. It has its downsides, and I’ve learned to tame it considerably over the years. But more recently, I’ve actually found that FOMO is one side of a two-sided coin for me. The other side is that I am an enthusiastic advocate for convening and coordination, and I often think about who else should be invited to whatever I am doing.

I’m telling you all of this about me, dear reader, because I’ve come to believe that these kinds of things — personality, anxieties, motives, extroversion and introversion, etc. — all matter significantly in our work to transform the building industry.

We already know that this daunting goal requires a collective effort, and we are great at that. We bring our technical contributions, our successes and failures, our persuasion tactics, our facts and data to help the greater good. But all too often, those activities don’t involve a critical act that I believe we need more of, and that is the act of thoughtful and rigorous coordination. Our sense of urgency, our passion and, oftentimes, our desire to help our individual businesses propel us to share what we are doing and add to the collective knowledge base, but it doesn’t require that we agree with each other on critical tactics, on definitions and “what good looks like.” And without this harmonization of tactics and goals, I believe it will be impossible for us to rapidly transform our industry in the ways that our planet and our communities need.

And so I am delighted to share the small example of what we have begun with the Embodied Carbon Harmonization and Optimization (ECHO) project over the past year. It was just one year ago that it all got started, and Andrew Himes asked me to share a bit about the story. As a fellow believer in collective impact, Andrew is a kindred spirit with me on this topic, and I think we both hope that lessons can be learned from the full story of how ECHO came into being. I will say upfront that it has not been a perfect or linear path, nor is the story complete.

Five organizations took on the responsibility of hosting and leading the conversation: Architecture 2030, Carbon Leadership Forum, Building Transparency, ILFI (us!), and USGBC. The group included representatives from all of the major organizations in the US that were presently collecting embodied carbon data at a whole building (and project!) scale, either as a part of a certification or voluntary commitment program, and a few who were just embarking on the task.

FOMO was a big factor for me in showing up in the conversation that became ECHO. I was introduced to a woman named Kate Ascher and told that she was putting together an event about embodied carbon in New York in April of 2023. In January, she would be out in Seattle to meet with a few embodied carbon experts to discuss how best to set up the agenda, and she invited me to join. Double FOMO! Two in-person events (after the pandemic years, this alone was exciting), one a lovely small group of experts and the other a larger and powerful group of industry leaders. I cleared my schedule and eagerly showed up in January.

The meeting in January was intended to just be a planning meeting, to help Kate come up with a useful agenda for the May meeting. But as the conversation progressed, folks around the table suggested that there was one potential outcome for the April meeting that would be a shame, and we all wanted to avoid it. It was something we had learned from the past: if we held an event to talk about embodied carbon in the built environment and ask developers, architects, owners and others to take action to reduce embodied carbon emissions, we would get a familiar and understandable response, that was something along the lines of:

“There are too many conflicting standards and definitions, too many acronyms, too many certifications asking for slightly different things. It’s all just too confusing and we don’t know what we are being asked to do. We need clear and universal (and achievable) targets to hit before we can really address the problem.”

At that point, I piped in to say that I thought we had a decent shot at getting ahead of that problem. For many reasons, 2022 and 2023 were years where the spirit of communication and collaboration really picked up between green building certification programs and related NGOs. The communication lines were open. We might be able to get a group together to agree to make the paperwork and definitions and other infrastructures as streamlined and harmonized as possible, so that embodied carbon achievement could be evaluated consistently. Especially because the field is so much younger than that of operational carbon accounting, we had a chance to address inconsistencies before they got out of control.

At the same time, it turned out that Architecture2030 and Building Transparency had been talking to a set of large firms about aligning carbon data reporting for the various professional commitment programs (AIA 2030, SE2050, MEP2040, etc.). This idea was clearly aligned and quite similar, so it was woven into the conversation.

Through the grace and tenacity of Kate Ascher, the financial support of the Holcim Foundation, and the efforts of a small group of people, we managed to get a group in a room together just 2 months later. The group was convened by another group- five organizations who took on the responsibility of hosting and leading the conversation: Architecture2030, Carbon Leadership Forum, Building Transparency, ILFI (us!), and USGBC. The group included representatives from all of the major organizations in the US that were presently collecting embodied carbon data at a whole building (and project!) scale, either as a part of a certification or voluntary commitment program, and a few who were just embarking on the task. We spent a day getting to know each other’s organizations, and then discussing the question: how might we work together, how might we harmonize our efforts?

If this piece has left you feeling FOMO about ECHO, I feel you. We are working hard to make sure that all of our peer organizations are in the room, and that others will have opportunities to weigh in to what we are doing in the right ways. But ECHO is just one way that we can come together and align on our shared goals.

There is much to be found now on ECHO’s website to see what has transpired since. We are working on two specific deliverables, a common project data reporting schema and something we are calling the North American Minimum Project Embodied Carbon Reporting Framework V1.0. I will leave those to speak for themselves, because admittedly I am NOT the expert on the technical details of what we have agreed to align on. But I do want to clarify and share what I think we have accomplished so far, and what this can teach us for the future.

First, the ECHO project is not a new standard or definition. It is a collective project to align ourselves. The activity that we are engaged in is coming to agreement across a variety of programs and organizations so that all of our definitions and embodied carbon data requests are asking for the same things.

Second, coming to agreement is not as easy as it sounds. There is a lot that we can all agree on about embodied carbon reporting in terms of what is in scope and what is not. But sometimes there are very real reasons why our standards and programs might ask for different data. Some programs focus on a theory of change that focuses on only decisions that a particular stakeholder has control over, while others (like our Living Building Challenge) are founded on a different theory of change that means that we look at the holistic impacts of the building, regardless of the stakeholder in control. That’s good! We need a variety of approaches to addressing our industry’s problems. My hope for our community is that we talk more with each other about these theories of change, these definitions of what we care about, and act more like a community of different programs working together toward a common goal.

Finally, we are still iterating on the structure of our project. We all feel very fortunate that Architecture 2030 provided the logistical backbone of the group for the first year, and we are grateful that Carbon Leadership Forum is now serving in that role. Many participants in ECHO are volunteers with full-time jobs. Others work for non-profits like ILFI and USGBC, but without funding to support our work on this project. The act of establishing formal governance structures is a big one, and we haven’t gotten too far down that road. So it requires living in a bit of ambiguity, building trust, good communication, and a fair amount of overcommunication to keep things moving and make sure we stay on the same page. I’ve gotten to know a handful of people more deeply than I would have, had we not embarked on this project, and that is perhaps the greatest accomplishment in my eyes. We need to build these relationships with each other, so that we can build a movement strong enough to catalyze the transformation our industry needs.

And if this piece has left you feeling FOMO about ECHO, I feel you. We are working hard to make sure that all of our peer organizations are in the room, and that others will have opportunities to weigh in to what we are doing in the right ways. But ECHO is just one way that we can come together and align on our shared goals. We all can and should find ways to do this work in the communities that we are a part of. So perhaps the next time you meet with your CLF Hub or other group, you can ask yourselves the same question we started with in March: how might we come together and make something bigger than the sum of its parts? In my experience, the act of trying will bring you into a community in a deeper way, and help to build our little movement to the strength and size that we need for the work to come.

This blog post was originally published on Carbon Leadership Forum.

In the dynamic realm of regenerative design, products, and organizations, the Living Future 2024 Conference (LF24) emerges as a paramount gathering for experienced and emerging leaders. Themed “Change Starts Here,” LF24 serves as an immersive exploration into the interconnected principles of the regenerative movement—climate, health, and equity. In this article, we delve into the profound significance of these principles, examining regenerative practices at various levels, scrutinizing the conference tracks aligned with regenerative ideals, and offering a sneak peek into the remarkable speakers and talks that will shape the discourse.

Climate, Health, and Equity: The Interconnected Pillars of Regenerative Principles

At the heart of the regenerative movement lie three interconnected pillars: climate resilience, human health, and social equity. At the International Living Future Institute, we believe this holistic approach is critical to achieving a regenerative future.

Climate Resilience

Regenerative design recognizes the urgency of climate action goes beyond mere sustainability, aiming to actively regenerate ecosystems and mitigate the impacts of climate change.

Human and Ecological Health

Regenerative practices extend beyond minimizing harm; they actively promote well-being, not just for building occupants but also for the local ecology.

Social Equity

True sustainability cannot exist without social equity. The regenerative movement emphasizes inclusivity, justice, and community resilience.

We will explore the intersection of these pillars of regenerative development at LF24 as the programming seeks to intertwine these principles with its overarching theme, acknowledging that true sustainability transcends environmental considerations alone.

Exploring the Vanguard Issues of the Regenerative Principles through LF24 Conference Tracks

LF24 boasts a diverse range of conference tracks, each aligned with the three core regenerative principles. These tracks provide a structured framework for attendees to explore specialized areas within the regenerative movement:

LF24 Track: Revolutionizing Climate Action

Explore game-changing net positive strategies, groundbreaking technologies, and bold policies aimed at tackling climate change within the realm of regenerative development. Gain insights into how zero carbon buildings, renewable energy integration, climate resilience solutions, and circular economy practices are actively shaping a regenerative future.

LF24 Track: The Nexus of Human and Ecological Health

Discover the transformative potential of designing spaces that support human health and enhance the vitality of ecosystems. Delve into the profound connections between regenerative development and the well-being of both people and the planet. 

LF24 Track: Illuminating an Equitable Future

Prepare to challenge the status quo and redefine what it means to build inclusive, just, and equitable communities. Engage in dynamic sessions spotlighting affordable housing breakthroughs, community-driven engagement models, visionary approaches to equitable access and empowerment, and economic opportunities arising from regenerative development.

LF24 Track: Change Starts Here

This conference track delves deep into the core theme of the conference, offering a focused exploration of central ideas, concepts, and challenges related to the event. Get immersed in stories of success that become beacons, radiating positive influence and inspiring transformative action beyond boundaries.

Discovering Living Future Programs & Projects

Discover ILFI programs and how they catalyze the regenerative design movement and offer key tools, as well as hear from project case studies. This track provides an opportunity to connect with ILFI leadership and gain key updates and information on Living Future programs. 

A Call to Leadership in Regenerative Practices to Come Together at LF24

As experienced and emerging leaders within regenerative design, products, and organizations, LF24 provides the community for the critical exploration of climate, health, and equity that aligns seamlessly with the interconnected principles of the regenerative movement. It offers a multifaceted examination of regenerative practices at various levels and provides a structured framework through its diverse conference tracks.

The speakers and talks at LF24 promise to be a source of inspiration, offering valuable insights and practical knowledge to fuel our journey toward regenerative futures. As we collectively engage in this deep dive into regenerative principles, let us seize the opportunity to shape the discourse, share our experiences, and contribute to the regenerative movement’s momentum. “Change Starts Here,” and within the immersive landscape of LF24, leaders in regenerative practices are poised to be architects of that change.

The Ecology School Embraces the Ambitious Nature of the Living Building Challenge

The Ecology School is a nonprofit organization dedicated to innovative ecology education for the youth and adults of New England. River Bend Farm, situated in the Saco River watershed in southeastern Maine, is the site of this living-and-learning community. Drew Dumsch, President and CEO of The Ecology School, was introduced to the Living Community Challenge and the Living Building Challenge by architect Jesse Thompson of Kaplan Thompson Architects in Portland, Maine and he never looked back. The campus now boasts a new 144-bed dormitory and a 7,000-square-foot dining facility and Dumsch has plans to renovate the 1794 farmhouse and an 1840s barn on the River Bend Farm property.  They are currently working towards Living Building Certification for the two new buildings and the entire campus has the Living Community Challenge Master Plan compliant seal. Drew is all in. 

“At The Ecology School, we are focused on community resilience and food systems,” Dumsch says, “so the holistic nature of the Living Building Challenge appealed to us right away. And now that I know it more deeply, I know that the LBC and LCC programs are more rigorous, more thoughtful, and more holistic than other certification programs.”

Drew proudly notes that The Ecology School wound up being the first approved Living Community Challenge Master Plan. And now he’s an ambassador for the program. “A lot of people have not heard of the Living Building Challenge,” he says. “We are helping to spread the word about these aspirations and this pathway to regenerative design and practice. I think it opens up possibilities for many people.”

“What we do best at The Ecology School is living and learning in a place together. It seems natural to have this place built and rebuilt according to the Living Building and Living Community practices.”

Dumsch’s process is unconventional in a few ways. When he interviewed for architects, he liked proposals from three local firms and asked them to come together on the project, so Kaplan Thompson Architects, Briburn, Simons Architects, and Richardson & Associates were all engaged in the campus design. Dumsch sees an element of Maine Pride in this work, too, and is thrilled with how the Living Building and Community Challenges are helping to, as he puts it, “show what the Maine economy can do for resilience and sustainability.” He talks about the community of contractors involved, including Zachau Construction and Hancock Lumber, which handled the FSC lumber and renewed their certification to handle the trusses; Revision Energy for installing the 712-panel solar array to help them get to net positive; and many more. The Ecology School is in the midst of the certification process now, with Kaplan Thompson leading the documentation.

Dumsch is effusive about the ancillary benefits of working with ILFI. “I can think of so many stories of new relationships and new business opportunities because of our interactions with ILFI,” he says. One surprising example he cites is engagement with a national network of real estate agents who are interested in using the regenerative lens and for the past two summers The Ecology School has hosted Latitiude’s National Regenerative Real Estate Gathering in August at River Bend Farm after joining the organization as a guest on its podcast. He also has connected with green schools and regenerative design advocates in Canada at DoorNumberOne.org and they are currently creating a Leading Beyond Green Institute for K-12 school communities to attend at River Bend Farm coming up in July.

“ILFI is doing an amazing job advocating for a Living Future, and we are, too. Designing and building this way, in this beautiful farm location, is part of realizing that possibility.”

“Beyond giving us a strong, highly ambitious approach to building our own campus, the ILFI programs have helped us make many national and international connections,” he says. “We love to convene, connect, and catalyze this important work at our River Bend Farm campus. But more than that, partnering with ILFI is remarkably mission-aligned to us. What we do best at The Ecology School is living and learning in a place together. It seems natural to have this place built and rebuilt according to the Living Building and Living Community practices. ILFI is doing an amazing job advocating for a Living Future, and we are, too. Designing and building this way, in this beautiful farm location, is part of realizing that possibility.”

Cover photo courtesy of The Ecology School.

Your donation supports community impact

Do you want to be part of making lasting change? Around the world, there is a community of people working towards a living future every day. In ways great and small, they are changing minds, overcoming obstacles, and bringing ambitious projects to life. Individually, they cause ripples that show what’s possible. Collectively, they envision the regenerative future that we all want. Will you join us in this transformative work? Your donation to the International Living Future Institute equips us to assist this community with programs, technical support, events,  education, and more.  Your donation will help us realize the possible together.

At the vanguard of transformative change, architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) professionals, regenerative enterprise leaders, and product manufacturers find themselves positioned at the intersection of innovation and sustainability. The Living Future 2024 Conference (LF24), themed “Change Starts Here,” stands as the International Living Future Institute’s annual flagship event and a platform to explore the leading issues facing the regenerative community today.

Serving as a dynamic platform that transcends conventional business boundaries, LF24 is uniquely poised to offer a critical space for exploration and dialogue on the key priorities of the regenerative movement. This annual event is more than a conference—it is a catalyst, fostering conversations that delve into the profound significance of both individual and collective actions in propelling positive change within the built environment and beyond. Now more than ever, exploring the outsize impact that one project, one product, or one organization can have on the greater industry is critical to scaling the adoption of regenerative practices and addressing the converging issues of climate, health, and equity.

The theme, “Change Starts Here,” encapsulates a vision that transcends passive sustainability and aims for regenerative practices that actively contribute to ecological restoration. We have seen Living Buildings used as teaching tools, mechanisms for advocacy, and paradigm-shifting design experiences. These buildings, products, and organizations signify a departure from the status quo and beckons professionals to be architects of positive change within their respective spheres.

As the community celebrates wins, we also continue to grapple with key challenges and opportunities such as materials vetting, carbon accounting, occupant health, nature-positive solutions, and more. The conference promises an immersive experience for exploring these questions in community—featuring an array of sessions, workshops, and discussions that delve into regenerative design, sustainable business practices, and innovative product solutions. It is an opportunity for AEC professionals, regenerative enterprise leaders, and innovative product manufacturers to converge, collaborate, and chart the course toward a regenerative future.

Experiencing the Kendeda Building as a Living Example

One of the stars of LF24 exemplifying the theme of “Change Starts Here” will be the Kendeda Building for Innovative Sustainable Design, the first Living Building in Georgia and the 28th Living Building worldwide. The twin goals of The Kendeda Foundation and Georgia Tech, when creating the Kendeda Building, were to lead by example through demonstrating that a building can foster regenerative systems in a mixed climate and to amplify the impact by inspiring change on the Georgia Tech campus, across the Southeast building industry, and the world. Individuals involved in the construction of the Kendeda Building made deliberate choices in materials sourcing, energy systems, and water management. These choices, when aligned with a collective vision, resulted in a structure that not only minimizes its environmental impact but actively contributes to ecosystem regeneration.

The Kendeda Building stands as an inspiration for professionals attending LF24, demonstrating the tangible outcomes of integrating regenerative principles into the built environment. LF24 attendees will spend time at the Kendeda Building, and the partners that participated in this project will be at LF24 to talk about their experiences and the lessons learned during the design and construction of the Kendeda Building.

The theme “Change Starts Here” underscores the profound impact of both individual and collective actions on driving positive change. The Kendeda Building for Innovative Sustainable Design serves as an exemplary case and is a living testament to the transformative power of conscious decision-making and collaborative efforts.

Acting Like a Movement to Scale Change

At LF23, ILFI’s CEO Lindsay Baker called on the community to start acting like a movement as a way to organize, advocate, and scale up impact on the industry. At LF24, this regenerative movement continues to emerge and gain momentum as a critical force propelling sustainable transformation beyond conventional practices. Unlike traditional sustainability, which often focuses on reducing harm, regenerative approaches seek to restore, rejuvenate, and revitalize ecosystems affected by human activities. This movement calls for a paradigm shift in how we conceive and execute projects, emphasizing holistic, interconnected solutions that consider environmental, social, and economic dimensions.

AEC professionals, regenerative enterprise leaders, and innovative product manufacturers have a unique role to play in advancing the regenerative movement. By adopting regenerative principles, they contribute not only to the resilience of ecosystems but also to the well-being of communities and the longevity of their enterprises. The Living Future 2024 Conference serves as a platform to deepen understanding and explore practical applications of regenerative thinking.

At LF24 we will gather together to brainstorm new ideas, learn from one another and to be inspired.  We will discuss the hard things and share the great ideas that will move us all forward – new ideas in materials and reuse, design strategies and project management methods.  It is a time to build your personal community and your professional network. Attendees will have the opportunity to dive into the details of the Living Building Challenge, the Living Future Accreditation program and the Declare & Just Transparency Labels. 

Embracing the Imperative of Change

As we approach the Living Future 2024 Conference, the theme “Change Starts Here” resounds as a call for this regenerative movement. It is an invitation to be at the vanguard of the movement, to embrace regenerative principles, and to actively contribute to the creation of a built environment that regenerates rather than depletes.

The Kendeda Building stands as a living example of what is possible when individual actions align with a collective vision. The Living Future 2024 Conference provides a platform for professionals to delve into regenerative practices, collaborate on innovative solutions, and explore cutting-edge products that pave the way toward a regenerative future.

For AEC professionals, regenerative enterprise leaders, and innovative product manufacturers, LF24 is not just a conference; it is a convergence of minds, a catalyst for change, and an opportunity to be part of a movement that redefines the relationship between humanity and the environment. “Change Starts Here,” and the journey toward a regenerative future begins with the active engagement of each professional within these influential communities.

A Member Impact Story

ILFI is proudly featuring a series of impact stories to showcase and celebrate the exciting positive effects of our Living Future Member community. In this month’s interview, we are pleased to feature the team at evolveEA.

When evolveEA was in its infancy, sustainability looked a lot different. “Embodied carbon, health impacts, and resilience weren’t all that well-defined 20 years ago,” shares Marc Mondor, AIA, who co-founded and leads the Pittsburgh-based firm with his wife, Christine Mondor, FAIA.

These days, the scope of problems that the green building movement addresses has greatly expanded, and as the industry moved forward, so did value-driven firms like evolveEA. What began for them as sustainable building consulting and design grew into education and communications, planning, and urban design. With this diverse experience, they’ve been able to apply sustainability principles at scale, and work with their clients to enhance their vision or mission–whether a sports team or a nonprofit—through sustainability solutions. They’ve worked on certified projects running the gamut from Living Buildings to WELL and EcoDistricts.

As members in the ILFI community might understand, certifications like the Living Building Challenge (LBC) can serve as both validation for work you’re already committed to as well as education into new areas to grow. “[We thought], of course we’re green…until we started looking at sustainability frameworks and realized we’d never considered this other issue.” What sets LBC apart for the firm is its standard of absolute sustainability rather than relative sustainability. 

A similar shift for evolveEA began with winning the Green Workplace Challenge held by Sustainable Pittsburgh starting in 2011. This celebrated and validated the firm’s first year of  carbon neutrality after having set the goal two years prior. These achievements started us on the path to our first B Corp Certification (2013), which we’ve maintained now for a decade and counting.

When the Just label was introduced to the industry in 2007, the team at evolveEA wondered whether this label differed at all from B Corp. They quickly realized the Just label complemented their work well, and helped strengthen their firm operations. “Just encourages us to continually re-examine how we operate,” shared Daniel Klein, Senior Communication Designer at evolveEA. 

This continual re-examination has led to new policies and standard operating procedures for internal improvements, but also helped the team to deepen and broaden their positive impact on communities where they work. Their Community Engagement Strategies are tailored to the needs of the project, in ways that build capacity within the community to ensure that plans reach their highest potential to benefit local organizations and individuals. Neighborhood planning processes have inspired participants to start small businesses and initiatives, addressing local issues like food desert status or initiating renewable energy installations. On other projects they’ve collaborated with artists or hired youth ambassadors who have emerged as community champions for equity and sustainability. Over time, evolveEA has established internal systems that ensure they’re engaging every community and client with intention and focusing on their unique needs, whether they’re designing a Living Building, a public transit station, or planning for the future of a whole city.

evolve environment :: architecture is a sustainable design and consulting practice founded in 2004 by Christine Mondor FAIA and Marc Mondor AIA, LEED Fellow, with a focus on people, processes, and places.

Christine has been active in shaping places, processes and organizations in the US and around the world through her work as an architect, educator, and activist. As evolveEA Principal, her projects are frequently recognized with national and regional awards for architecture and urban planning, and led three Pittsburgh area communities to become the world’s first EcoDistricts Certified municipalities. Christine also teaches architecture, landscape design and sustainability at Carnegie Mellon University and has been an invited lecturer and guest critic at many institutions and has presented at the Living Futures Conference, Greenbuild, and other international venues.

Marc sees triple-bottom line potential in every project and has been an influential voice in sustainability for decades. As Principal and cofounder of evolveEA, Marc works with greening design and construction projects, including the first LEED certified project in Africa, the oldest LEED EB certified project (1869) and the first certified Living Building in Pennsylvania. As former President of AIA Pennsylvania, Marc created the thriving COTE (Committee On The Environment) and EDI (Equity Diversity & Inclusion) committees, and Marc is Vice Chair of the PA Climate Change Advisory Committee, producing the Pennsylvania Climate Action Plan.

Daniel believes in the power of visual communication as a force for social impact and informed change making. As senior communication designer at evolveEA, he contributes conceptual direction, visualization, and content development to a broad array of project types. Daniel also leads evolve’s B Corp certification and Just label processes.

Interested in becoming part of our community of practitioners, organizations, and everyday advocates transforming the building industry through the holistic lens of climate, health, and equity?

Architectural Nexus Turns Living Building Aspirations into Reality 

The Living Building Challenge has always been about much more than buildings. The influence that the program has had on one architecture firm is a powerful case in point. Architectural Nexus is a 125-person firm with offices in Salt Lake City and Sacramento. Their understanding of architecture’s opportunity—to be an agent of human health and climate resilience—led them to engage the Living Building Challenge and certification for their own offices as well as for client projects. They haven’t been the same since.

Their Sacramento office project earned bragging rights for the firm. It was the the first Living Building certified in California. That certification was secured in 2017, after which the firm worked with the Living Building Challenge on such projects as the Living Tiny Homes, three residences in Moab, Utah. And they are hard at work on a renovation of the Salt Lake City office (original structure dating to 1955); their goal is Living Building Certified. 

In Sacramento, the team found its way to Living Building certification in part as a response to the drought in California. Their Sacramento office was in a leased space and they were looking to create a new office space that embraced company values of inspiration, stewardship, and regeneration. They decided to renovate the 1954 structure. Erica McBride, LFA, Regenerative Operations Manager  at the firm, says the team “wanted a building that would be self-sustaining with respect to water.” A focus on the Water Petal seemed natural, but soon they were drawn to a bigger, more holistic goal. “We wanted to demonstrate that a renovated building could be a model for water effectiveness and integrate with its ecosystem,” she says.

It is our mission to demonstrate regenerative design in our practice.
The best way to do that is to be in a Living Building.

Brian Cassil, Director of Communications with Architectural Nexus, says “In Sacramento, we found that the Living Building process ignited our shift toward regenerative design.” The success of the small Sacramento building was a motivator for many projects. “It is our mission to demonstrate regenerative design in our practice. The best way to do that is to be in a Living Building,” Cassil says. “We wanted to extend the success of Sacramento in a larger Salt Lake City office.” 

In 2009 the firm renovated the building for the first time and achieved LEED platinum certification. After experiencing the positive impact from the design and operation of the Sacramento office the firm decided to take advantage of working from home during the pandemic and completed renovation on their Salt Lake City office  to deepen their commitment and enrich their culture with a regenerative environment for their entire company .The process is underway, and it has been instructive and, at times, a reach—like finding a new muscle in the practice. The commitment to learning in its own offices has inspired the entire firm to think about operations and human habits that make a building thrive. 

“We talk about the Living Building Challenge with clients and consultants, and it’s very straight talk about risks, and costs,” Cassil says. “But we have learned so much, and it is immensely, continually rewarding,” McBride says that the learning has influenced all the work. “We see ways to bring aspects of the Living Building Challenge into every project,” she says. 

Cassil adds that the benefits are increasingly easy to articulate. “We talk to clients about healthy materials, about energy efficiency and its direct ROI, about biophilic features, and daylight.,” he says. “Is every client going to commit to a water-positive design? No. But every project can benefit from these measures. Energy-positive design is getting easier to sell every year. And the Living Building Challenge is a potent way to implement these strategies and prove the benefits.” 

One of the benefits to this firm is having a life-size proof of concept to share with others. “We are constantly doing tours,” McBride says of the Sacramento office. “People have never experienced a building like this.” 

Cover image © Architectural Nexus

Your donation supports community impact

Do you want to be part of making lasting change? Around the world, there is a community of people working towards a living future every day. In ways great and small, they are changing minds, overcoming obstacles, and bringing ambitious projects to life. Individually, they cause ripples that show what’s possible. Collectively, they envision the regenerative future that we all want. Will you join us in this transformative work? Your donation to the International Living Future Institute equips us to assist this community with programs, technical support, events,  education, and more.  Your donation will help us realize what’s possible together.

A Holistic Approach

In the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the City of Bridges Community Land Trust is tackling the affordable housing challenge in a holistic way. They are addressing the urgent demand for affordable and resilient housing and ensuring that the housing supports the health and well-being of residents, keeps operating costs affordable, and manages construction impact on the community. We talked to the Julie Nigro, who is Senior Real Estate Project Manager at City of Bridges Land Trust to learn how ILFI programs have supported these goals; the organization is participating in ILFI’s Affordable Housing Pilot Program and pursuing Living Building Certification for four units in Hazelwood. 

City of Bridges is a nonprofit developer of permanent affordable housing that has been operating for five years. “Ours is a pay-it-forward model,” Nigro says. “We retain the land and sell the homes to an income-qualified person, who buys it at a lower than market rate. The community retains land ownership and we are able to hold those below-market rates.” At present, the City of Bridges has 22 homeowners in a number of neighborhoods across the city. In Hazelwood, there was a lot of vacancy after years of disinvestment, and recently tech company interest had spurred some speculation. “We are trying to get ahead of that,” Nigro says, “to help increase the capacity of people to stay.” The developer was working with architect Rothschild Doyno Collaborative, who introduced them to ILFI programs and it was decided that they would pursue the Living Building Challenge (Core Certification). The four units have recently broken ground: These are modular, factory-built units.

“The pilot project has been great,” Nigro reports. “Monthly Zoom meetings with the whole affordable housing team have enabled our project team to connect with others around the country. This provides immense value to the project. It is tremendously helpful to have peer support while we seek to achieve affordable housing and reach really high energy and material standards.” Nigro says that they always strive for better than code energy and comfort standards, but “we want to be sure that our homes are affordable to purchase and affordable to live in, too. That’s crucial for our model and a very important part of the story. We, perhaps more than most developers, know that the building is not ‘done’ when it is occupied. That is just the beginning.” She adds that the Hazelwood neighborhood has historically had poor air quality. For this reason, the team was very focused on ensuring very high indoor air quality standards for these units. 

Everything we are doing here is replicable.

“The Living Building model is ideal for our goals and aligns with our values,” Nigro says. “We are focused on the impacts on residents. Another critical aspect is that this is not a one-off: everything we are doing here is replicable, and the more times we do it, the lower the cost can be. Part of our story is about tracking the bills and talking to the residents. We are excited to look at this long term, to show how these are so much more affordable to live in.” 

Cover image courtesy of Rothschild Doyno Collaborative.

Your donation supports community impact

Do you want to be part of making lasting change? Around the world, there is a community of people working towards a living future every day. In ways great and small, they are changing minds, overcoming obstacles, and bringing ambitious projects to life. Individually, they cause ripples that show what’s possible. Collectively, they envision the regenerative future that we all want. Will you join us in this transformative work? Your donation to the International Living Future Institute equips us to assist this community with programs, technical support, events,  education, and more.  Your donation will help us realize the possible together.

A Transgender Day of Remembrance Impact Story

Did you know that, in America, the cost of living for transgender people is approximately 35% higher than cisgender people during the first eight to ten years of their transition, and approximately 10% higher for the rest of their lives afterward? On average, the medical cost of transition for the first eight to ten years sits around $150,000 dollars. Combine that with the reality that less than half of all states in the USA have legal protections for transgender people for housing and employment and you begin to see how the transgender community—not just in the USA, but globally—is at risk. And yet, despite these sobering statistics, there’s cause for hope.

Now, I could sit here and throw more statistics at you, such as transgender people are more than 40% more likely to have attempted suicide than cis folks. Or how each year since 2015 in the USA has surpassed the previous year as the deadliest year on record for transgender Americans. But instead, for this year’s Transgender Day of Remembrance, I think I’d rather tell you a story: my story.

My name is Stephanie Danielle Gonzalez, and I’m a transgender American. In 2015, at the age of 25 and after a third suicide attempt, I finally decided that I needed to make a change. Clearly, I was deeply at odds with myself, and that internal struggle was distressing to a breaking point. So after much soul searching, many tears, and long visits with a therapist (not to mention steeling myself for the possibility of being disowned), I decided to take the plunge and transition from male to female.

In late 2019, I was hired by ILFI, and the support, safety, and stability offered me by the Institute allowed me to finally break out of a cycle of mere survival and truly begin to thrive.

At the time, I was going to college in Savannah, GA, and working a minimum-wage job. When I initially came out and met with the HR department to discuss my transition, I was initially met with, shall we say, indifferent ‘support’. Less than two months later, I was let go for “not being a good cultural fit.” But it was the South, after all. Not exactly a region of the country known for its acceptance and support for LGBTQ people. So I decided to move to Seattle in 2016.

For three years in Seattle, I bounced from one minimum wage job to another, frequently hearing that I “wasn’t a good cultural fit” or a variation thereof. Because of this, it was very difficult to find and maintain housing. Indeed, I was briefly homeless for a time. But thankfully, in late 2019, I was hired by ILFI, and the support, safety, and stability offered me by the Institute allowed me to finally break out of a cycle of mere survival and truly begin to thrive. Without exaggeration, ILFI truly saved my life, in no small measure because of Just.

At a time in history when transgender people are…effectively being legislated out of existence…written policies can codify protections for transgender employees in a way where legislation is struggling to catch up.

Just^® aims to help organizations foster inclusive and equitable environments for all employees; however, there are several Indicators that can be especially impactful towards making transgender employees feel welcome and supported. For starters, Just’s Gender Diversity Indicator calls for organizations to create and maintain gender-diverse workplaces that include historically underrepresented genders, including people who identify as women, transgender, or nonbinary. 

In the upcoming 2024 release of Just 3.0, we intend to introduce new Indicators such as Belonging and Equitable Recruitment. These additions will create more chances to show support and allyship to transgender employees. This type of work is particularly important. At a time in history when transgender people are under legal attack and effectively being legislated out of existence in places across the world, these written policies can codify protections for transgender employees in a way where legislation is struggling to catch up. 

Being able to read an organization’s Just label can go a long way in showing a potential candidate that the housing, work, whatever, is an accepting and supportive environment.

As anyone with experience can tell you, when you’re facing down the barrel of homelessness and unemployment, time is of the utmost essence. One simply cannot afford to waste time applying for a job if they’ll simply be let go three weeks later for being transgender. Being able to read an organization’s Just label can go a long way in showing a potential candidate that the housing, work, whatever, is an accepting and supportive environment, and not a waste of time.

And it’s not just the right thing to do that will give you the warm fuzzies. I mean, it is that, but it’s also just smart business. While the statistics are currently changing as acceptance for transgender people continues to grow (albeit slowly), roughly 70% of transgender individuals begin their transition after the age of 30, when they have been in the workforce for at least a decade. Combine that with the fact that over half of transgender individuals are fired after they begin their transition, you can begin to see the untapped potential of experience looking for employment.

Of course, there’s also the boost to morale and employee retention when an organization is transparent about its commitment to social justice, diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in and beyond the workplace.

I hope on this Transgender Day of Remembrance, you can begin to see how a Just label can become more than just a “nutrition label for equitable organizations,” as we like to call it. It’s a voluntary disclosure tool and a transparency platform to disclose your operations, attract diverse candidates, boost morale, and enhance your culture. It’s an investment in your community. But most of all, with a Just label, it could genuinely save lives.

Just like ILFI did for me.

Ready to begin your Just^® journey?

Header Photo by ink drop on Adobe Stock