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Eight Ways to Implement Green Principles into Your Practice
June 06, 2007
1. Include eco-friendly goals into your existing peer reviews.
If you give your employees realistic and measurable objectives, you can increase your chances they will put them into operation. Simply talking about green design in the abstract will get you nowhere.
2. Create green standards for each of your projects.
In addition to giving employees yearly eco-friendly goals, apply specific aims for each kitchen or bath you design.
3. Explain your goals to everyone involved in a project.
Although it would be nice if we always had final say over each detail in a project, the reality is everything is a team effort. Get each team member, from the homeowner to the contractor to the installer, on board with your eco goals. You’ll want to make sure your plans are implemented correctly, and they may have ideas you haven’t thought of.
4. Fill product libraries with green options.
Out of sight, out of mind certainly applies here. If you have easy access to environmentally responsible products, you will use them.
5. Bring green to the attention of your clients.
Don’t wait to be asked! Though some homeowners will come to you wanting an eco-friendly design, the reality is most won’t. It’s your job to educate them.
6. Stop asking the client for permission to do what is right.
This may sound controversial, but you were hired because your clients either couldn’t or didn’t have time to make certain decisions, including when to use green products.
7. Offer green design as part of your basic services.
Soon an “environmentally sound” house will be as redundant as a “structurally sound house.”
8. Only offer non-toxic materials when giving homeowners options.
There’s really no point in showing potentially harmful products. If you wouldn’t use it in your own home, why offer it to your client?
Eric Corey Freed, founder and principal, Organic Architect
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