There are not many new ideas in the building industry. The basic concepts have been around for a while. 'High-performance' products and design details that might be described as 'innovative' here in New Zealand are likely to be standard practice somewhere else. With building his experience in Europe and Scandanavia Richard Eden is well placed to help New Zealand builders do things better. He can often be found teaching builders around the country how to do a good quality install of good quality windows.

274: Doing Windows Well

Brad Wills is Director: Strategic Customers & Programs at Schneider Electric. Based in Tennessee, he has three decades of experience with the organisation. We discuss the diverse range of products and services now offered by Schneider as well as the exciting opportunities for smart metering, microgrids, onsite battery storage and more.

273: Our Homes Are Getting Smart

In 2007 when Kim Feldborg arrived in New Zealand he was surprised at how cold and inefficient the houses were, despite growing up in much colder European climates. Originally from Denmark, Kim has built houses in Greenland, Norway, Germany and England. He now enjoys life in a Certifed Passive House he built himself in Taupō.

272: A Passive House in Taupō

Growing up in a typical kiwi home, it wasn't until he had lived in the UK for a bit that Damien McGill realised we don't need to be suffering through winter in cold, damp houses. Damien is an engineer and knows how things should be put together so they don't fall apart. But he's interested in more than that. In this chat, Simon Cator and I discuss how Damien got into the Superhome Movement. We also review his experience working on his own 'Super-Reno'.

271: Super Reno

Richard Houghton now lives in a very good, healthy home. But that wasn't always the case. Along with Simon Cator from Pro Clima NZ, we discuss Richard's journey in designing and building an energy-efficient SIP home just outside Auckland, New Zealand. 

270 Richard Houghton

Bert Sarkkinen has built a successful timber framing company around a solid philosophy grounded in the style and craftsmanship of a unique and timeless form of building. Bert appeared on the Home Style Green podcast back in episode 176. A couple of years on, Arrow Timber Framing has expanded into a larger facility and Bert has recently released the second edition of his book, The Art of Hybrid Timber Framing.

269 The Style of Sustainability

Zola Rose has a vision for regenerative housing as a solution for improving communities and sustainability. She brings diverse and international experience to Aotearoa New Zealand where she now calls Nelson her home. Real estate has long been used as an investment and a means of making a profit in New Zealand. Zola explains how this has tended to undermine the values that we should otherwise associate with where we live. Housing should protect, shelter and foster community, but we've tended towards the commoditisation of housing. There are solutions that can help provide better housing and helping people implement these solutions is the basis for Zola's social enterprise. https://www.commonground.net.nz

268: Regenerative Housing

Mariano Croce is an Argentine entrepreneur who relocated into Queenstown with his young family just before the first COVID lockdown in 2020. He has a background in prefabrication, having co-founded a modular building company in Argentina when he was 24. More than 15 years on, Mariano has created Modulo.nz to provide architecturally designed, high-performance, modular homes built in New Zealand.

267 Architecturally Designed Modular Homes Built in New Zealand

Darren O'Dea is a self-confessed building physics nerd. Along with co-founder David Carroll, he has helped to create Speckel, a platform for designing low carbon, healthier, durable and energy-efficient buildings. Having proven popular with architects and consultants in Australia, Speckel is now available in New Zealand. Find out more at https://www.speckel.io/

266: It's Time to Speckel!

Sabine Schoenberg is co-founder of the Smart Healthy Green Living network, a collection of videos and streaming content on everything from tiny homes and carpentry to interior design and gardening. Through her network, Sabine is promoting the 'Do One Thing' campaign to help everyone take a step towards living a more sustainable life.

265: Smart Healthy Green

My third conversation with Simon Cator in our series on the control layers of a well-performing building envelope. In this episode, we cover the why and how of airtightness.

264 How to Control Air

Hemp is an extremely versatile material. It may have a complicated recent history due to medicinal and other uses, but the benefits of industrial hemp have been known for a long time. Jo Say, co-founder of the Hemp Building Association New Zealand explains why it's a great time to start rediscovering some of the many benefits of building with hemp.

263: The Many Benefits of Building with Hemp

Following my previous chat with Simon Cator we continue our discussion about how to construct a good building envelope. This week we're focussing on keeping the weather out. We cover the benefits of a monolithic membrane instead of a microporous one, the importance of being resistant to water while maintaining permeability to vapour, and how to keep everything connected.

262: Weathertight vs Waterproof

Casey Curtis shares tips on how and why to create airtight buildings, the benefits of mid-build open homes, and using collaborative design to create the right house on any given site.

261 Casey Curtis

Michael Rubino is an educator, author and an expert in mould remediation of homes. In this interview he shares his journey and some tips on how we can make our homes a better, healthier place to live.

260 The Mold Medic

Simon Cator is passionate about helping people to build better homes. Prior to becoming Regional Sales Manager for the Upper North Island at Pro Clima NZ, he worked for New Zealand's online architectural products library - EBOSS and also HRV before that. In this introductory episode, I spoke with Simon about the diversity of his role at Pro Clima and how he talks with people throughout the whole building industry to help change the way we do things.

259: Building Better Homes

Matariki is a festival that makes sense for New Zealand. It feels good to respect and learn from the wisdom of those who have inhabited this place for generations. It may have taken us 200 years, but we're creating our own vernacular; our own geographically appropriate culture of design.

258 Matariki

Germán Molina trained as an engineer in Chile and has recently completed fascinating research posing the question 'what is comfort? at Victoria University in Wellington. Having come from what he describes as the 'warm side of engineering, he's long had an interest in energy efficiency. He didn't expect to be looking so much into human behavior. Germán has made some of the output of his research, freely available - The Atlas of Comfort. Find it at https://buildingsforpeople.org/

257: What is Comfort?

Tim Ross featured on Home Style Green back in episode 191 to talk about getting starting on New Zealand's first Passive House co-housing project. I interviewed Tim again a year ago as we were kicking off the Passive House Podcast, and the Dunedin High Street Co-housing project was well underway.

256 An update on New Zealand's First Passive House Co-Housing Project

Justine Money describes herself as a British-Maori-Australian Architect. She brings a strong cultural sensibility to her practice. In this discussion, we chat about why Justine decided to take up the challenge of studying architecture as a mature-aged student, and her journey from biophilic design to Passive House.

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