Design with Natural Materials

Design with Modest Means

This is Sarah Susanka's home page for The Not So Big House , a book about the virtues of building smaller by better.

http://www.notsobighouse.com/

This site gives the table of contents and allows you to download chapter one of the book.

http://www.notsobighouse.com/notsobig.html

Design for Identity

Design for Group Living

This site is an archive from a discussion about cohousing design issues . Cohousing is a term used to describe a group house for intentional communities of families that choose to live together and share some of the facilities and equipment of everyday life.

http://www.infoteam.com/nonprofit/nica/netbits1.htm

Here is an example:

"One of the problems of having a kids space is that it is usually infinitely more attractive than dinner so your kids take two bites, then run off and play, then come back as you (and all the other kids) are leaving and whine for food. Having a locking door so that no one gets to use the playroom until 20 minutes after dinner starts is a way to get kids to sit at the table for long enough to eat something."

Design for Energy Efficiency

Clean Energy 101 gives basic facts and information about renewable energy from the sun, wind, plants, water, geothermal, waste products, and so on.

http://www.nrel.gov/ceb.html

The United States Department of Energy

http://home.doe.gov/index.htm

This is lengthy list of solar energy and renewable energy related web sites.

http://www.ise.fhg.de/Other_Solar.html

An air-to-air exchanger can vent air from bath and kitchen areas and bring fresh air to the whole house while retaining most of the heat. Otherwise, the air in a supper insulated home may become stale and polluted. Ordinary exhaust fans waste heat and are noisy. http://www.nationalguild.com/orderforms/thermax_wrightfirstpage.html