Major companies providing cookie-cutter houses for people certainly don’t care about the environment. It’s up to architects to try and set a better example for the general public to strive for. These houses may be expensive, but as with many other things, there is a trickle-down effect once people start to see how the rich live their lives. Eventually it reaches the mainstream and normal, middle-class people will become familiar with things like FSC-certified wood and solar hot water heaters. Just remember, indoor plumbing and electricity were once considered luxuries. A so-called “green” lifestyle is mainly for the rich (or indigenous people, which is an interesting paradox). But society as a whole will start to take environmental issues more seriously in the next 100 years. They will have no other choice.

I think people who have a problem with this house have a problem with the term “green” in general. Nothing about humanity these days is green or sustainable – those terms are complete misnomers.

Ha ha.

While vice president of a New York state modular mfg. and as an architect and industrial designer, I take respectful exception to the casual manner in which $200 per square foot is tossed about as a terrific savings. Unfortunately, all the well intended (not to mention very talented) architects who have taken up this most recent fad of the semantically challenged “pre-fabricated home”, have entirely missed the point, and gloss over the fact of relatively little, if any, savings in cost or time of their models. Our modulars consistently sold for $85 – $125 per square foot, and were delivered to site within eight weeks of order. The strategies with which the process realizes such extraordinary savings, cannot be learned in a twenty-five page primer. I urge all such designers to engage a more serious and professional attitude; one commensurate with the enormous potential of concept. Failing that, this most recent interest in this methodology is once again doomed to be shelved for another ten years.

Personally, I love the look of that house. It’s slick. If it is actually green as a building, then I’m impressed. I do question the wisdom of clearing the amount of land they did. Though I would not be at all surprised if it was a contingency of obtaining insurance. The other thing that I think bears consideration is the use of the home. Is it purely a getaway that gets used occasionally, or is it more of a home that someone has built in the mountains?