Tag Archives: recycled materials

New Insulated Concrete Blocks Made From Recycled Styrofoam

BluBloc insulated concrete forms

  A new company in Portland, Oregon is gearing up to manufacture large quantities of the latest product in the ICF (insulated concrete forms) world.  BluBloc offers a twist on standard ICF products – it uses recycled styrofoam instead of manufacturing new for use in the forms. BluBloc is 85% recycled polystyrene foam (styrofoam) and…

Pre-Cut Steel Buildings Snap Together Like Legos

Architects admire steel framed house

The flexibility and simplicity of steel framing systems draws many clients because there are no interior load-bearing walls, so remodeling or reconfiguring rooms when needs change is a snap. “When children leave at 28, you can easily knock down walls.  And when they return at 32 you can erect them again,” BONE founder and president…

Bamboo, Plastic Bottles Make Eco-Friendly Greenhouse

Hanoi architecture firm 1+1>2, in collaboration with Action For The City, has designed an eco-friendly greenhouse that protects growing plants from the elements, provides a place for farmers to rest and a offers a creative play space for children to learn more about their environment. It also offers a break from the visual sameness of…

Guest Post: Recyclable Material Usable in Home

People across the country, and the world, are finally recycling paper products, aluminum, glass, and cardboard as a matter of course. And yet, there’s more that can be done. We must continue to push the importance of green, making sure that we use recycled material wherever possible, and stay conscious of the need to reduce our carbon footprint.

Trash House

There is plenty enough to know about all the trash we create and the wastefulness of our ways. But when you meet Colorado architect, Doug Eichelberger, you are happy to find a person who is all about solutions, putting trash to use as a building material. A visit to his Lucky Ranch reveals a very…

Green Counter Culture

If you attended the Greenbuild conference in Chicago last November, you would have been hard pressed to find a green cabinet manufacturer among the exhibitors – but you couldn’t turn around without bumping into a new type of green countertop. They nearly outnumbered the waterless urinals. Over the past couple of decades, countertops have evolved…