Author: Matthew Cutler-Welsh
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265: A New Network of Smart Healthy and Green Living Content
Sabine Schoenberg is co-founder of the Smart Healthy Green Living network, a collection of videos and streamed 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. Sustainability, says…
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264: How to Control Air
In this third session with Simon Cator from Pro Clima we cover the reasons for and the application of an airtightness system. As I’ve discussed previously, airtightness is a good thing. This is independent of ventilation, which is also a good thing. The opposite of an airtight building is a leaky one and sometimes this…
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263: Building with Hemp
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…
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262: Weathertight is Better Than Waterproof
Unless you live in a submarine your home is likely not waterproof. And that’s ok, as long as the majority of it is weathertight. To make something completely waterproof requires all sorts of seals and intricate design, often with second and third lines of defense against the pressure of water. Think sports watch or a…
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261: Casey Curtis
“You could be an architect one day,” was a comment made by an school teacher that has influenced the life of Casey Curtis. Out of necessity, Casey joined a group home builder after completing her deisgn degree in Christchurch. It was 2010 and she felt fortunate to have a job at the time as the…
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260: The Mold Medic
Michael Rubino studied marketing and business at college, but ended up back home working for his family business. Michael’s father was involved with a lot of fire restoration work, some of which came from insurance claims to do with the damage caused by all the water used to fight fires. He saw first hand, the…
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259: Building Better Homes
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 HRV before that. In this introductory episode, I spoke with Simon about the diversity of his role…
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258 Matariki and Architecture
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.
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257 The Atlas of Comfort
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 ‘the warm side’ of engineering, Germán has long had an interest in energy efficiency. He didn’t expect to be researching human behavior and social science.
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256: An Update on New Zealand’s First Passive House Co-Housing Project
Tim Ross featured on Home Style Green in episode 191 to talk about getting started 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 Toiora High Street Co-housing project was well underway. My apologies to Tim for…