Sustainable Design Experience
Sustainable design is at the core of our practice, and is rooted in the belief that architecture and design matter – that through our work, we can make a difference in the world.
Below is a list of our projects that have had some form of sustainable certification.
Winthrop Center in Boston is the world's largest Passive House building, as well as LEED Gold and WELL Certified.
Winthrop Center includes over 1.8M sq. ft. of residential, office, and retail space, designed to LEED Gold standards. The office component of the project is Passive House certified, the most rigorous energy efficiency standard in the world, making Winthrop Center the largest Passive House building in the world.
The House at Cornell Tech on Roosevelt Island in New York City is Passive House as well as being LEED Platinum.
The House was designed to Passive House standards, which had never been done before in a residential multi-family high-rise building. The building opened in 2017 and was the largest and tallest Passive House building in the world at the time. In addition, the building needed to be delivered at a cost that allows for affordable rents for the student population.
Sendero Verde in Harlem is Passive House, and is the world's largest fully affordable Passive House building.
Sendero Verde is Passive House certified, making it the largest fully affordable Passive House building in the world. A highly-insulated envelope – R-10 foundation, R-32 walls, and R-40 roof – combine with triple-glazed windows to lower the conditioning loads and allow for the use of low energy mechanical equipment. Photovoltaic panels and a co-generation plant lower dependence on city-supplied infrastructure .By creating affordable, sustainably designed housing, we can work to both break the cycle of poverty that disrupts so many people’s lives, and dramatically reduce the carbon footprint of large buildings of any type and use.
The new Student Residences at the University of Toronto Scarborough is being designed to Passive House standards.
The new Student Residences are designed to be Passive House, the most rigorous sustainability standard in the world. The high-performance building envelope incorporates a vertically patterned aluminum cladding system. This textured, dynamic pattern diffuses the repetitious grid of windows that would otherwise define the character of the building. The earthy tones were inspired by and are evocative of Scarborough’s regional geography.
Sven in Long Island City is LEED Platinum.
Sven includes over 100,000 sq.ft. of electrochromic glass, a first for a building of this height and size, to control for solar heat gain in the apartments and reduce the building's cooling load. Each panel is wired to a program that is connected to a sun sensor on the roof that automatically adjusts the amount of glass tinting.
The Nove townhouses in San Francisco are LEED Platinum.
Nove is LEED Platinum, employing sustainable elements such as solar thermal hot water, in-floor solar assisted radiant flooring, double glazed thermally broken windows and doors, energy star appliances, low-flow faucets and toilets, low water / drought tolerant landscaping, and maximum use of locally sourced sustainable materials.