i + D - March/April 2020 - 54

Living by
Design
Green
Houses

For a home on the Chesapeake Bay,
Bates Masi + Architects selected
materials with natural weather
resistance to withstand waterfront
structural concerns like high
humidity, salt air, and wind.
(Image: Courtesy © Michael Moran/OTTO)

A LEED Home on the Chesapeake Bay
Bates Masi + Architects LLC, a full-service architectural firm based in East Hampton, N.Y., is familiar
with the challenges of coastal locales. When their client found a small but spectacular lot in downtown
Annapolis on the Chesapeake Bay with a 1970s house, it was evident that the existing home was
prone to flooding and also had other issues that could not be addressed by renovating it. But its
bulkheads and docks provided a unique opportunity to build a new home just steps from the water.
"Good design by definition must include sustainable building strategies such as daylighting, energy
efficiency, and durability," says Aaron Weil, project architect, Bates Masi + Architects. "So it's part of
our common practice. But not every client is interested in quantifying those strategies through LEED,
especially in a single-family home. Fortunately, conservation and sustainability were high priorities for
these clients, and they requested that it be LEED certified."
According to Weil, many modern sustainable systems such as photovoltaics, geothermal heating and
cooling, and efficient appliances and lighting can easily be incorporated in renovation work. However,
the more common-sense sustainable practices like appropriate site selection, daylighting, and natural
ventilation can be fundamental to a new design but more difficult to apply to an existing one.
The 1970s house was demolished, and the current house is entirely new construction. Known as the
Acton Cove house, the project went on to win six awards including the 2020 AIA Peconic Award of
Merit, the 2019 American Architecture Award, and the 2018 AIA Chesapeake Bay Honor Award.
High humidity, salt air, and windblown sand are highly corrosive. Rather than fight those effects with
applied finishes that must be maintained, Bates Masi + Architects selected materials with natural
weather resistance, such as FSC-certified ipe decking, oversized reclaimed heart pine siding, stainless
steel and bronze hardware, and weathering steel planters. Flood risk and rising sea levels were also
accounted for by raising Acton Cove 3 feet relative to the existing house.
"There are environmental benefits to building on the water as well," explains Weil. "The large sliding
glass doors of Acton Cove that pocket into the walls take advantage of the consistent breezes off the
water to cool the house. Plus, high groundwater allows for efficient geothermal heating and cooling.
At this point our clients expect sustainable, resilient design, and more and more local building codes
are making it a requirement."

At EchoHaven, a sustainable
community in Calgary, Alberta,
Canada, a home by Bow Crow
Design registers at 51 percent
above code.
(Image: Sergei Belski Photography)

Calgary's Sustainable EchoHaven
The only thing better than a sustainable home is an entire sustainable community like
EchoHaven in northwest Calgary, Alberta, Canada. EchoHaven was formed more than two
decades ago when several families with a shared environmental vision got together to
purchase an old dairy farm on the outskirts of the city. The subdivision comprises 25 lots,
and today there are still a few lots available for building.
"It was really a visionary project, and it's just coming into its own now," says Kim Walton,
founder of Bow Crow Design, an architectural design and consulting practice in Alberta,
Canada. "If they were to start a project like this today, there would be a much easier uptick."
Using her skills in energy modeling and building science, Walton designs and manages
passive house and net zero projects across Western Canada. She has worked on seven
of the homes at EchoHaven and designed the first house, which was completed in 2011.
"From the beginning my role has been architectural designer, energy analyst, and project
manager," she says.

i+D - March/April 2020

i + D - March/April 2020

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