INTERVIEW WITH COPELAND CASATI

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Yesterday I interviewed Copeland Casati of Green Modern Kits regarding her passion and insights for modern eco-friendly structure and home kits.

Q: Let's start with a little background on you. What brought you to the place you are today?

A: Oh, gosh. THAT is not a short answer! A native of Virginia, my family has always had farms… yet I’m urban as well (I lived in the East Village of New York City for seven years, and Paris…). I always get along with either very rural or very urban people- their sense of community is stronger. Plus they have a great sense of humor, and, you might have noticed, I like to poke fun at myself.

We always had a vegetable garden growing up, so now my children have one too. Our garden is not always successful, which makes me keenly aware of the fragility between ourselves and the food we eat.

Awareness of wasteful practices and the rise of GMOs made me gravitate back to things my lineage practiced, and expand upon them with modern, yet respectful, technology. It’s not about going back to doing things not as well; it’s about utilizing past tools that still work well without electricity, incorporating larger, later knowledge, and asking yourself, “Do I really need that? Do I really want that?” Or can I enjoy creative, practical ways of not using plastic wrap, or refusing to contribute waste to my childrens' school system by not sending them to school with anything disposable but instead a bento box, real cloth napkins and real utensils, much less refusing to buy a plastic nap mat. Yes, it’s sad you have to say real. It’s so… simple. And enjoyable. And if you embrace reuse and craftiness, it can be more affordable. It’s good sense!

Q: Tell us a little about your websites.

A: We have three lines of passive solar prefab house kits: www.GreenModernKits.com, www.GreenCottageKits.com, and www.GreenCabinKits.com. The prefab house kits are either very modern or unabashedly cottage-y, as if the cottages were designed 200 years ago yet for the next 200 years, where you can snap on your solar and rainwater collection systems and achieve zero energy goodness. All are designed for energy efficiency, so that you don’t need big systems because they are already functioning through passive solar design and tight insulation with SIPs (structural insulated panels). I aim to bring green building for The Rest Of Us – affordably, with practical function, to pass down for generations. My aim is not to build, build, build, but to solve housing needs in a smart growth, preservationist manner.

Q: What inspired you to pursue building your own sustainable abode?

A: I lost my family farm in my mid-twenties, after a lifetime of being told it was a family farm. I was an adult, working and living in New York and I came home one day and… What? What happened?

Now I’m creating my own, to determinedly pass on and preserve for our children, and their children... Sustainability is not just about LEED accreditation. It’s about lessening stress on systems, not draining resources but replenishing them, it’s about knowing where your food comes from, it’s about community preserving community. It’s about the strategy and decisions you make to preserve the landscape and to ensure it is passed on and protected. For the people who need it most, we should all have the right to hormone-free backyard eggs.

Sustainability is also preserving and passing things on, a subject I will go into more as my own prefab house kit is finished.

Q: How accessible and feasible is building a home from a kit and in a more sustainable manner for the average person?

A: Reality: You are not going to get a 2,000 square foot finished house for $30,000. It breaks my heart when I get people asking, “Does that come with a foundation and solar panels?” Think about it: How much does it cost to build a XYZ square foot house with XYZ systems in your neighborhood? Ok, there’s your guess-timate to start with in green building.

I purposely did not “finish” these house kits as much as most prefabs, for a reason: Over engineering means the consumer does not get 100% of what they want, it’s more expensive, with more opportunity for things to go wrong in shipping, and does not allow for more creative customization. Plus when consumers use local contractors and craftsmen we leave green building skills in that community.

If I had “finished” our prefab house kits, would I as a consumer have the opportunity to eschew dry wall and instead recycle VMI’s old basketball court on my walls? No...

Q: What are the big challenges now with green and sustainable building practices?

A: Performance measurement, LEED-igation. But that is tied to certification. Like the organic vs. natural food industry, I personally have a non-certified approach (you are certainly welcome to adjust our house kits to whatever certification you seek whether it be LEED, Passive House, ASHRAE…). But that confidence comes from education, knowing how things work… it’s like knowing where your food comes from. I buy food from my friends’ farms, they’re not certified, but I know their farm practices and philosophy! Now if they’re marketing to Joe Schmoe who doesn’t know them, those certifications mean they meet criteria. But they also cost money to certify.

I think a big challenge is in current urban planning: what to do with the existing stock of suburbia, and unleased downtown storefronts and lots. That is for each community to approach creatively, and learn from each other, to apply locally and culturally, to best address.

A planner thinking they can carve out developments of cul-de-sacs from fringe rural landscapes vs. smart growth merits disdain.

Q: What are the constraints that exist for those who might consider a sustainable prefab house kit?

A: Well, your site is important if you want our passive solar house kit to work… regardless of where the lake view is! And even if you don’t choose our prefab home, NOW YOU KNOW! Why, why would you want all that glass facing the wrong way towards The View? Even when you get someone to build as you please, how can you erase from your mind the dollars floating, unstoppable, out those glass panes into the northern, View-Oriented breeze?

Q: What kind of efficiencies and ROI should one expect from a sustainable home investment?

A: Great question, and one, as I mentioned previously, ROI / LEED-igation is a topic for the green building lawyers.

As a non-certifying consumer of my own passive solar prefab house kit product, we as a family love seeing how our own house kit performs without systems installed. Seeing how we could not only take the prefab house kit but further add to its efficiency and functionality without systems has been the big geeky fun family project this year.

Now the systems? Systems are another matter. The house kit is not where you get so off track on expenses. But as you get into systems, as you look at the whole of your home construction, you make decisions: Do I buy the $25 inefficient cheapo toilet at a yard sale or do I buy the $200 efficient toilet or the $1,500 composting toilet? Realize you have to make those decisions for Every. Line. Item. For. Building. Your. Dream. Home and, when totaled, it can add up to a lot.

OR You can also learn to do more, with less.

Bio:

Copeland Casati is a bandit in real life. Checkout her site Green Modern Kit.

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