When I was in graduate school, my plan was to create a vertically integrated design and development company. I loved designing things and wanted to remain close to those sorts of details, but I had already decided that I wasn’t going to be an architect… Read More
Toto announced a new product this month at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) called the Wellness Toilet. It won’t be available to consumers for at least several years, but the plan is for it to do two key things to improve overall health and wellness.… Read More
Fred Wilson (venture capitalist) and Joanne Wilson (also an investor) have been working on a passive house apartment building in Brooklyn for the last five years. Their development company is called Frame Home. And this past week they received a pretty great Christmas gift in… Read More
The drywall started this week at Mackay Laneway House. This is a fun part of the construction process because it is that moment in time where, very quickly, the space transforms from a full on construction site to something that starts to resemble a livable… Read More
The construction process can be a pain in the ass. It’s messy. It’s inefficient. It’s always filled with surprises. And you could argue, as many have before, that every job is really a custom job — a kind of prototype. But at the same time,… Read More
Why do some buildings cost more to build than others? And how is it that some cities, as a whole, seem to build more cost effectively than others? Without getting into the specifics of how different markets work, I thought it would be valuable to… Read More
Here’s a weekly round up of links and articles that you may find interesting. The topics cover the sorts of things that we usually talk about on this blog. The latest Mackay Laneway House update is now live on the Globizen Journal. The ground floor… Read More
It has been well documented that Tokyo tends to build a lot of housing. And the argument goes that this has helped to maintain a certain level of housing affordability. The city is constantly building and rebuilding. It also has different views about housing. Now,… Read More
Cities are dead. New York City is dead. That’s why it was announced early last month that Facebook has just signed a lease for 730,000 square feet in Vornado’s new Farley Post Office redevelopment in Manhattan. Here’s what I think is a pretty telling remark… Read More
I was “on site” this morning for the installation of the helical piers for my laneway suite (that will be the topic of a separate post). More often than not, I’m in the office. But I like going on site because, well, building things is… Read More
