Think Green!
Janice Randall Rohlf
Editor
My father was at his happiest messing around in his garden. He was handy at uncomplicated home renovations, but his first love was the outdoors — the trees and flowers in our yard and the large vegetable plot on a small rise behind our modest ranch house. Growing up, my sisters and I didn’t really appreciate our dad’s nurturing of seeds and saplings, but as adults we look back wistfully on the underappreciated bounty.
Maybe my father’s knack for planting and growing is why I have so much respect for those with remarkable green thumbs. Another reason is my own attempts at gardening, which have been a mixed bag of victory and defeat. Anyone who can make a landscape come alive is a hero in my book, which is how I feel about James Brewer and his “Wolfe Henge” garden (page 86) and Jill Nooney at Bedrock Gardens in Lee (“Parting Shot,” page 96). I also look forward to Pocket Gardens of Portsmouth and all the other garden tours in spring and summer that offer sneak peeks at horticultural magic in the making. See Robin Sweetser’s list of garden tours in “Discover” on page 44.
Of course, today the word “green” applies to buildings as well as gardens. So double-billed in this issue are houses that have been sustainably built and, thus, kind to the environment. The ultimate example of this is a net-zero home, like the one perched on a high ridge whose story starts on page 72. To qualify as net zero, a structure must produce as much energy as it consumes. This home’s solar array is the source of 100% of the building’s energy needs on a net annual basis.
The two other featured houses illustrate how, even if a solar array is not in your immediate future, smaller steps can be taken toward the goal of minimizing environmental impact. Start by making responsible choices for energy and natural resources, such as installing mini-splits and using sustainable, low-maintenance materials sourced near your home. High levels of insulation, high-performance windows and tight construction make for a more energy-efficient house. Green products and systems, it is said, pay for themselves at least 10 times over the life of the building, even if the features cost more at the outset.
Hand in hand with constructing greener homes is a trend toward smaller homes, which by virtue of their reduced size require less land, fewer building materials and less energy consumption. In “Living Small” on page 80, we introduce The Cottages at Back River Road in Dover, whose homes not only provide much-needed employee housing but also, being tiny, have the added benefit of being eco-friendly, too.
