By Evelyn Lee
INHABITAT: We’ve covered several Gensler projects in the past on Inhabitat. As one of the largest architectural and design firms in the world, how does Gensler prioritize sustainability not only in their buildings but in the everyday operations of your offices.
Irwin: We think of great design as having four equally important parts: ethical practice, experiential design, thoughtful impact, and excellent delivery. Included in ethical practice is sustainability and the idea that you can’t create great design without it. This translates into our everyday office operations in many big and small ways. The really exciting sustainable operations are yet to come in our new office! We’ve worked closely with Glumac to get our energy usage as low as possible through the use of natural light, task lighting, and daylight sensors for overhead lights. We are using chilled beam technology for cooling instead of conventional forced air. All of our plumbing fixtures are very low-flow, and we’ve built showers to encourage the use of alternative transportation, and we offer a great rideshare incentive program. In fact, a key factor in our ultimate decision to relocate to downtown Los Angeles was the proximity of our new office a broader range of public transportation options. We also have recycling, green cleaning products, and paper with high recycled content. All of the vendors that visit our office are asked to share what’s green about their product, and we host weekly presentations that always include sustainable building materials, products, or technology. I could go on, but the bottom line is that we definitely practice what we preach when it comes to sustainability. READ FULL INTERVIEW>>
via inhabitat.com
