Brooklyn design studio CO Adaptive Architecture prioritizes embodied carbon

{"version":"0.3.0","atoms":[],"cards":[["images-card",{"images":[{"url":"http:\/\/res.cloudinary.com\/dpcbzfiye\/image\/upload\/v1657808177\/nzwkytdbarhj5ksakc9x.jpg","id":"6525312"}],"caption":"A former metal foundry in Gowanus, Brooklyn, was transformed by CO Adaptive Architecture into a rehearsal space for threatre artists."}]],"markups":[["a",["href","https:\/\/coadaptive.co\/","target","_new"]],["a",["href","https:\/\/mercurystore.com\/","target","_new"]],["b"]],"sections":[[1,"p",[]],[10,0],[1,"h2",[[0,[],0,"\u0022Architecture, in some ways, is paying too much attention to just the aesthetics, and it should really be solving some of the crises the building industry has created.\u0022 "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"By Joann Plockova"]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"In Brooklyn\u2019s once-industrial Gowanus neighborhood, local design studio "],[0,[0],1,"CO Adaptive Architecture"],[0,[],0," recently transformed a 1902 former metal foundry into a low-carbon development and rehearsal space for theatre artists. Despite the existing building\u2019s chopped-up rooms and lack of light, both the client (the "],[0,[1],1,"Mercury Store"],[0,[],0,") and CO Adaptive alike saw its potential. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201cI\nfeel like anything, [even] the ugliest structure, has something there that you\ncan work with,\u201d says Ruth Mandl, co-founding principal of the studio along with\nher partner and husband, Bobby Johnston. \u201cAnd I actually really enjoy that\nconversation with what is there. It\u0027s really fun.\u201d"]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"Mandl originally hails from Austria and Johnston is a native of Santa Ana, California. The couple has made reworking existing building stock into low-carbon, high-efficiency spaces homes, offices and cultural spaces the focus of their firm. In\npart a response to working in a dense city where space for new builds is\nlimited, their choice is fueled by a passion for \u201cworking with these structures\nthat have so much history,\u201d says Mandl, and what she describes as a \u201ctreasure\ntrove of embodied carbon.\u201d "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201cSeeing\nthe city as a material mine, and using those [materials], we don\u2019t always reuse\nthem in our own projects. But upcycling them, finding homes for them so they\nare not going into landfill, that\u2019s definitely a passion,\u201d says Johnston. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"Although Northern European-inspired aesthetics\nare part of the package, the now seven-person-strong studio prioritizes\nbuilding performance over form, solutions over appearance and adaptability over\nstasis. \u201cCoadaptation is a\nterm in biology used to describe the process by which a bee adapts to a flower,\njust as the flower adapts to the bee,\u201d Mandl says. \u201cFor us, the name gets to the core of our goal for architecture as a\nprocess, rather than something static, which must continuously adapt to the\nplanet we live on and the people who use it.\u201d"]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"Mandl\nand Johnston met during their graduate studies in architecture at Columbia\nUniversity. While Mandl\u2019s focus was sustainability and Johnston\u2019s performative\narchitecture, the two agreed \u201cthat architecture, in some ways is paying too much\nattention to just the aesthetics, and it should really be solving some of the crises the building\nindustry has created,\u201d says Mandl. Those include greenhouse gas emissions,\nwaste, and material health issues that directly impact the health of both\npeople and the planet. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"Founded\nin 2011, CO Adaptive\u2019s accomplishments showcase a variety of typologies. The\nfirm has transformed a former 1950\u2019s bank building into the headquarters of a\nSwiss freight logistics company in Long Island and reconfigured a\n675-square-foot apartment into a material rich, two-bedroom family home for a\nclient in Brooklyn. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"In\nparticular, CO Adaptive has embraced the passive house principle, including robust\nexterior insulation, triple-pane windows, operable exterior shades to mitigate\nsolar heat gain, and airtight, vapor permeable \u2018membranes,\u2019 in effort to reduce\noperational energy, or the energy required to run a building over its lifetime,\nsince the start of their practice. This includes Mandl and Johnston\u2019s own\nfamily home: a converted three-story 1889 Brooklyn townhouse that is producing\nmore energy that it can use, Mandl says. Yet their focus is shifting to include\nmore of the other side of the equation. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201cWhat\nwe really want to make sure our clients know is that you have to focus on operational\nenergy, but in that equation you can\u0027t leave embodied carbon [the carbon\nemissions associated\nwith the extraction, processing, transportation, maintenance, demolition, and\ndisassembly of building materials] to the wayside because it\u0027s a big part of that equation, says\nMandl."]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"For\nthe pair, the Mercury Store project exemplifies the embodied carbon side of things. One of the first\ncommercial buildings in New York City to incorporate CLT (cross-laminated\ntimber), the 12,700-square-foot, double A-frame building was opened up to\nexpose its mainly timber and brick bones. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201cWe were\nlooking for a low carbon solution that would not change the existing\nconstruction class of the building,\u201d says Johnston. Using a Gantry crane, the\nlow-carbon CLT panels were inserted to support the structure, including original\ntrusses that were exposed. Any building materials that were removed, including\njoists and bricks, were repurposed as new architectural features (guardrails\nand lining for acoustic panels in the main studio space) or, in the case of the\nformer, taken to a like-minded lumberyard that repurposes the materials into\nflooring and other applications. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201cIt\njust goes to show that we\u0027re surrounded with this stuff that shouldn\u0027t be\nconsidered waste,\u201d says Mandl, who together with Johnston feels that both waste\nand carbon should be taxed in some way. \u201cThere should be a cost associated with\ntearing something down and getting rid of all that material, because it\u2019s\nvaluable.\u201d"],[0,[2],1," "],[0,[],0,"As Gowanus is in a\nlow-lying flood area, CO Adaptive, in collaboration with a theatrical set\nfabricator, designed a modular floor system that can be easily disassembled and\nthen placed on higher ground. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201c[The\nMercury Store] was one of the first projects where we really started to work\nwith designing for deconstruction [and demountability],\u201d says Johnston. \u201cIt\u0027s\nsomething that we\u0027re really getting involved with now in our practice.\u201d "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"In\ntheir new office in Brooklyn Navy Yard, CO Adaptive has incorporated a small workshop\nwhere they are developing a prototype for a demountable wall panel that will be\nmade of wood and natural materials, including wood fiber board insulation and\ncork. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201cWe have hopes that this demountable wall panel we are\ndeveloping will help bring the cost down of retrofitting existing buildings to\na high performance, standardizing and modularizing passive house for\nretrofits,\u201d says Mandl. \u201cThis is the long term goal for the prototype we are\nbeginning to develop now, and something we are passionately working towards.\u201d"]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"As\nwith the Mercury Store and a new passive house project they\u2019ve started working\non in Astoria, the studio is exploring a new material health-focused approach where\nthey are carefully deconstructing projects and reusing materials as much as\npossible. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201cThe\noperational energy and the embodied carbon are almost diametrically opposed, in\nthe sense that, when you do a passive house, you typically have to gut renovate\na building so you can get all the systems in,\u201d says Johnston. \u201cWhat we\u2019re trying to do more now, for example\nwith the project in Astoria, it\u2019s kind of the lightest touch we\u2019ve done. We\u2019re\nleaving floors in place, and walls, and really trying to minimally deconstruct\nthings that need to be removed in order to get the systems in. We\u2019re trying to\nkeep as low of a carbon footprint as we can while making it as energy efficient\nas possible.\u201d"]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"In\nan ideal world, it\u2019s marrying both [the operational and embodied], Mandl says.\n\u201cIt\u0027s sort of designing for adaptability and demountability and reusing\nmaterials, and in doing so, retrofitting for high efficiency.\u201d"]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"Along\nwith their holistic approach to the design process, CO Adaptive believes that\nit\u2019s the responsibility of architects to understand that every move they make and\nthe associated cost is part of a holistic system. "]]],[1,"p",[[0,[],0,"\u201cWe\nwould like to see our profession as sort of this collaborative effort in which we\nall try and solve this big, massive problem we have on our hands. And we\u0027d like\nfor architects to share resources,\u201d says Mandl. \u201cThat\u0027s something that\u0027s very\nmuch apparent in the passive house community already. I would love it to become\nsort of a wider architectural phenomenon. That we\u0027re sort of all building\ntowards the same goal and sharing resources along the way and realizing that\narchitecture is a collaboration.\u201d"]]]]}