Designing for Sustainability

In this era of changing climates and more extreme weather patterns, it is increasingly imperative to reevaluate our approach to the built environment. Modern era expectations have become overly reliant on a limited palette of energy-intensive strategies for addressing the perennial need for thermal comfort, durability, and resilience, with diminishing regard for the role of the built forms, materials, and methods in reducing their demand.

And yet we have a much broader palette available. Working with a preservation mindset, it is always important to recognize what came before to appropriately chart a course forward. Many strategies have been developed and employed in vernacular vocabularies in climates all over the world. Understanding their basis and application, before being modified or supplemented with modern materials, detailing, and enhancements, can go a long way towards meeting our thermal comfort and survival needs while delighting our senses.

This presentation reintroduces the audience to our global built heritage from the perspective of the embodied wisdom of thermal comfort concepts and climate-specific strategies. With clear illustrations of building principles underlying a wide range of regional, vernacular, and traditional examples around the world, it inspires our imagination with the breadth of wisdom and ingenuity in our shared human experience. It challenges us to shift our paradigm to understand, honor, and work with that wisdom to address the climate crisis with our stewardship and sensitive adaptation of the built environment. It introduces the audience to a growing visual database of embodied wisdom as a publicly available informational reference tool.

Goldilocks is a professional service I am developing that generates just-right sustainability solutions that can be used as a basis for architectural expression. The goal is to employ a programming platform that combines modeling software (Rhino and selected plug-ins) and mathematical analyses into a useful service that could be used by architectural firms to iterate and prototype architectural solutions that are environmentally optimized.

The software we use for this is Rhino and a variety of plug-ins- Grasshopper, for parametric design; Galapagos, for parametric optimization; and Ladybug Tools, for analyzing weather data and simulation modeling of environmental loads. It features as its primary innovation the integration of a mathematical optimization formula with the plug-ins listed above. This formula is embedded in python, the built-in scripting language in Grasshopper and the procedure works as described below.

Given a fixed quantity such as surface area, or material cost, what are the optimum dimensions of an architectural form? A mathematical operation called Lagrangian Multipliers (LM) is used to solve these types of questions. What is the best orientation of an architectural form to minimize solar gain and maximize daylighting? The Ladybug toolkit can be used to model solutions for these types of questions. By passing LM solutions into the Ladybug toolkit for environmental analysis, these two questions can be combined into a single programming platform. This works by having parameters that are used in the LM equations, i.e the parameters governing dimensional quantities, be available as parameters for the Ladybug toolkit. Lot dimensions and bulk, surface areas, window locations and module constraints are examples of such parameters. These parameters can be fixed or given a range of values, for instance a window area may be a fixed parameter, but its location on the facade could be a variable parameter. These parameters are used in the LM equations which return a quantitatively optimized form. From here a family of forms emanating from all parameter values can be tested for overall fitness by Ladybug / Galapagos and an ideal architectural form can be returned that is based on a particular composition of parameters.

Decarbonization is no longer a distant goal. It is the design mandate of our time, shaping how buildings perform, how communities adapt, and how long-term value is created. Yet in practice, it is still too often treated as a technical overlay rather than a design driver.

This presentation reframes decarbonization as a design problem. Through built work, project-based insights, and climate data, it explores how early design decisions influence carbon, cost, resilience, and occupant experience across scales, from interiors and buildings to districts.

The session focuses on translating climate intelligence into design action. Attendees will see how strategies such as electrification, adaptive reuse, passive performance, and material selection can be integrated into concept design rather than deferred to later phases. The discussion also addresses a critical gap in practice: the ability to communicate sustainability in a way that aligns with design thinking, client priorities, and project delivery.

This session connects data-driven approaches with design intuition, showing how carbon can become a framework for decision-making rather than a constraint to be managed.

Attendees will leave with practical strategies, clear language, and a stronger ability to embed carbon thinking into their work from the earliest stages of design.

Climate change is not only an environmental crisis—it’s a public health emergency. In the U.S., your zip code is the strongest predictor of your health outcomes, surpassing genetics or lifestyle. Vulnerable communities, especially in the Southeast, face disproportionate climate risks, compounded by systemic inequities and exposure to toxic environments.

This talk reframes emissions as pollution and buildings as health interventions. With over 18,000 premature deaths annually linked to fossil fuel combustion in buildings, the case for electrification and stringent energy codes becomes not just environmental, but ethical. The public health costs of air pollution exceed $800 billion annually, and full decarbonization could pay for itself through health savings alone.

We’ll explore how design can be a catalyst for health equity—lowering blood pressure through biophilic design, extending life expectancy through material choices, and transforming buildings into tools for healing. Attendees will learn how to identify the “dirty dozen” sources of indoor air pollution and how to use rating systems like LEED, WELL, Fitwel, LBC, and RESET to model and mitigate exposure.

Through data-informed strategies and AI-enabled site analysis, we’ll examine how design can improve community health outcomes, especially in underserved areas. This session empowers architects and planners to use their specification power to create spaces that heal, protect, and uplift.

This presentation examines how material choice can advance a culture of wellness while delivering measurable environmental performance. Centered on the Frist Health Center at Princeton University, the session situates mass timber within a broader framework of decarbonization, adaptive reuse, and human-centered design, demonstrating how sustainable strategies can simultaneously support institutional mission, student wellbeing, and long-term value.

A central focus is the adaptive reuse of Eno Hall, a Collegiate Gothic structure whose preservation was not assumed but evaluated against demolition and deferral scenarios. Repositioned as a defining interior frontage within the atrium, the historic fabric becomes both environmental strategy and social infrastructure, illustrating how reuse can simultaneously reduce carbon and sustain institutional memory.

Combined with a new hybrid CLT, glulam, and steel structure, the project balances low-carbon construction with performance and constructability, offering a pragmatic model for mass timber in complex program types such as healthcare. Sustainability is further advanced through high-performance systems, daylight optimization, and material transparency, aligning environmental responsibility with occupant health.

The presentation emphasizes health, wellness, and indoor environmental quality as integral to sustainable design. Exposed timber, natural materials, and strong indoor–outdoor connections contribute to reduced stress, improved comfort, and a more welcoming, non-institutional environment. Performance is not abstract but experienced, supporting behavioral health, social interaction, and academic success.

Case studies and comparative analysis highlight transferable lessons in procurement, hybridization, and decision-making frameworks, including the use of embodied carbon metrics and stakeholder-driven evaluation of design alternatives. This session links carbon reduction with cultural sustainability and human wellbeing, offering a replicable model for institutions seeking to align climate action with mission-driven design.

When architects engage with local government, whether through elected office or appointment to boards and commissions, we show expertise and leadership in planning, land use, design, and environmental issues that are critically important to our communities.

Through outreach, engagement, and consensus building, architects can promote the principles of environmental justice: the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people. In our everyday jobs, architects bring together groups of diverse collaborators who have their own goals and priorities. Architects are natural consensus builders who work to find common ground and turn shared goals for communities into reality.

In the practice of architecture, we make professional decisions that preemptively save lives, promote health, and increase well-being in the buildings where people live and work. We are trained to plan and prepare for the future.

In the context of governance, planning and advocacy, this can take many forms. Architects and planners can:

• Work to improve transparency in government and the budgeting process through our experience with contracts and analysis.
• Advocate to plan for affordable housing for all residents.
• Lead on climate and the environment by championing municipal climate action plans, enhanced sustainable building practices, community solar programs, and green and blue infrastructure.
• Make the case for calmer, safer streets that are walkable, bikeable, and equitable.
• Champion regional planning partnerships to reduce congestion and guide smart development in our towns and counties.
• Focus on infrastructure investment to build resiliency and transportation equity.

Architects have the skills and experience to lead locally, taking on the roles of learner, facilitator, mediator, advocate, and implementer. We can use our training and tools to help stakeholders construct a vision for the future, which sometimes stands in contrast to elected officials and community members who struggle to see past short-term impacts and quick fixes.

This session will include presentations from two Associate Principals at Dattner Architects, Rachel Ehrlich and Keith Engel, whose passion for meaningful involvement has impacted both their professional work as well as their local civic engagement.

“Land really is the best art.” – Andy Warhol
“Resilience is the ability to attack while running away.” ― Wes Fessler (poet)

In an era of relentless sea rise how do we occupy the edge? We know it’s safer to move inland, yet we remain drawn to the expanse of the ocean, seduced by its feel, its touch, its sound as much as by the horizon it offers. Older homes are especially vulnerable to this challenge. Vulnerable both to the swell of water, the literal storm surge, as well as to the desire to have larger, more robust structures capable of withstanding the swell.

The time tested method of resistance is to rise above the fray – lifting construction above the waterline and allowing flood waters to pass below. This is not an instance of a rising tide lifting all boats; only those who can afford it are protected, and often, those who can afford it, expand.

This is where the fun begins. How to push, pull, nip, tuck. We consider different kinds of math: formulas that vertically expand an existing structure, that build below (transforming a single-story structure into a light-filled upper level), and that extend alongside it. In these equations, do you get different sums?

We focus on the expansion of existing structures – the mathematics of architecture- both because reuse – even when paired with expansion – is inherently more sustainable, and because we know that, in our world, governed by agencies aimed at protecting the coastline, regulations will be more receptive to preservation. This is the most likely path to maintain the connection to the edge.

Through images and drawings this talk provocatively examines whether and how we occupy our coastal spaces. In this environment that is both fragile and seductive, what is our place? How do we leave the best possible mark (which is likely no mark at all)? Considering design strategies, building and zoning regulations, and resilient methodologies we ask what truly sustains these places and allows us to live life on the edge.

Reducing embodied carbon in construction requires new and innovative ways to salvage, recycle, and source building materials. This presentation will provide a detailed case study on The Sheward Partnership’s Philadelphia headquarters, a 10,000 square foot interior fit-out that achieved double LEED and WELL Platinum and Ready Designation under the Living Building Challenge Core program. The team targeted salvage strategies early in design process to reduce embodied carbon and waste. Team will share lessons learned from auditing existing components, specifying salvage, and installing reused products. During construction, waste was meticulously sorted to maximize recycling rates. Team will share how they partnered with Richard S. Burns & Company to streamline waste management and promote recycling. Attendees will learn ways in which they can maximize salvage and recycling on their next project to support certification goals and minimize material sent to landfills and incinerators. 

Outline how environmental responsibility, operational resilience, and long‑term strategic planning intersect with modern defense needs. Analyzes how environmental issues such as sea level rise, groundwater contamination/remediation, and urban development affect critical defense infrastructures. Describes various sustainable initiatives and practices to correlate with the defense industry manufacturing and growth.

Join us for a deep dive into LEED v5, the newest iteration of the globally-recognized green building rating system. This latest version will fully replace the previous versions in June of 2026, ushering in a new and improved framework to discuss and quantify sustainability in the built environment. Designed to meet evolving challenges and opportunities, LEED v5 focuses on impact and drives measurable progress across three critical areas: decarbonization, quality of life, and ecological conservation and restoration.

The new rating system changes entire project approaches, timelines, and team member engagement strategies in pursuit of meaningful outcomes, deeper success, and positive impact. Through this session we will discuss what that means for all members of the design and construction teams, including key changes in project approach and critical early steps for project certification success. We’ll provide an overview of the “need to know” changes as well as provide guidance on how to successfully drive the market towards a near-zero carbon reality that is equitable, resilient, and promotes the wise, safe use of all resources.

The updated rating system provides a clear path towards decarbonization in our building projects, towards ensuring quality of life of those inside and near our projects, and towards defining and integrating resilience goals into projects from their inception.

As people spend approximately 90% of their lives indoors, the architectural profession is required with moving beyond qualitative “rules of thumb” toward evidence-based design for human health. This session presents a comprehensive research-driven framework for evaluating window views as a critical component of Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ). While window views are widely recognized for their psychological benefits, they have historically been treated as subjective aesthetic features rather than measurable performance variables. This presentation bridges that gap by introducing a triple-axis framework for view quality: content (visual features), access (spatial availability), and clarity (visual sharpness through glazing and shading).

Attendees will explore the dual pathways through which window views influence occupants: the visual pathway, which shapes perception and psychological well-being, and the non-visual pathway, which regulates essential physiological functions such as circadian rhythms and endocrine health. The session will detail recent empirical studies, including controlled human-subject experiments and international collaborations, that have led to the development of the View Access Index. This metric predicts occupant satisfaction based on geometric window variables, allowing designers to optimize for health without compromising building energy performance or thermal comfort.

Finally, the session addresses the future of sustainable practice by discussing the integration of these metrics into major building standards, such as IES LP-3-20 and ASHRAE GPC 45P. By leveraging AI-driven computational techniques and digital twin platforms, architects can now scale these insights from individual rooms to dense urban clusters. Participants will leave with actionable strategies to advocate for equitable access to high-quality views, ensuring that health-centered design becomes a core dimension of the built environment rather than an aesthetic afterthought.

As climate change accelerates and flood risks intensify, elevating buildings has become a standard response across coastal regions driven by evolving FEMA requirements, insurance pressures, and code compliance. Too often, elevation is approached as a technical mandate rather than a design opportunity. The result is a growing number of lifted buildings with underutilized or poorly performing ground-level conditions that diminish usability, and long-term value.
This session reframes building elevation as a form of adaptive reuse that fundamentally reshapes a building’s relationship to the ground. Rather than an isolated intervention, elevation can be understood as adaptive reuse in section. This presentation shows how a vertical transformation that introduces an entirely new architectural layer beneath an existing structure can create a new ground plane that is critical to environmental performance, occupant safety and community engagement.

Through case studies including the Bay Head Yacht Club in New Jersey and precedents from the Gulf Coast, the session examines how different ground-level strategies, including open, enclosed, or infilled, have impact on flood resilience, material durability, accessibility, and programmatic flexibility. The presentation also explores how decisions about elevation height, structural systems, and site integration influence long-term climate adaptation and reduce the need for future interventions.

Presented collaboratively by a preservation architect and a sustainability specialist, the session integrates design and performance perspectives. It will introduce a practical framework for evaluating elevation strategies that align preservation goals with climate adaptation, regulatory requirements, and embodied carbon considerations.

Using the Bay Head Yacht Club as a central case study, the session demonstrates how elevating beyond minimum requirements enabled a functional, open ground level that improved circulation, accessibility, and connection to the waterfront while enhancing long-term resilience.

Attendees will gain actionable strategies for designing elevated buildings that are not only compliant but intentionally designed as part of a resilient architectural future.

Despite advances in performance-based design, perceptual dimensions like view quality and visual privacy remain difficult to evaluate systematically, although view and privacy quality affect occupants’ well-being, work performance, mental health, and properties’ economic value. This limits architects’ ability to make fully informed decisions about façade design and spatial layout.
This session presents an AI-based, occupant-centric framework for evaluating daylight, view, and visual privacy in early-stage design, built on the development of a data-driven simulation tool integrating building geometry, environmental analysis, visual scene data, and human preference modeling. Designed to work with data that architectural firms already collect, the framework supports customization through firm-specific datasets and AI fine-tuning—translating occupant perception research into actionable design intelligence.

Participants will learn how AI and machine learning expand conventional performance modeling by incorporating perceptual outcomes that matter to occupants. Through case examples showing how façade configurations, window sizes, orientations, and urban conditions shape occupant 3D spatial experience, the session highlights trade-offs that traditional tools miss—offering a forward-looking approach to design that interprets environmental quality through the lens of human perception.

Join us for a unique and interactive session that blends sustainability with wellness through the lens of mixology. Led by architect and sustainability advocate Jason Takeuchi, AIA, this course explores how the principles of low- and zero-waste design can be creatively applied to beverage preparation—offering broader insights into material use, energy conservation, and environmental impact in everyday living.

Through a series of live demonstrations, attendees will learn how to create sustainable cocktails and mocktails using upcycled ingredients like vegetable peels, fruit cores, and coffee grounds. Beyond mixology, the course highlights how thoughtful resource use and waste reduction contribute to a healthier built environment and support occupant wellbeing. Whether for hospitality design, community engagement, or residential application, this hands-on course offers practical takeaways that align with the goals of sustainable architecture—reducing waste, promoting health, and encouraging mindful consumption.