Imported marble countertops and exotic wood floors may be fashionable now, but such materials could soon carry the controversy of, say, a mink coat or ivory elephant tusk as rising fuel costs and concerns over climate change alter our sense of what is handsome and virtuous in home design. Many builders have already shifted their focus toward locally-available materials — be it southern yellow pine in the Carolinas, cypress reclaimed from Florida riverbeds, an indigenous fieldstone, or factory windows salvaged from a nearby urban area in transition. Using native components not only reduces the embodied energy needed to transport goods to the job site, but also lends an air of authenticity that really is, well…authentic. In its top innovations of 2008 list, Popular Science lauds the accomplishments of Chinese engineer Yan Xiao, who devised a bamboo equivalent of glu-lam beams (
read the story about GluBam here), making excellent use of one of his nation’s most rapidly renewable resources. What’s abundant in your neck of the woods and how are you building with it?
