Reclaimed Home writes:
Last week I visited the Eco Brooklyn house in Carroll Gardens and spoke with Gennaro Brooks-Church about his project. Well, ok, if it doesn’t look like Gennaro is talking to the camera, that’s because I piggybacked on a contractor’s job interview. Anyhoo, please excuse my lack of editing skills….still haven’t learned a thing.

All of the material used in this restoration was recycled! Crazy used stuff I’ve never been able to get my hands on, like sheetrock and plywood. This guy’s got connections, baby!

Part II will be a tour of the house, a work in progress. I’ve really gotta figure out how to edit that bit though.

Gennaro Brooks-Church of Eco Brooklyn installing a solar tube in a Brooklyn brownstone.
Check out the amount of light coming through even on an overcast day.

If you’re interested in green building in Brooklyn, I would suggest subscribing to  Eco Brooklyn Inc’s posts. Gennaro Brooks-Church, is the author and he is a Brooklyn based contractor, Certified EcoBroker®, LEED AP, educator, lifetime builder and author of the Build It Forward green building concept. Hence, the information comes from a reliable source. Since I’ve been following the site, I’ve learned about the importance of insulation and how it’s easy to install, working with salvaged wood, good business models for green building, and raising chickens.

Gennaro also goes beyond his site to promote green building in Brooklyn.  In a radio interview on Burning Down the House (click to hear, section:  Popular Recycled Materials in NYC), he discusses the value of reclaimed lumber and talks about my favorite source for salvaged wood in Brooklyn,  M. Fine Lumber. (click here to read old post on M. Fine)

In addition, Eco Brooklyn is looking for a  a space to keep their salvaged materials. If anyone knows of a place to rent, sale or donation in the Carroll Gardens or Red Hook area, get in touch with Eco Brooklyn.

Moe builds his furniture from resawn hardwood beams salvaged from dismantled buildings across the country – barns, warehouses, old mills – any of the approximately billion board feet of wood that is removed from buildings in the U.S. every year. “Each beam has a story and carries its history in its grain,” says Moe. “By reusing this material we reduce the impact on our landfills, eliminate the need to harvest trees, and are reminded of the simple beauty inherent in old wood.”

Andrew Moe, by the way, is the son of Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.  The plank doesn’t fall far from the barn.

This year Moe introduced Oslo, his first collection of 12 pieces. Cleanly designed with a minimalist purity and reasonably priced, the furniture received a lot of praise at ICFF 09. East coast ash, an indigenous hardwood, is the primary species, though others are available, and each piece is crafted by hand. Modern in design, Moe builds his furniture using traditional wood shaping techniques and joinery. He uses some non-toxic glue and his finishes are a water-based polycrylic.

Click to visit Studio Moe

Beginning in 2009 Studio MOE will donate 3% of its annual profits to The Alliance for International Reforestation (AIR), a non-profit organization which plants trees, establishes tree nurseries, and works with local communities in Guatemala and Nicaragua to help restore the health of the land. Since 1993 they have planted over 3 million trees.

by Daniel Sommer, Contributor

To many, trailer parks conjure images of poverty and undesirable living conditions. Brooklyn artist Kim Holleman challenges these misconceptions in Trailer Park, part of the Bushwick Biennial on view now at NutureArt Gallery. In the piece, Holleman turned the inside of a former camper into a live and growing public park. BrooklynModern recently caught up with Holleman inside her trailer and spoke with her about her work.

“I lived in a trailer when I was a young child, and I could always see to the other side of it. I always knew where my parents were, it was very cozy, it was very enclosed, it was a perfect oasis, and enclosed bubble…When we moved out of the trailer into our gigantic house, everything went awry. (This upbringing) give me the insight other people aren’t going to have.”

Holleman used her construction and fabricating background to turn a trailer into a fertile oasis, challenging ones expectation of what the object holds within. Replanting the trailer every spring, the plants themselves are found objects. Each one was found growing in Brooklyn and was transferred to the custom designed planting beds.

Also on view, Kim Holleman’s The View is a theoretical core sample of what the ground we live on has become. The hanging glass case contains a mini ecosystem, complete with living plants and bugs, but also toxins and pollutants. Over the life of the piece, the ecosystem has begun purifying the toxins and regaining control over the toxins.

The Bushwick Biennial includes shows throughout Brooklyn. Information can be found at www.bushwickbiennial.com

For more information on NUTUREart, see www.nurtureart.org.

Instructables is a great site for D.I.Y. types. One of their recent posts teaches you how to make a bench from cardboard, which has actually become a material of choice for many designers lately. The builder of this bench mentioned that he was inspired by the work of Brooklyn’s very own Scrapile.  Aside from being an easy project, this tutorial also has a sustainable benefit if it’s done with reclaimed cardboard.  The author also testifies to the bench’s strength, saying that it can support three adults. But just keep it keep away from water. Visit the tutorial here and download a pdf with instructions.

SCRAPILE ’s benches made with repurposed scraps of wood from New York’s woodworking industry. Visit their site here.

Fan cover repurposed into a Noguchi-style lamp.

In the article below from TimeOut , Rodney Trice of T.O.M.T. explains how to repurpose a fan cover into a Noguchi lamp. This project is très Brooklyn in that a lot of local designers are working in this vein.  However, Trice is actualy teaching the how to salvage objects at Brooklyn workshop. His website has a list of classes and features a variety his work. Contact him at rodney@tomtinc.com.

The item: Old, broken fan cover
Found: St. Johns Place and Washington Avenue, Prospect Heights, Brooklyn

The process: “As with all of my projects, a good degreasing was necessary,” says T.O.M.T. designer Rodney Trice (who was just named one of Time’s Green Design 100). “Next was to make sure it dried out well, and then I moved on to the removal of unnecessary parts. There was a handle that needed to be sawed off and the center ring with the logo was also removed.

“I was inspired by the very famous and beautiful Noguchi paper lanterns, so I decided to create a hanging lamp with a fabric cover stretched over the fan cage. This particular cage separated into two pieces, making the job of fitting the fabric a lot easier. I chose a stretch wool because it offered the kind of flexibility I needed without looking cheap. The fabric was measured, cut and then sewn to fit the shape—and then was pulled tight with a simple drawstring inside so as to give it a nice, taut appearance.

“I wired the lamp with three candelabra bulb sockets and screwed in small soft fluorescent bulbs with a candelabra attachment.

“The two halves of the lamp were put back together, and voilà! My tribute to Noguchi!

“Now that I made this, I’m on the lookout for more of these fan cages, because I am going to do more and hang them in groups of three in different shapes.”

The materials: Stretch wool ($14 per yard) at Mood Fabric (225 W 37th St between Seventh and Eighth Aves, 212-730-5003), and lamp parts: gold fabric wire ($5), brass chandelier canopy ($10), candelabra sockets ($3), threaded tube ($1) and bulbs ($5) all at grandbrass.com.

The venerable Isamo Noguchi

The inspiration: Trice riffed on legendary sculptor Isamu Noguchi’s Akari Light Sculptures, and New Yorkers can see the Japanese-American artist’s work all year long at the Noguchi Museum in Queens, where thirteen indoor galleries showcase his organic, undulating works in granite, marble, bronze and wood. Adjoining gardens offer a natural setting for some of Noguchi’s granite and basalt sculptures. But nothing impresses so much as the room dedicated to Noguchi’s illuminated Akari sculptures—in situ, the lamps take on the appearance of spectral moths. And, if you hurry, you can catch “What Is Sculpture? Akari from the 1986 Venice Biennale,” a special exhibit dedicated to the light sculptures (on view until May 31). Want one of your own? The museum shop sells Akari table lanterns for as little as $75. The Noguchi Museum, 9-01 33rd Rd at Vernon Blvd, Long Island City, Queens (718-204-7088)