A Q&A with Lynne Templeton of Renewal Design Showroom By Emily Kovach You love your home, but there are always improvements to be made, right? Perhaps an outdated bathroom needs a facelift; a backyard deck isn’t looking so hang-friendly anymore; or—the big one—it’s time to rip out and redo the kitchen. But even smaller scale-projects,
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Breaking up with your old furnace and window air conditioner units By Brion Shreffler If your air conditioner or heater won’t make it another season, it may be time to think about a highly-efficient (and space saving) mini-split system. It’s easy to zone your home, so that you aren’t heating and cooling each room all
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Energy efficiency remains a giant opportunity for building resilient cities Illustration: James Heimer By Alex Dews Over the past 15 years, the Philadelphia region has been deeply involved in a national movement to change everything about the building industry: how buildings are designed, built, operated, demolished, disposed of and rebuilt. “Green building” is now in
More1. Hit the spring fairsIt’s that time of year where every weekend has another street festival with local food and music. But your kids will appreciate a good old fashioned Ferris wheel and some funnel cake, too. 2. Commit to the community part of your community gardenSure, you’ve cleaned up your plot. But those common
MoreIllustration by Kathleen White Most electronic devices in your home consume very small amounts of energy per day. However, most homes have over 40 electronic devices, many of which are left plugged in and continue to consume energy even when turned off or left in standby mode. Adding together the individually small energy use of
MoreInside the Walls by Alex Dews Streets, bridges and power lines all come to mind when we think of infrastructure, but the reason all those things exist in the first place is to connect and power the buildings we inhabit. In Philadelphia, our building stock is perhaps our most valuable infrastructure asset. Earlier this
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portrait by Mark Likosky “Energy efficiency is such a win-win. It truly is the cleanest, cheapest, safest and fastest energy resource, and it creates the most local jobs. In a city like Philadelphia, it’s also transformative. Harnessing our energy efficiency resource will transform our energy economy and enable our wonderful old buildings to last another
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