Went to see the Sunset Magazine 2007 San Francisco Idea House on Sunday,part of the Green House Tour. A lovely woman from Sunset stood outside reassuring people it would be open for ten weekends in October. If it ever gets finished. It's an ambitious house, made even more complicated by the dozens of vendors competing to get their products installed. Interesting details, like an indoor lap pool on the first floor. The greywater system. The low-this paint and the high-this insulation. And some glitches, like sloppy tile work and a custom stair that's too wide for the opening in the ceiling. Any cohesive design was elusive. Like so many show houses, it's on the brink of becoming a three-dimensional product catalogue.
The place was crawling with the fleece-and-birkenstock crowd. Little blue booties were provided. And volunteers everywhere preventing camera use- photography was forbidden. Which is understandable, since for Sunset, that's content. Best part of all, the windmill. It's the first wind turbine approved in an urban setting (and a provisional approval, at that) and should produce a third to half the house's electricity.
And it bore an amazing resemblance to the 2007 Curbed Show House. More after the jump.
· Got Eggs? [Curbed SF]
Park(ing) Day 2007:It was just up for a few hours, but the Eglu drew a big crowd of architects along with the expected crowd of local, sustainable agriculture adherents to it's site on Third Street in front of the Wired Magazine building. Isabel and Claudette loved the attention.