Home Building

Think "green" materials and ideas when you're renovating

Randy: Green is big these days.
Paul: Yeah

R: Where do you see the impact in the kitchen area?
P: I'm seeing a lot of paint that people are using...I think they call it "zero fume", I forget the technical term for it but it's no fume or zero fume (zero VOC paint). A lot of people are using that kind of paint.

More info on Low VOC paint: Practical Environmentalist on Low VOC (volatile organic compounds) paint

...recycle and/or salvage!

P: A lot of people that we're talking to now are recycling. You know...kind of like what's old is new again. We had a lady who's kitchen that we were working on and she found a picture frame from Taiwan that was a beautifully ornate piece of wood carving. She actually made a pot rack out of it. She went with sort of a contemporary look in the kitchen but this pot rack fit because it was absolutely beautiful, but it was recycled!

...bamboo has a lot of potential that's finally being realized by today's consumers

P: You know, a lot of people are using bamboo. Bamboo is a really strong...I can't call it a wood because it's actually a grass, but people are putting bamboo flooring in and bamboo cabinets. The reason for that is because it's a renewable resource and it really grows fast. So people are choosing that over some of the more exotic hardwoods that you might see.

And again... I think we're seeing people are finding other different items to recycle. They kind of incorporate that into the kitchen. Even it's a contemporary look, they still want to recycle old items and find a new use for it.

...cork is a great green choice for flooring...

R: Do you think cork is used anywhere in the kitchen...cork flooring or anything like that?

P: Yes, I've seen a lot of cork flooring.

R: Really?

P: Yeah..yeah. I've probably done 40 kitchens and we've probably put cork flooring in probably 5 of them.

R: Wow!

P: I know! Cork flooring is a natural product. People that want to go green are going with cork because it is a natural product. The one thing about cork is that you have to have a perfectly smooth sub-floor. That's one of the things...that I think, if anything, has deterred people from doing that. It is a lot of prep work. And a lot of times you'll have to go over your existing sub-floor with 1/8" birch...1/4" birch. And then after you put the birch underlayment down, you actually have to come back with a floor smoothing compound to fill in all of the holes from the screws, staples or whatever you're putting down. So you make sure it is perfectly smooth because once you get that cork flooring down, if it's not perfectly smooth...it's just like VCP flooring (vinyl composite). You're going to see the bumps. You're going to see the divots and it's really it's painstaking but cork flooring is really nice. It's smooth. It's easy on the feet. The one thing about it, if you have to replace a cork tile, it's kind of a pain. So the maintenance aspect of it isn't the greatest. And the other thing that we found with cork flooring is that if you try to seal it yourself, you'd better be good at it because it's not that easy. A lot of the tiles will come pre-sealed and I would recommend that because it can be kind of a pain to seal it yourself.

R: I've seen cork in one house that I was featuring on my website, and they used it in the craft room on the floor and also in a large den/entertainment area.

P: Oh sure.

R: And that was down in the basement of the house.

P: Sure.

R: ...so I guess on a (cement) slab is where it probably works best maybe?

P: I would say so because you've got a nice flat surface to work with.

There are plenty of choices of building materials to fill the needs of today's burgeoning green homebuilding trends (hopefully not a trend) that allow consumers to have less of an impact on the environment from both the end product and the production of the materials. If you are putting your homebuilding plans together, I urge you to explore the plethora of green products and ideas that are widely available today. And don't forget to explore your local building material salvage yards. They are a great resource for cheap materials...and a lot of fun!

Related

See how Paul installed a floating floor system made of cork.

Another DIY Network link to installing a cork floor.

How to install cork flooring in your RV.

Natural Cork link...bamboo content, too!

Green Homebuilding shows you some options for cork, bamboo and much more.

Interesting reads...

More segments of my interview with Paul Ryan. Go to the bottom of the page for all of the links.