Imagine looking at something familiar and seeing new
possibilities – much like artists transforming scrap metal, old bits of furniture, cloth or found objects Into unique,
imaginative creations. Their creativity embraces vision and outside-the-box thinking.
Add this to sustainable building and land use design and, voila! Repurposing -- other
ways of using our resources wisely.
One example: Sound Community Bank, seeking a branch in Port Angeles, Wash., found an ideal location -- an abandoned
fast-food restaurant between First and Front, the town's main streets.
Instead of finding a slab and putting up a branch, they decided “to have as little impact
as we could, to be friendly to the environment and re-use whatever we could,” said Laurie Stewart, the bank’s
President and CEO.
“What can we do
rather than haul stuff to the dump?” they asked.
Creative thinking resulted in keeping the same footprint and reusing fixtures and plumbing.
“We recycled a lot of materials to builders. Olympic Restaurant
Supply recycled the kitchen equipment. Even the concrete rubble from the walls went to the Olympic Game Farm that had some
use for it.”
They added only two
truckloads to the more than 130 million tons of construction debris hauled to U.S. landfills each year.
“Low-maintenance landscaping with native plants requires
less water – and only in retrospect did we realize we could have done a grass roof,” said Stewart.
Sound Community Bank’s first repurposed branch demonstrated
sustainability.
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Repurposing a tire store into the Lower Elwha Klallam Heritage
Center on First Steet, the tribe is “very conscious of green building, sustainable technology and using recycled materials,”
said Mike Gentry, the project’s architect.
The concrete shell, with six-inch walls of re-enforced poured
concrete, embodies the energy to excavate, process and transport those materials.
Repurposing saves all that embodied
energy, he said.
The corner of Peabody and First, once the site of a two pump gas station, also embodies stories
of early Port Angeles history.
Creating and preserving community are important tribal values, says Gentry, who
has also done projects with the Makah, the Quilieute and the Jamestown S’Klallam tribes on the Olympic Peninsula.
By locating a showplace for their art in town, the Klallam are bringing its creativity to the Port Angeles community,
he said.
Workshops for a community of artists is integral to the center’s purpose. “Al Charles Jr.
Is already working night and day carving pieces for the center,” said Gentry. “It all comes back to the art;”
More creativity: Transforming unused steel shipping containers into homes and offices. Millions are floating,
riding, flying or taking up dock space around the world because shippers believe it’s cheaper to get new ones instead
of returning empties. Enjoy some results.
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Whimsical repurposing transformed huge wine barrels into
motel rooms in Holland.
In Oregon, Rob Boydstun constructs green homes from crushed junked cars.
"I
knew I needed to diversify in order to stay afloat," says Boydstun, who launched Miranda Homes (mirandahomes.com), repurposing
a company that built commercial car carriers. His goal: sustainable homes that are affordable."
In Michigan,
where economic and social trends have shuttered many manufacturing operations, a Ford plant in Wixsom, a town of about 12,000,
offers a striking example of larger scale repurposing.
Cranking out Thunderbirds and Lincoln Continentals for more
than 50 years, it once employed 3,000 people before closing in 2007.
Wixsom’s derelict is now a green energy
incubator housing solar panel maker Clairvoyant Energy; Xtreme Power, creating systems that store solar and wind power; and
Oerlikon Solar USA, a thin-film solar technology company.
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle are no longer enough.
Rethinking and Repurposing help us tap important human resources like creativity and vision as we move toward more sustainable
communities.
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