Thursday, July 17, 2008

Green garden office - an American view

Lloyd Alter at Treehugger had a good long look at our post earlier in the week on green garden offices and very kindly added a North American viewpoint. Here are his views:
PVC windows
There are lots of North American sources of wood windows, but you should also check for used windows at Habitat for Humanity and other deconstruction sources.

Wooden cladding and flooring
In North America there are lots of FSC certified woods available now, as well as resawn boards. Keep away from ANY pressure treated woods.

Insulation
In North America one can get Denim, but most shed sized buildings are made from 2x4 studs, which will give a maximum of R12 insulation with wools. Again, since the areas are so small, I would consider a soy foam or icynene if I could get an installer to do such a small job.

Paints and wood stains
Absolutely critical in such a small space to use formaldehyde free, non-toxic finishes. I would also not bring any furniture or millwork that was made with formaldehyde binders and would think twice about having a laser printer. You want to start with clean air and keep it that way.

1 comment:

  1. Hi Alex - I thought I'd come over from BSC to answer your pollster response to me on there. So apologies for being off-topic on here.

    I think it's just Blogger polls that are a problem. I also have some blogs that I get stuck in (I get trapped in your Shed!) and it seems to be those Blogger blogs that are running a poll. It used to happen with The Garden Monkey, but since polls on there have stopped I can extricate myself safely and not get worried I might turn into Carol Klein!

    Hmm you've also given me food for thought - I'm working on a shiny new blog and have put a Blogger poll on there. Perhaps I need to think again.

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