HUMBLE BEGINNINGS

When my wife and I decided to transform our run down 800 square foot Minneapolis rambler into the my personal laboratory for mod sustainable design, a.k.a the Mullet House, I saw an opportunity to learn more about being a better designer for my region. I wanted to figure out ways we can create homes that work better, are healthier and are still really cool while minimizing their impact on the environment. Most of those great mod houses out there seam to be geared for the temperate climates of California. I wanted to figure out how to make something that worked better in my home town, where it's only higher than 50 degrees for 5 months out of the year. Those cool Case Study glass houses just don't work so well when its 30 below for a month solid. So I figured the best way to start was to look into other cold climates and how they designed their homes. This little trip to the library grew into an obsession with understanding how we can shape our world with design that works with what we've got, and in Minneapolis that is a WHOLE LOT OF COLD. With this question in mind we asked what do we do to make our 785 square foot 1948 rambler into a fun, mod sustainable home for a young family in a traditional urban neighborhood? Please follow us on our journey as we attempt to be builders for the first time remodeling our home into a modern sustainable pad.