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Echo Studio welcomes the opportunity to try new things, and seeks clients who understand the need to question materials to produce beautiful, healthy, and inspiring places to live, work, and play.

An example of an ongoing materials research:

Translucent stair tower

How do you keep water and wind out and let light in without windows?

Fig. 1 East elevation (left) showing steel structure below reclaimed wood rainscreen (dashed lines), and section through stair (right)

Fig. 2 Perspective sketch of east stair tower and deck addition. Rainscreen shown as pale yellow.

This stair tower, part of an addition to a home adjoining a back yard, has the opportunity to bring in the glow of morning light from the east while giving some privacy from neighbors to the north. The current thought is to give the perception of movement inside the house and allow the steel structure of the stair (Fig. 1 above) to be seen when viewed from the back yard by using a translucent material below a rainscreen of recycled or reclaimed wood siding.

Translucent polycarbonate sheets panels or insulated glass would do the trick, but the first is a petroleum byproduct and the second rather expensive.
Is there a bio-based translucent product available that will not degrade when exposed to ultraviolet light or water? If not, is this a good opportunity for companies working on similar products to test an application? Can the use of a petroleum product be offset by using a recycled or reclaimed one? Is this ‘green’?

Learn more about this residential project.

See more examples of materials research in the new Materials Research section (coming June 22).