Josh Salinger is the founder and CEO of Birdsmouth Design-Build, building custom new residential homes and ADUs, as well as some retrofits and remodels. They focus their new construction on passive buildings and have been doing that — and certifying them through Phius — since 2012 or so, operating out of Portland, Oregon, in the US Pacific Northwest.

In this episode, we talk about best practices and how passive building techniques and passive house certification are, in a way, nothing more or less than a means of following best practices at every step along the way. We talk about the benefits of design-build, the five things everyone really wants from their building (and how to figure out which one to talk about first), and much more.

Connect with Josh and Birdsmouth:

• Josh on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/in/josh-salinger-763a396/

• Josh on Fine Home Building => https://www.finehomebuilding.com/author/josh-salinger

• Josh on Green Building Advisor => https://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/author/josh_salinger

• Birdsmouth on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/company/birdsmouth-designbuild/

• Birdsmouth on Instagram => https://www.instagram.com/birdsmouthpdx/

• Birdsmouth website => https://www.birdsmouthpdx.com/

Lorrie Rand is a Sustainability Specialist at Habit Studio, a Senior Advisor at the ReCover Initiative, a Board Member at Retrofit Canada, and an instructor at Passive House Canada. Her first practice, Habit Studio, is an award-winning, women-led architectural and residential design firm based in Halifax, NS, focused on Passive House and deep retrofits.

In this episode, we talk about Lorrie's semi-accidental journey into forming two companies, how her passive house journey began with a client request, Habit Studio's commitment to building passive house homes at cost parity with code-built homes, Canada's big need for home retrofits, and more.

Connect with Lorrie, Habit Studio, and The ReCover Initiative:

• Lorrie on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorrie-rand-80b03611/

• Habit Studio on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/company/habitstudio/

• Habit Studio on YouTube => https://www.youtube.com/@habitstudioinc

• Habit Studio on Instagram => https://www.instagram.com/habitstudio/

• Habit Studio website => https://www.habitstudio.ca/

• ReCover Initiative on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-recover-initiative/

• ReCover Initiative on Instagram => https://www.instagram.com/recover_canada/

• ReCover Initiative website => https://recoverinitiative.ca/

Elrond Burrell is an architect and owner of VIA Architecture, as well as the program director for Building Science and a senior lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington's Faculty of Architecture and Design Innovation.

In this episode, we talk about Elrond's blog, Passivhaus in Plain English, including how it has helped open doors to new work and opportunities, the unexpected move to teaching, the challenges of building Passivhaus in New Zealand, and the persistent warmth and supportiveness of Passivhaus communities all over the world.

Connect with Elrond and VIA architecture:

• Elrond on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/in/elrondburrell/

• Passivhaus in Plain English Blog =>https://elrondburrell.com/

• 10 Things I Hate About Passivhaus! Blog Post => https://elrondburrell.com/blog/10-things-i-hate-about-passivhaus/

• VIA architecture on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/company/via-architecture-passivhaus-experts/

• VIA architecture website => https://via-architecture.net/

• Victoria University of Wellington Faculty of Architecture and Design Innovation on LinkedIn => https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/wellington-faculty-of-architecture-and-design-innovation/

• Victoria University of Wellington Faculty of Architecture and Design Innovation website => https://www.wgtn.ac.nz/wfadi

• Passive House Institute New Zealand (PHINZ) website => https://passivehouse.nz/

• PHINZ High-Performance Construction Details Handbook => https://passivehouse.nz/hpcd-handbook/

• Architype website => https://www.architype.co.uk/

• Passivhaus Trust UK website => https://www.passivhaustrust.org.uk/