Our "Happy Hour" to Become the "Global Passive House Showcase"
September 1 will witness the launch of our Global Passive House Showcase, formerly known as the Global Passive House Happy Hour, and we couldn't be more excited for what's in store. This weekly Wednesday series will feature the same "fast, factual, and fun" focus and will showcase (see what I did there) cool, cutting-edge projects from around the world. The Passive House Showcase will also be full of the interactive connection and community that we all expect from Accelerator programs.
So why the name change? We want to grow the Passive House and larger building decarbonization communities. "Happy Hour" connotes booze, which can be fine, but not particularly welcoming to youth or to anyone in recovery. And who, if they are curious about how to make buildings part of a zero carbon future, can resist a "Showcase" of Passive House design and construction bad-assery?
We do have a couple changes planned:
First, the intro segment of the show will be much shorter so that we can dive into the presentation as quickly as possible. So, we'll have few if any announcements and will save the socializing breakout room sessions for the end of the hour.
Second, we'll weave in a UK- or European-based project once every month. And when we do that, we will...hold onto your seats...change the time of the event. (We've never done that before.) The UK/Europe-based showcases will run at 7pm British Summer Time (or 2pm Eastern and 11am Pacific). In addition to being a good fit for our UK and European friends, we expect this new time (once a month) will be welcomed by folks in North America (like parents of young kids) who have been unable to attend evening events.
Again, this different UK-Europe-friendly timeslot will happen once a month. All other Wednesdays will be the normal 7pm Eastern and 4pm Pacific time. (For our friends Down Under, that hits on Thursday mornings, of course.)
(Note that we also plan to weave in projects from elsewhere around the world, but plan to showcase those projects at our "regular" time.)
It's going to be great!
During the August break in programming that we've had at the Passive House Accelerator, we've been hard at work lining up an incredible fall. (Special thanks to Sydney Gladu for making this happen.) Check out the first month of the Global Passive House Showcase:
Sept. 1: Temporal.haus: Climate refugee housing (Venice Biennale 2021), Andrew Michler
Sept. 8: Architype, Anne-Marie Fallon (NOTE special timeslot: 7pm British Summer Time, 2pm Eastern, 11am Pacific)
Sept. 15: Harbor Village Affordable Housing: The Massachusetts Passive House boom, Michelle Apigian
Sept. 21: Living Building with Passive Design: PAE Engineers' new Portland office, Kathy Shaloo Berg
Sept. 28: Recladding Facade of a Manhattan Apartment Building, Alissa Bucher
Enjoy the waning days of August, and see you all soon in September!