Home maintenance expert turns her own home into a testing ground for cutting-edge sustainable design

The CEO of a major home improvement business called Glasshouse, Shannon Bloemker remodeled a mid-century house that achieved the first LEED platinum certification in Piedmont, California. Pouring 15 years of experience with home renovation into the project, Bloemker used her own house as a testing ground for sustainable design.

Bloemker preserved much of the original look of the house, built in the style of mid-century modern, while giving it a beautiful modern makeover. She used natural and recycled materials and sent 90 percent of the construction waste from the redesign process to a housing non-profit for reuse.

The house features an impressive array of sustainable elements. Instead of using photovoltaic panels, Bloemker equipped the roof with a PV film that sits in-between the metal panels in the roof surface. This layer gathers energy from heat, augmented by the metal. A rainwater harvesting system collects about 4,000 gallons of rainwater that is used to flush toilets. Excess water us used for irrigation, while the water from the shower and bathroom sink are drawn back to nearby wetlands.