The Green Building
The award-winning project The Green Building in Louisville, KY opened in the Fall of 2008 in the East Market District, the heart of NuLu, Louisville's arts district.
Renovation of the 110 year old masonry structure, a former dry goods store, was commenced by owners Augusta and Gill Holland in spring 2007 when they decided to become the first commercial building in Louisville KY to go for LEED platinum certification (the US Green Building Council's designation of a sustainable building). Intent upon rescuing the building from decades of misuse, the project included resuscitating the structural masonry shell and infusing it with a modern core, including a 40 foot high lobby, expansive natural lighting, eco-friendly materials, and renewable energy systems, as well as extensive solar power, geothermal wells, and recycled denim insulation. The Green Building Gallery, event spaces, and an indoor-outdoor courtyard at the rear complete with a green wall vertical garden. The second and third floors house office studios for SonaBLAST! Records, Holland Brown Books and The Group Entertainment.
Click here to listen to an interview with The Green Building's architect, Doug Pierson of (fer) studio. 
View Completed Project Photos (Album 1) 
View Construction Photos (Album 2)
View Construction Photos (Album 3)
Environmental Excellence Awards Presented by Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection
Winners displayed environmental leadership
Frankfort, Ky. (Sept. 30, 2011) – The Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection honored the six recipients of its 2011 Environmental Excellence Awards during an awards luncheon at the Governor’s Conference on Energy and the Environment at the Lexington Convention Center. The awards were presented by Kentucky First Lady Jane Beshear.
Through this awards program, the department recognized the efforts and activities of individuals, businesses and organizations that are committed to protecting and improving Kentucky’s environment.
Environmental Pacesetter Award for a Small Business: The Green Building, Louisville
The Green Building achieved platinum LEED certification, becoming Louisville's first commercial building to hold the honor and is Kentucky’s first Platinum Adaptive Reuse Project. Rehabilitation of the 115-year-old former dry goods store included resuscitating the structural masonry shell and infusing it with a modern core, including a 40-foot-high lobby, expansive natural lighting, ecofriendly materials and renewable energy systems, as well as extensive solar power, geothermal wells and recycled denim insulation. The Green Building is a prime example of the potential to be sustainable that exists in older structures.
Ben Sollee: "Merch That Matters", LIVE from The Grocery on Home, Ep 2
LEED Platinum retrofit serves as example for Green Energy Focus
HUNTSVILLE, Alabama -- The accelerating trend of green retrofits can turn blighted, crumbling downtown buildings into functional, energy-efficient spaces that help revitalize neighborhoods, according to a Los Angeles-based architect who specializes in "adaptive reuse."
Doug Pearson, partner and design principal at Form Environment Research, presented his adaptive reuse of a 120-year-old Louisville retail and warehouse structure at the Green Building Focus Retrofit Seminar at the Jackson Center in Cummings Research Park.
Local building wins environmental award
By Erin Austin | WDRB
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- It's called the Green Building. The Louisville structure was recognized for the environmentally-friendly design Friday that won it the first award of its kind in the state.
State representative Steve Riggs presented the building's owners, Gill and Augusta Holland, with an award of merit from Kentucky.
It comes after the Green Building earlier this year became the first commercial building in Kentucky to be awarded platinum level LEED, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, certification.
"A lot of people worked on the design. A lot of people worked on the interior demolition. You know, we didn't want to send anything to landfills. A lot of people then worked on sourcing materials, renewable materials, recycled materials, recycling materials from the building. And then we finally built the building and then we had to market and promote the building," says Green Building owner Gill Holland.
Holland says he's also proud of the impact the building has had on the design of other buildings in Louisville.
Current Exhibition at The Green Building Gallery
Awkward x 2 at The Green Building Gallery
May 2nd – July 27th, 2012
Opening Reception: Wednesday, May 2nd, 5-9p
Gallery Hours: Monday through Thursday 9a-5p Friday 9a-10p, Saturday 10a-10p
Awkward x 2 is the collaborative team of Los Angeles based artists Rebecca Norton and Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe. Individually, Norton and Gilbert-Rolfe's work share a similar sensibility in style and context, so they decided to begin their Awkward x 2 alliance during the summer of 2010. The resulting outcome of their joint efforts has created both a stunningly beautiful and a dynamic body of work.
The Awkward rule is that the painting isn’t finished until neither artist is sure of who did what. They start their paintings by combining two very different kinds of grid systems, and proceed to generate unpredictable and complex surfaces, combining color and space to evoke energy and movement operating according to a logic which neither painter could have generated alone.
Awkward x 2 uses science and technology as a starting point for much of the work. Paintings range from references of the unimaginable speed at which light particles leave a black hole to technological connections of artists through history who have attempted to replicate the brightest whites known during their lives (i.e. Manet replicating electric light, Mondrian recreating the light from movie projectors, and for Awkward the light of the computer screen).
More than the cultural, art historical or the scientific, however, Awkward x 2 is about sensation. Immediate and involuntary, the paintings filled with movement and color demand that viewers spend extended time with them to allow the works to fully unfold their character.
The Green Wall @ The Green Building
The Green Building :: Reclaiming Wood
