Obsolete Design Elements

Pocket doors are disappearing from old houses and rarely seen in new ones, yet they are a great way to temporarily divide large spaces. It's a mystery.

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Ever since humans decided that a hut and a veg garden were preferable to nomadic hunting and gathering, we’ve struggled with a problem we have yet to solve - where do we put the poop? The fundamental design of the toilet and the sewage infrastructure haven’t changed much since the Dukes of Dookie cleaned up the Thames. But, with 7 billion people on the planet and 2.6 billion with no access to toilets, somethings got to give.

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In Part 2, we saw how we used to build homes that recognized the patterns of nature to provide us comfort and happiness. Many preservationists like to talk about how “old homes are the greenest homes.” But sadly, the impact our homes have had on the planet over the last century and a half has been devastating to the biosphere upon which all life depends.

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Many preservationists proudly assert that “old homes are the greenest homes.” While old homes start with an embodied energy advantage over even “green” new homes, the energy used to operate them quickly burns any historical savings unless the structures undergo deep energy retrofits.

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Tucked away in the tiny town of Centerville, TN is a cafe on the square. Breece's Cafe has long been a place of pride for the town, and it shows in the historic

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