Once again, an energetic group of designers, manufacturers, architects and contractors came together for a day on the green at the beautiful Sequoyah Golf Course on the Oakland hills. The weather was gorgeous and the good times were a plenty.
If you’re interested in joining the planning committee for our 2023 Golf Tournament, please reach out (this is a fun committee!).
Early Phase Integrated Carbon (EPIC)
RMW’s objective for every interior project is to consider the health and wellness of our clients and most importantly the impact we have on the planet when building these beautiful interior spaces. Every project we strive to learn from our past projects and build in a more efficient climate conscious way. It is an arduous task to calculate and quantify our climate impact for each project, completely on our own.
Through much trial and error, our team found Tally, a carbon calculator tool. This tool can use our project information from Revit and give us a rough measurement of our climate impact. Tally is not a perfect tool and comes with its own challenges. We found it is a great tool for comparing design options in the beginning phases of a project. To really delve into specific interior materials, we found we needed to combine the use of Tally with EC3. EC3 is another program that connects with Tally and allows us to take the design to a DD level and compare specific products and their climate impact. We are currently working with a repeat client on a new interior buildout. With the use of Tally and EC3, we can compare our past projects with this new one. We can compare the specific materials used in the past projects with the new materials we want to use. This allows us to see if we improved our climate impact and how we can reduce even more. We hope to continue using these tools to evaluate our design and material choices throughout the design process for every project.
On September 9, 2022 our design community joined together in person again at the Four Seasons in San Francisco for breakfast. Former IIDA Northern California Chapter President, Donald Cremers was honored as a with the renowned Red Eames Stool presented by MillerKnoll. Our keynote speaker, New York Times best-selling author, game designer and futurist, Jane McGonigal, led us through some exercises in future tripping to instill a sense of urgent optimism. The legendary Cheryl Durst joined Jane on stage for a Q&A, diving into Jane’s story and how her futurist thinking can be utilized in the design industry.
In her keynote, Jane challenged us to think of 100 things that are (relatively) true about our industry today and how those things might be different in 10 years. Verda Alexander took that challenge to the airwaves (Zoom that is) and invited folks from our industry to a two-part series of virtual meetings where we brainstormed 100 things about Commercial Interior Design that are true today.
In part 2, we narrowed down a couple of things from the list of 100 to see how we could think like futurists and image how things might be in 10 years.
Being Misunderstood >>
Being Client Focused >>
For more information on Leaders Breakfast, this year’s keynote address and bios for Jane and Donald, see the event page. If you are interested in being a part of the Leaders Breakfast planning committee for 2023, please reach out.
On July 27, 2022 our design community joined together in person again at SF Jazz for a riveting conversation between Verda Alexander and this year’s Pioneer in Design, Walter Hood. Walter and Verda discussed how architecture/landscape architecture and memory & meaning intersect in the American landscape. Our chapter also honored, Kriss Kokoefer, President & Owner of Kay Chesterfield with the 2022 Distinguished Achievement Award.
If you missed this inspiring exchange, you can now watch the recording below. And even if you were there and just want to be reminded of this Pioneer and his vision, take a watch.
For all the background on our honorees, see the event page. If you are interested in being a part of the Pioneers in Design committee for 2023, please reach out.
We kicked off this year’s show and celebrated our community being together again with a live, all singing, all dancing musical tribute to the heritage of the Fox Theatre. It was a wild start to the evening! Dancers greeted guests as they arrived at The Fox, posing for photos and ushering guests into the main hall. The room was packed with familiar faces clamoring for that elusive Honor Award.
Our hosts, Tom DiRenzo and Brian Graham regaled the client statements, design teams and judges comments for ten projects honored with awards on this special night. Student award winners brought their families and teachers, manufacturers and dealers brought their clients and design teams brought the ones responsible for the wins. It was a night to remember!
Revisit some of the grand entertainment from last year >>
Planning has already begun for our 2023 Honor Awards! If you are interested in volunteering for any of our event planning committees, please reach out.
