The Guilford artists' residence building is part of a larger campus for artists and musicians for which Ryall Porter Sheridan Architects coordinated the renovation and addition to an existing farm house and also designed a new state of the art music recording studio. These first buildings were designed to have an integrated approach to energy use and are all heated through a central high efficiency wood burning furnace that distributes heat from a renewable fuel source to the individual buildings.
When it came to building the new residence hall for year round use the owners wanted to push the efficiency of the building even further to reduce the heating and cooling demand to a minimum. RPSA suggested the passive house standard and assembled a design team consisting of architects, passive house consultants, LEED raters (Efficiency Vermont) and the builder to work on the clients goal to creating a home for the community and for artists. Early design charrettes and regular team meeting throughout the design and construction process up to the final commissioning were held to ensured the building was designed and built according to the initial passive house targets.