Tag Archives: Steve Glenn

Prefaboo: LivingHomes’ Steve Glenn Visits Art Center

LivingHomes founder and CEO, Steve Glenn

Have you made it to each and every one of this term’s Big Picture Lecture Series? No? Did you know you can watch them, in their entirety, on Art Center’s iTunes U page? Just make sure you have the latest version of iTunes and start watching!

This past Monday, ecological entrepreneur Steve Glenn spoke to a standing-room-only crowd in Art Center’s Los Angeles Times Media Center about his company LivingHomes, which works with renowned architects, like Ray Kappe and KieranTimberlake Associates, to create prefabricated homes.

During the lecture, Glenn made a compelling argument for why prefab homes can be built “better, quicker, cheaper and with a smaller ecological footprint” than traditional on-site construction.

LivingHomes first building, Glenn's house

He also shared some personal history and provided insight to his business decisions.

On his earlier aspirations:

“I wanted to be Frank Lloyd Wright. In college I [entered] a design program and learned that I neither had the talent nor the temperament to be an architect. I also learned that [Frank Lloyd Wright] wasn’t such a nice guy.”

On Ray Kappe:

“Ray Kappe is one of my all-time favorite architects. He has a big ego about design but not about himself. His public reputation . . . is nowhere as great as it should be, based on the work that he does. He’s a rare modernist that integrates a craftsman-like attention to detail and warmth.”

On the ecological benefits of prefab:

“In typical site-built construction, 30 to 40 percent of the materials end up as construction waste. Indeed, if you talk to any of the landfill guys, they’ll tell you the biggest part of any landfill, up to one third, is construction waste.”

On why he chose his house as LivingHomes’ first project:

“I didn’t want any other customer to bitch at us if anything was wrong. I’d be the customer. There’d be no one else to bitch at. I’d take the biggest grenades.”

Glenn’s home, a modernist structure chock-full of ecological amenities—a photovoltaic “LivingRoof” that produces 75 percent of the home’s power needs, a cistern that recycles water into a pond and a waterfall, and low-flow faucets, just to name a few—was the first home to ever receive LEED Platinum certification.

Be sure to check out the entire lecture online.

Next up in the Big Picture Lecture series: LA Weekly’s Pulitzer Prize-winning food critic Jonathan Gold presents “Authenticity, Culture and the Kimchi Taco” (July 5, 1 pm, Los Angeles Times Media Center).

Big Picture Lecture Series: Steve Glenn

Don’t miss Monday’s Big Picture Lecture Series featuring Steve Glenn.

Glenn develops modern, prefabricated homes that combine world-class architecture with a commitment to healthy and sustainable construction. He is founder and CEO of LivingHomes, a company that creates homes with a small ecological footprint. The first LivingHome, designed by Ray Kappe, was installed in eight hours.  It became the first home ever to receive a LEED for Home Platinum rating, and was the only home to win the AIA’s top sustainability award in 2007.

Before LivingHomes, Glenn worked with the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative (CHAI) and was a founding partner of idealab.

Big Picture Lecture Series:
Monday, June 14, 1 pm
Los Angeles Times Media Center, Hillside Campus

Big Picture Lecture Series Kicks Off June 7

It’s the start of a new term, which means the start of a new Big Picture Lecture Series. The Toyota Motor Corporation Endowed Lecture Series brings visionary thinkers from around the world to campus to discuss the cultural and political currents shaping art and design.

The series kicks off Monday, June 7, at 1 pm in the Los Angeles Times Media Center at Hillside Campus. All lectures are free and open to the public. Coming up for Spring Term:

June 7: Jack Rakove, Revolutionaries: Big Thoughts on Founders’ Chic
Jack Rakove is a history and political science professor at Stanford University. The recipient of the 1997 Pulitzer Prize in history, his research revolves around the American Revolution and the adoption of the Constitution.

June 14: Steve Glenn, High Design, Low Impact: Creating LivingHomes
Steve Glenn develops modern, prefabricated homes that combine world-class architecture with a commitment to healthy and sustainable construction. He is founder and CEO of LivingHomes, a company that creates homes with a small ecological footprint.

July 5: Jonathan Gold, Authenticity, Culture and the Kimchi Taco
Jonathan Gold is the LA Weekly’s renowned restaurant critic and the author of Counter Intelligence: Where to Eat in the Real Los Angeles. In 2007, he became the first food writer to win the Pulitzer Prize in criticism.

July 12: Sandra Ball-Rokeach, The Seeds of Civic Engagement in Contemporary Urban Communities
Sandra Ball-Rokeach is a communication and sociology professor at USC and principal investigator of the decade-long research program, Metamorphosis: Transforming the Ties that Bind.

July 19: Jean-Pierre Hebert, Art and Science
Jean-Pierre Hebert is artist-in-residence at the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. His 40-year interest in mathematics, physics, music and computer science has resulted in the production of a large body of work at the intersection of art and science.

July 26: Paul Vangelisti, The Art of Being Elsewhere: A Writer’s Life
Paul Vangelisti is a poet and broadcaster who has written more than 20 books of poetry, and is also a noted Italian translator. He helped create the graduate writing program at Otis College of Art and Design.