“Salvaged Futures: Buildings as Material Catalogs,” a panel discussion hosted by Walter P Moore, explored how existing buildings can serve as the raw materials for tomorrow’s cities.
As the embodied carbon costs of common building materials become clearer, architects, engineers, and policymakers are pursuing circular alternatives to the linear, “take-make-dispose model” of business as usual.
Erin Heidelberger, Environmental Performance Specialist at KPF, joined colleagues from engineering, public policy, and the real estate industry to discuss how the building industry can move toward circularity and share insight from KPF’s portfolio of adaptive reuse projects and materials research. As a signatory of the AIA Materials Pledge, KPF is focused on minimizing environmental, health, and social harm stemming from building materials.
The discussion took place Thursday, November 20 at 5:30 PM at Walter P Moore’s office in New York. The panel also featured Lara Kaufman, Studio Gang, and Sydney Mainster, the Durst Organization. Panelists shared strategies such as designing for disassembly, using materials passports, and applying circular principles to enable reuse at various scales. They discussed how these approaches, supported by policy and supply-chain collaboration, can unlock the full value of buildings at the end of their lives.
