Tag: #poche-truss

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Outside the Studio

Sometime in 2018 I was sitting in the sunroom at Red Wing, sketchbook in hand as I rolled a recurring thought around and around in my mind.  The first sketches came out and as I considered what I was thinking I kept applying more and more criteria to it.. could this shape itself to regional environments…could this deal with roof drainage in an elegant manner …could this form itself to superior interior spaces.?.?.?

I recently read this: if aeroplanes were put into production in the manner of buildings, they would not fly. In my mind’s eye, architecture can soar.  My thoughts as I continue to develop the Poche_Truss with the Brooks ADU under construction, fresh off the factory floor..

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Outside the Studio

As Architects we see those things that are not yet built or imagined. I have been seeing the Poche_Truss for over six years. First as potential: why can’t we build trusses that include the walls and the roof?? Think of all the time and material we could save! And we wouldn’t be restricted to boxes in a prefab world! And so it went, touching down with engineers, patent attorneys, mentors, fabricators… and the courageous and generous clients. The Brooks ADU has landed in the capable hands of Josh Mitchell, and in a small backyard off a dead-end alley in Boulder, the first Poche_Truss is under construction!

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ADUs & Poche_Truss

On December 30, 2021 I was leaving my doctor’s office at around 11:00. We noticed plumes of black smoke off to the south but went about our business in Boulder, stopping to eat at DOT’S before noting there was now LOTS of black smoke to the east.  As we ran our errands, the staff at Walgreens were all on their phones with reports of road closures, power lines down, and instructions to shut the shop doors. The winds were tearing up the sky and whipping the car doors from our grip. Eyebrows raised, we went off to McGuckin’s and found it…closed? By 4:15 that hospital and its campus had been evacuated by what would turn into the catastrophic Marshall Fire where 1,084 houses were destroyed, forever altering the lives of those households.

8 months to the day later, the Town of Superior has issued 32 building permits for 3.6% of their 380 houses counted as being destroyed or with major damage. Folks want to get back to their normal.

Here’s what I wonder: after COVID and the Marshall Fire and under the influence of climate change restructuring the planet’s ecology, is that even probable?

I jumped in with the rebuilding effort of Superior for two reasons:

1. Within months of the fire, Superior amended its zoning policy to allow ADUs to be built before the main house.

2. Xcel, the energy supplier for the area, was offering a significant rebate of $37,500 to rebuild to PassivHaus standards.

ADUs and PassivHaus will NOT give people back their normal. Instead, they set a whole new bar: better living, better building.

Better living: our ADUs are built with the Poche_Truss where the building form, both inside and out, are custom shaped to the contextual environment and desired experience, without a custom build upcharge. Living in an intelligent (think responsive) small (think less stuff) house will realign your living to what matters most – being present.

Better building: our ADUs are built to PassivHaus standards bringing superior thermal, audio, and environmental comfort; and by using the Poche_Truss building system, our ADUs achieve passive survivability in these times of uncertain utility reliability and climate upheaval.

Moving forward. Not going back. Good design is like that.  

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Poche_Truss

It is said again and again in the recent decade: housing is the one major industry that has resisted disruption. In spite of the facts that material costs are all over the map; there is a severe labor shortage; buildings account for upwards of 30% of greenhouse gases; extraction, manufacturing, and construction carbon and waste are generally unaccounted for or to; and, there is a severe housing crisis for those having no home to those affording a house on a middle income. Yet the industry barely budges. Small residential projects and developer houses are built as they have been for centuries, with few innovations. Aren’t we done with this? I am.

Introducing the Poche_Truss (PatPend), an audacious disruptive innovation in residential construction. It is a low tech invention that sits right under our collective construction noses, embodied in the humble truss.  

What is not to love? The thin profile of the structural frame and the spacious unfolding of setting them sequentially to magically create space. In my career it was inevitable that this humble construction strategy would take hold of my imagination. In 1997 I flipped the trusses upside down on the Shaffer house and never looked back.

A short two dozen years later, On January 22, 2021, a provisional patent was filed with the US Patent and Trademark Office: Wall Roof Truss Building System, Inventor: ml Robles. Presentations on this building system are ongoing.

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ADUforMe 2021

Our first wee house in a backyard is done!  #14 under Boulder’s revised ADU regulations. Its total cost, excluding land, in 2019-2020 was $190,600, at 540sf that translates to $353/sf.  

Our second wee house in a backyard is under design. This one is substantially different. For one, lumber costs have more than doubled in cost and preliminary cost came in at almost $500/sf. A 41% overall increase! Plus – Boulder adopted the IECC’s 2018 energy conservation standards. But wait, there is more – COVID-19 happened and the city approval process is spiraling in excess and redundancy. Yikes. I, however, remain undeterred in building ADUs to change the way we make small houses and use our urban land. ADUforMe and Studio Points are making their way through all of this. We bring a solution to the table. Coming soon…the Poche_Truss!