While rebuilding new Orleans, How can we preserve the unique architectural flavor of the city, maintain interesting, dynamic, mixed use, mixed income neighborhoods. Recognize the historical vernacular of these neighborhoods and their relevance in the history of an endangered culture. Keep properties that can be saved and restore those that can be restored, but for those homes and properties that are beyond repair, NOT demolish and waste a potentially valuable resource.

A ReWorked home will be the product of a tangential way of approaching construction. A way of thinking in which the flows of energy and material are observed holistically. By accounting for every material, its sources and the amount of energy it carries, we can engineer our designs to make appropriate use all materials. Salvaged, second use materials can find a place alongside new materials in the design process. The linear accounting common in a throwaway economy demands incessant production of virgin material followed by equally incessant and energy intensive disposal. Obviously this is not sustainable. By integrating salvage and deconstruction as principle in the design process, we can better balance ecological dept. This is the direction in which future construction must progress and the opportunity to make it a reality has never presented itself so bluntly. In post Katrina New Orleans the building blocks of a city are literally being thrown away. How can such blatant squandering of resources be tolerated on such a large scale? Without an alternative in place, the widespread demolition will continue.

To make deconstruction based Re-construction economically feasible it must be site specific. Each site must be evaluated for available materials and the design for new construction must reflect that resource. By designing around this stock of material the new home can make efficient use of these materials. An efficient floor plan and elegant, space saving design strategies could bring the new home close to being completely recycled.

This competition is a call for those efficient plans and those elegant design solutions that take material efficiency to a whole new level. Fully embracing the goal of 100% recycled homes.

Digestion and Rejuvenation.