What Does Honey Have To Do With Architecture?

The interests of our six studios span a lot of things: art, culture, music, buildings, food, fashion, furniture details, the subtle curve on a serif font… and we also care (a lot) about the Earth. With one global health crisis on its second wave, a constant tug of war in political upheaval, an overabundance of sometimes misleading information, and technology advancing at a rapid pace, there is no better time to reconnect with nature more deeply. The world needs it. It’s worth protecting and design can have a powerful hand in that.

This year at McKinley Studios we have some ambitious plans to pursue what sustainability looks like to us.

In the past we have honed our sustainability chops by designing a bridge that activates from the changing weather, renovated large scale buildings using legacy materials to reduce waste, and envisioned a solar collector parking structure to power 100,000 sq ft of retail space. We are integrating biophilia into almost every project we have, in a pursuit and belief that there are better ways to reconnect the built form with the natural form.

As we curate ideas from the studios, we recognize how a seemingly obscure concept on the periphery of one problem, paired with a deep understanding of another project, can bring to light some exciting solutions. These are a few of the conversations we are having about the intersection of sustainability and our work:

“How many hives would we need to bring 1 Billion Bees into existence?” 

“Is there a way to take a vacant lot and cultivate the landscape years before constructions begins?” 

“How much food do you think our studio team could help grow in one summer?” 

“If the ratio of plant to human for improved indoor air quality is 8:1, then what could this look like for a space with 300 people?”