U.S. Design Firm Focused on Socio-environmental Solutions

April 12, 2010 - PRLog -- Last year, as the world dealt with the advent of the global economic downturn, one U.S. based design firm used it as an opportunity to look inward and refocus. In stressing the need for a solid foundation for the forthcoming green economy, R204DESIGN a firm committed to perpetual education, challenged all management, senior and mid-level design staff to become LEED accredited.

Their commitment to the environment is no new endeavor. In fact, R204DESIGN, has been in the sustainable business in the US, Europe and Asia for the past 12 years. Though their projects took on different shapes and forms of the now ubiquitous green movement, their strategies and concepts for sustainability have remained consistent, with a focus not just on environmental solutions, but the role that people play in regards to those solutions. In retrospect, the methodology to undertake these decisions early in the design process were not a consequence of a desire to differentiate as much as they were out of the need to be responsible to people and the environment. And any sustainable solution meant changes not just in how buildings treat resources, waste, or pollution, but also changes in the behaviors, attitudes and knowledge of the end users.

An example of this socio-environmental philosophy that goes beyond designing buildings is a project for the Environmental Awareness Center in Nagareyama, Japan, where the firm’s designers sought a solution that would educate local residents and ecotourists on the importance of preserving the existing natural habitats at their door step. In addition, inspiration and information on how to live, work and play in a more sustainable manner was a corner stone of the project’s raison d’être. More information on this project can be found at www.r204.com.

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R204DESIGN is an international design firm based in Los Angeles, California, with offices in Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai and New Delhi. The firm focuses on large scale mixed-use, commercial, residential, and retail projects around the world.