Our Approach

Sustainable Lifestyle

SUN Studio designs neighborhoods, buildings, and landscapes for user-friendly sustainable living. Most people want to care for the environment and their community. This is the key to sustainability. Smart design can help make a healthy and sustainable lifestyle convenient, and dignified. We specialize in crafting environments where saving and generating energy, conserving water, growing fresh food, and healthy living can be second nature.

Greensburg Green Neighborhoods
Greensburg Green Neighborhoods, winner of the 2010 Colorado AIA Honor Award, proposed climate-responsive, net-zero energy housing for a diversity of family types, and which supports urban agriculture, composting, and walking.
Osage Street courtyard garden in Denver, Colorado.
Cities should be safe and delightful for all ages, all times of year. 3312 Osage Street courtyard garden in Denver, Colorado.
Ninth and Pearl mixed-use in Boulder, Colorado.
Living over the store: Ninth and Pearl mixed-use in Boulder, Colorado, 1999, with Wolff Lyon Architects.
Mona’s Restaurant, 15th Street at Platte, Denver, Colorado.
Urban life should be interesting. Mona’s Restaurant, 15th Street at Platte, Denver, Colorado.
3312 Osage remodel in Denver, Colorado.
Passive solar and balanced daylight make for comfortable homes that live large. 3312 Osage remodel in Denver, Colorado.
Geos Net-Zero Neighborhood in Arvada, Colorado.
Geos Net-Zero Energy Neighborhood, Arvada, Colorado, winner of a 2009 National Honor Award and under construction since 2015, optimizes passive solar heating and shading within a compact, walkable neighborhood.
Geos Solar Cottage
Passive solar is achieved with traditional building elements: Porches and deciduous trees shade east and west sides of homes; eaves cover south facing windows but let in the heat from the low winter sun. Geos Solar Cottage, 2016.
Prospect House 4 in Longmont, Colorado
Prospect House 4, Longmont, Colorado, 2000, combines traditional approaches to passive solar heating and shading with a high performance building envelope.
Solar Village at Prospect Newtown in Longmont, Colorado
Solar Village at Prospect Newtown in Longmont optimizes three-story mixed use urban buildings with passive solar heating and shading. Each home has a sunny south-facing terrace that is comfortable year-round.
Slingshot house, Coos Bay, Oregon, 2007.
Our homes are designed to fit their local climate. If the winter nights are cool, we provide a nice place eat your breakfast in the morning sun. If the locale is cloudy, we fill the homes with daylight. Slingshot house, Coos Bay, Oregon, 2007.
Greensburg Green Neighborhoods, Colorado.
Our yards are designed to be comfortable and livable year round, like outdoor rooms. Greensburg Green Neighborhoods, winner of the 2010 Colorado AIA Honor Award.
Shade and shadow homes
Shade and shadow keep homes cool in summer. Ninth and Pearl Mixed-Use, Boulder, 1999 with Wolff Lyon Architects, winner of a Colorado AIA Citation Award.

Design With Climate

Sustainability starts by designing for local climate and utilizing passive, non-technological strategies to conserve resources. For energy efficiency this includes smart site planning to maximize passive solar heating and interior day lighting, while minimizing excess heat gain in summer, or heat loss in winter. Furthermore, buildings and landscapes are designed in harmony with the features and challenges of their surroundings.

For water efficiency this means choreographing the flow of rainfall and snow melt to passively irrigate landscapes that provide food, shade, microclimates, habitat, and biodiversity. For living this means creating indoor/outdoor environments that harmonize with the elements and promote everyday use throughout the seasons.

Urban Nature

Sun Studio specializes in weaving natural processes into the built environment. We carefully assess the features of a site to choose where to build and where to preserve, to create the highest quality outdoor spaces, ecosystems, and habitats. At a neighborhood scale, solar oriented blocks and lots, green infrastructure, percolation parks, ecological zones, nature play, and bio-civic realms are woven into the urban fabric. At the scale of the home and landscape we look for opportunities to integrate sun, water, and vegetation with everyday life.

Prospect Studios, Live and Work in Longmont, Colorado.
The flow of water nourishes life. Prospect Studios Live and Work in Longmont, Colorado, 2003.
Prospect New Town.
Green Roof, Solar Village, Prospect New Town, 2006.
Geos percolation parks
Geos percolation parks integrate the flow of water with the life of people.
Geos percolation park.
Geos percolation park, with community garden, fruit tree terraces, and child’s play.
Las Cupulas, Sayulita, Mexico.
In hot dry environments, cooling comes from water, greenery, and the earth. Las Cupulas, Sayulita, Mexico.
Outdoor spaces in Las Cupulas, Sayulita, Mexico.
Outdoor spaces should be like outdoor rooms – comfortable as year-round living spaces and making smaller homes live large. Las Cupulas, Sayulita, Mexico.
Las Cupulas, with Lathrop Strang and Erik Hendrix.
Las Cupulas, with Lathrop Strang and Erik Hendrix.
Open home in Solar Village, Prospect New Town, 2006.
Homes should open in the winter sun, and support acclimating one’s lifestyle to the seasons. Solar Village, Prospect New Town, 2006.
Racclugia garden in Boulder, Colorado.
Backyard terrace, Racclugia garden, Boulder, Colorado.
Ninth and Pearl Mixed-Use in Boulder, Colorado.
Condos can live large by opening to the outdoors. Ninth and Pearl Mixed-Use, Boulder, Colorado, 1999 with Wolff Lyon Architects.
3312 Osage in Denver, Colorado.
Fences are for lovers. 3312 Osage, Outdoor living in Denver, Colorado.

Outdoor Living

At SUN Studio we focus attention on creating outdoor environments that are rich and layered in uses and experiences, and provide for a healthy sustainable lifestyle. We craft great indoor-outdoor relationships between buildings and landscapes to create microclimates for outdoor living, and intimate landscape detailing for activity and comfort.

At the neighborhood scale we plan for threaded pedestrian-oriented pathways and places, gathering and event spaces, community gardens and agriculture, nature play and ecological areas. Blocks, lots, and buildings are designed to provide sunny south facing courtyards for gardening, gathering, cooking, and dining.

High Performance

SUN Studio designs neighborhoods, buildings, and landscapes that conserve and harness sustainable resources. Climate smart site planning is coupled with innovative green building design, technology, and construction. This includes passive house architectural principles, active and passive solar, geothermal heating and cooling, and energy efficient, durable building systems, materials, and components.

Our landscapes provide comfortable microclimates for sustainable outdoor living and practical use. We employ green infrastructure to perform valuable ecological services such as biological stormwater filtration, passive irrigation, evaporative cooling, urban heat reduction, and food production.

Net-Zero Energy Building.
Passive Solar drops heating and cooling demands by a third. High performance envelopes drop them by another third. An energy recovery ventilation system covers the last third to set up a net-zero energy building.
Photovoltaic Panels at Solar-Village, Prospect New Town.
With energy demands so low, photovoltaic panels can offset one’s electricity consumption. Solar Village, Prospect New Town, 2006.
Rapp House in Summit County, Colorado.
Solar Village Homes developed air-tight, factory built, modular construction. Rapp house, Summit County, Colorado.
Geos Neighborhood are heated by sun in the winter
The Geos Neighborhood is laid out such that homes are heated by sun in the winter, yet shaded from sun in the summer.
Solar Thermal Panels at Solar Village, Prospect New Town.
Solar Village at Prospect New Town integrates Solar Thermal panels, and passive heating and cooling into the architecture.
Thermal mass home in Las Cupulas, Sayulita, Mexico.
Thermal mass can keep homes cool in summer, warm in winter. Las Cupulas, Sayulita, Mexico.
Private Yards in Greensburg Green Neighborhoods, 2010.
Private yards should also be high performance, incorporating sustainable features and supporting a sustainable lifestyle. Greensburg Green Neighborhoods, 2010.
High performance landscapes in Geos Neighborhood, Arvada, Colorado.
Landscapes are high performance, integrating stormwater runoff with passive irrigation. Geos Neighborhood, Arvada, Colorado.