Grow Community Earns the Prestigious Platinum Award from NAHB!

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Grow Community built by Bainbridge-based PHC Construction and developed by Asani, has earned the prestigious Platinum Award from the National Association of Home Builders, in its 2014 Best of American Living contest.

The sustainable, solar-powered neighborhood received top honors in the Green Community category.

As the oldest and most prestigious national design award program in the residential construction industry, the Best in American Living Awards spotlights the most creative and innovative projects from around the nation.

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The award was presented at the NAHB International Builders’ Show in Las Vegas this week.

Grow Community is the first development in Kitsap County, Wash., ever to win the NAHB’s Platinum Award distinction, and PHC is the first Kitsap builder to hold the award.

“The Platinum Award is an outstanding honor, and one we’re very pleased to receive,” said Marty Sievertson, president of PHC Construction. “To be acknowledged among the nation’s very best residential projects really speaks well to every facet of Grow, from concept to design to construction.”

What a great honor for our whole Grow/PHC/Asani/Davis team!

You can read the full news release here.

View the award on the NAHB website here.

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January 2015 Construction Update

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The weather has certainly been mixed, but Grow Community construction continues apace. Crews have completed the majority of the excavation work and have now started forming and pouring footings and foundation walls for the garage for the Grove, our next neighborhood.

While progress may not always be apparent from street level, we are using a “UAV” – an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, otherwise known as a “drone” – to keep a visual record of the construction process.

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In the lower right corner of the accompanying aerial photo, you can see a series of white structures. This is actually a small part of the foundation and garage for a building in the Park, Grow’s third and final neighborhood.

This section of the last phase had to be built first in order to support the utilities and structures that will be uphill in the Grove. Construction sequencing can present challenges, but we always seem to figure out the right solutions!

The crews have also started in on the portion of the garage under the Salal building, and will march around to the northwest corner and then head south to form and pour the Elan townhome building next.

While the garage is being completed, the framing will start in earnest, so the two tasks – concrete foundations and framing – will be taking place at the same time.

We’ll be up out of the ground this Spring!

Urban Land likes Grow’s common spaces

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Grow Community got some more great kudos this week in Urban Land, the online magazine of the prestigious Urban Land Institute.

Grow is honored in the feature article “Growing Sociability: Integrating Communal Spaces with Development,” which looks at “agrihoods” (development-supported agriculture), edible landscaping, and other trends in sustainable community design.

“A new day is dawning in residential development that can serve as a foundation for how people will be living for generations to come,” ULI writes, a comment amplified by a leading architect and town planner.

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Community, the planner says, is the next generation’s golf course – an attractive amenity to build a whole neighborhood around — and developments that include a working farm or agricultural activities are creating new healthy, cohesive communities.

Sounds like Grow! Our project manager Greg Lotakis tells ULI how Grow Community’s shared gardens are the axis around which our first phase, the Village, is organized. And what a draw those gardens are for buyers. The gardens are growing a vast variety of flowers, shrubs, and even some vegetables. The community is coming together and growing things for one another, creating a gorgeous landscape. Some community members have read a backpack leaf blower guide, learning to keep the space nice and clear so that there is a clear division between plants. As you may have guessed, there are a lot of leaves in this space, so being able to clear them with ease is important to the community and keeping this space pristine.

“We have microhoods-six or eight homes that face each other and the community gardens between them,” Greg says. “The neighbors work together and decide what they want to plant – and the gardens have really brought neighbors together. When people come to see the community, they see how lush the garden spaces are and the community interaction they create.”

It’s a great article on this exciting trend in urban planning, all the better for highlighting the success of our own Grow Community. Read the whole story here.

 

What’s it like to live at Grow Community?

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Our bountiful neighborhood gardens get all the press, but there’s still plenty going on during these chilly indoor months.

YULE FEST: Over the holidays one Grow resident hosted a Weihnacht Evening, a German-themed Christmas get-together with tasty hot mulled wine (and NA cider, for those who don’t imbibe), homemade cookies and spicy bread.

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FETE ’15: Across the way, residents of the new Cooper building threw a neighborhood-wide New Year’s Eve party, a get-acquainted social to introduce Grow’s most recent residents.

BARGAINS & BINS: Our eco-conscious ethos served us well through the holidays, as residents made sure unneeded items found their way to the nearby Bargain Boutique thrift store, and leftover packaging wound up in the appropriate recycling bin.

STAYING SAFE: Grow’s Emergency Preparedness Training got underway with the Bainbridge Island Fire Department, with the goal of “Building and Strengthening Disaster Readiness Among Neighbors.” Emphasis was on “mapping” the neighborhood to know our neighborhood resources and identify residents who might be vulnerable in an emergency. Grow is all about being a self-sustaining community.

PEDALS READY: The new bike barn was finished – and promptly filled up with two-wheeled wonders. One resident donated a small children’s bike community use, for any young visitors who want to get to know Grow by pedaling around the green.

GETTING ON BOARD: For strategically minded gamers, a new neighborhood Chess Group is forming.

Oh — and the 2015 Garden Committee is now looking for new members to plan for the upcoming planting season. You didn’t think we could get through a whole post without mentioning the gardens, did you?

Grow Community’s first phase, the Village, is at full occupancy, so we’re making more room just for … you. Find out what our next two neighborhoods, the Grove and the Park, have to offer by visiting our sales office at 180 Olympic Drive in Winslow, just up the way from the Bainbridge Island ferry terminal.

Learn more about the Grove on our website here and pay us a visit! We’d like you as a neighbor too.

Grow sets the table for Urban Agriculture

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Grow Community is outstanding in its field — more precisely, its planter boxes.

Grow is one of 10 exemplars of the new Urban Agriculture, the Urban Land Institute Magazine says in its current issue. The ULI praises Grow for the rich mix of raised beds and plantings throughout the community grounds, tended by residents and yielding a bounty of fruits, vegetables and herbs to be shared by all.

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It’s a sustainable strategy, the magazine writes, narrowing the wasteful distance between farm and table and enhancing food security. It’s an idea that’s catching on — and one that puts Grow Community in the forefront of a national movement.

“The rise of the locavore movement dovetails with an increased awareness of the health benefits of choosing fresh vegetables and fruits over highly processed foods,” ULI writes. “In response, municipalities, nonprofit organizations, developers, and entrepreneurs are bringing agrarian practices into the city, shrinking food deserts, helping educate people about gardening practices, and reconnecting city dwellers to the source of their food.”

Grow Community’s first phase, the Village, includes extensive gardens while the next phase, the Grove, now under construction, will be arranged around an orchard to produce “edible landscaping.”

Other projects feted by the ULI include the Grow Dat Youth Farm in New Orleans, La.; sprawling and productive rooftop gardens on Chicago’s McCormick Place convention center; and other amazing plots and pea-patches that have sprouted up in unlikely urban settings in Toronto, London, Montreal, Los Angeles and other major metropolitan areas. Great company for Grow!

Thanks to the Urban Land Institute for calling attention to Grow Community’s commitment to healthy, sustainable urban agriculture.

Read the whole story here.