Sustainable Renovating: Owner Builder Suzanne McConchie’s approach

Author: BuildHer Collective
Published: Mon 14 Nov 2022
Episode Link: https://omny.fm/shows/building-with-buildher/sustainable-renovating-owner-builder-suzanne-mccho

Sometimes it can feel like there are only two options around sustainability - you either do the green life perfectly or you choose to ignore it altogether.

Owner-builder Suzanne McConchie is here to bridge the gap between those two extremes and joins us to share her approach to sustainability, which she feels sits in the middle of the spectrum.

While sustainability has always been in the back of Suzanne’s mind, it wasn’t until she started renovating a beautiful bluestone in Melbourne’s Inner West and faced outrageous building material prices that sustainability came to the foreground. Turning to a passive house design kit build solution, Suzanne realised she could address sustainability and save on building material costs.

Suzanne steps us through the renovation process, from the pre-fabricated building panels built in a factory and installed in four days onsite, to managing trades on site and the elements she did herself as owner-builder.

Suzanne shows that sustainability can be done well no matter how much you do. She shares how she reused items and building materials, achieved a smaller energy bill and why having sustainability at the core of her approach made decisions (like whether to get triple-glazed windows) easy.

I love Suzanne’s story. You can start educating yourself and take this approach too and it doesn’t have to be more expensive.

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Resources mentioned:

Suzanne’s house is for sale here!

Connect with Suzanne: