The Stagehouse at Merriweather Post Pavilion is a Maryland highlight for USGBC Top 10 States for LEED®
In 2018, Maryland was among the top ten states for LEED®-certified buildings. Doo Consulting was proud to work on one of the most notable projects, the new Stagehouse at Merriweather Post Pavilion. This unique 25,897 ft2new construction project was recently highlighted by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC®).
The USGBC List
This month, the USGBC announced their annual list of the Top 10 States for LEED. Maryland weighs in at number 10 with 113 certified buildings and nearly 17 million SF of construction. Washington, D.C. was awarded an honorable mention because it is not a state, however it is the leader on the basis of SF per capita. Washington, D.C. has more than ten times the square feet of certified building per capita than Illinois, the number one leader! Together, the top 10 states are home to 128 million Americans and have constructed over 468 million gross square feet of LEED-certified space in 2018.
Merriweather Post Pavilion Stagehouse Project
The Stagehouse at Merriweather Post Pavilion was the featured Maryland project of the official USGBC Top 10 Campaign. Merriweather Post Pavilion is a musical institution that has hosted some of the greatest artists in music history including Elton John, The Grateful Dead, The Doors and Janis Joplin. Today, the venue hosts top-notch talent including Florence & the Machine, Jason Aldean, Phish, and Pentatonix. The non-profit owner, the Downtown Columbia Arts & Culture Commission (DCACC), and the independent venue-runner, I.M.P., are both dedicated to environmental sustainability. Singer song-writer Jack Johnson said, “We love coming back to Merriweather Post. This is one of those venues, I’d say probably number one, that not only did they make the (environmentally responsible) changes but they didn’t make us feel bad about having to make the changes and even made us feel good about asking to make the changes.”
The LEED Silver®Stagehouse at Merriweather Post Pavilion is designed to be a home away from home for touring artists. The sustainable design elements include touches that are unnoticeable to the untrained eye, like a white roof with a high-solar reflective index and building materials with no or low volatile organic compounds (VOC).
The Stagehouse design allows for a 26% reduction in energy costs and a 44% reduction in water use compared to a similar baseline building. Together with JP2 Architects, B&R Consulting Engineers, the Merriweather team, and construction contractors, we were able to reduce the project’s environmental footprint by utilizing materials with high-recycled content and products extracted and manufactured within 500 miles of the project site. A whopping 96% of the waste from the Stagehouse construction and demolition was diverted from landfills using salvage and recycling programs.
Merriweather Post Pavilion engages in a robust ongoing waste management program for their operations, composting food scraps onsite and recycling several waste streams.
The Little Things Make a Big Difference
It’s the little things, too. It’s the convenience of the bottle filling stations, the cool wallpaper made from discarded newspapers, and the creative reuse of old concert banners for just about any purpose behind-the-scenes. It’s about the fact that everyone’s in. The owners, the producers, the staff, and the artists are all in. Everyone’s on-board and speaking the same language, and they’re all saying, “this is how we do it now.” And these efforts are not lost on the 20,000 music fans that fill the seats and lawn for a sold out performance. Believe me – I’m often one of them. After all, music is about inspiring community – finding others to share in the groove. Merriweather Post Pavilion helps us do that. Now they help us do it more responsibly.
