Traverse City Business News

Sep 08, 2023

When Jess Glowacki's parents’ house on M-22 burned down in 2012, he knew what he needed to do.

The world traveler and eco-architect moved back to Traverse City to design a new home in two weeks, per the insurance company's requirements.

Glowacki considers the house fire a turning point, leading him that year to launch Traverse City-based EcoPhi Architecture.

In the decade since, Glowacki has traveled the globe working on various sustainable design and Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) projects. When the world shut down due to COVID-19, he returned to Traverse City to enjoy time with his family and put down some roots. He's focused on making connections, collaborating on local projects and testing out new sustainable design methods.

"My passion changed during COVID," he said. "All the things I had been working on to help all these communities around the world, in Indonesia and South America, I realized, ‘Hey I can do things around here.’"

The Traverse City West High School graduate has worked on various northern Michigan projects with local partners, including East Bay Structural Consulting, SEEDS, Bay Area Recycling for Charities, and Sorensen Engineering.

Recent projects include Strong Foundation Childcare, Richardson Retreat eco-cottage in Northport, Dune Bird Winery event space in Leland, BARC's De/Re Construction projects, SEEDS Historic Barns eco-education kiosk in Traverse City, Candace Raimi's upcycled home in Cedar and Hammond Eco Sky Yoga Park in Cedar.

As an eco-architect, Glowacki takes a holistic approach to the building environment. He says he "assesses all information available to make the most sustainable and economical decisions from material choices to social and economic impacts for the world and humanity alike."

According to Glowacki, eco-architects are "eco-warriors" who design for environmental, economic, health and social benefits. The goal is to minimize the environmental impact and optimize energy efficiency by using renewable materials and natural energy sources. They also factor in things like climate, culture and a connection to nature.

Glowacki's family home on M-22.

Glowacki stayed to help rebuild his family's home, named M-22 Phoenix House since it emerged from the ashes, and incorporated sustainable concepts throughout. They built the house out of insulated concrete forms, like a Lego set.

The multi-generational home has separate yet comfortable living quarters and outdoor spaces so the family can gather or spread out. Glowacki lives there when he is in Traverse City.

"My vision was to have a place we would always want to come back to and also make it so you had your own personal space," he said.

Glowacki's speciality is in building information modeling (BIM) and sustainable architecture. In a global world, BIM technology allows the team to work remotely in real time from anywhere.

"I always work with someone local on the ground wherever I work," he said.

All the people involved in the cloud-based project can access the building and construction documents. They can also view the 3D models in virtual reality and do sustainable analysis prior to construction.

"This saves a considerable amount of time, money and change orders during the construction process," he said.

EcoPhi also specializes in bioclimatic analysis, which allows designers and builders to utilize local climate patterns and resources to ensure thermal comfort and energy efficiency. They also consider the natural environment into the design.

"Lighting is such an important role in good design, and with the advancement in window thermal dynamics, it has become really amazing what we can do to bring the outside in and make us feel great while indoors," he said. "You would not believe the plants that love to thrive in the buildings I have worked on with big open window designs."

He has seen the benefits of building with natural materials and other eco-friendly practices on projects in other parts of the world.

"I think they understand their environment," he said of projects in South America and Indonesia. "They really have different building techniques and those techniques are amazing. You can live in these environments where they don't use a lot of heating and cooling (systems). They think about how the structure is going to be affected by the sun, the wind, the rain, the seasons."

Glowacki has owned four firms, developing partnerships that have connected him across continents. In Indonesia, he worked with friend Pak Rizal on ways to use bamboo for buildings instead of using hardwoods to help fight climate change. In Bali, he teamed up with Nev Hyman of NevHouse to create low-cost rapidly deployable homes made out of recycled plastic.

After a chance meeting with Jorge Londoño, president of GHL in San Andrés, at Glowacki's brother's wedding in Bogotá, Colombia, Glowacki worked on various projects to make Londoño's hotels throughout South America more energy efficient and sustainable. He also created the company EkooBIM with some partners to train young architects and engineers in Bogotá to take on large BIM projects.

In Colombia, Glowacki helped friends design a hostel in Minca, a small foothill town located in the Sierra Nevada mountains. He spent six months living with locals, who brought materials to the site by donkey and horses.

Glowacki designed and built this hobbit-style treehouse in Bali in 2020.

In 2019, Glowacki worked on projects in Bali, Indonesia, and traveled to Tulum, Mexico, to start a partnering firm and help Ibuku Design build the new Green School. In Indonesia, he specialized in bamboo, strand-woven bamboo and SIPOD panel construction while designing hospitality wellness centers, eco-resorts, glamping, hostels and eco-communities.

Glowacki's cultural experiences have informed his design sensibilities and innovative building methods. Material costs, government regulations and building codes are a few of the hang-ups when it comes to actually implementing sustainable practices stateside.

"We have gotten so stuck on just doing the same building typology that when we try to be inventive, the building code can be a deterrent from doing what we know is best," Glowacki said.

He says that buildings can still look a certain way, appropriate for northern Michigan, but that efficiency gains also need to be addressed.

"We could be building much more efficiently if we’re actually paying attention to the environment, how we orient our buildings, how we insulate them," he said.

It also takes getting clients and their builders on board, he says.

"When you have a team that believes in creating eco-friendly and eco-conscious projects, it is not that hard to be sustainable and make the right material and design choices," he said. "It just takes a team willing to go the extra mile and be proud of the project and the impact that it has on our planet and humanity."

As owner and founder of EcoPhi Architecture, Glowacki considers himself a synergist and synthesist, working with licensed architects, engineers and other partners both locally and globally. Due to his travels, he hasn't invested the time or money in becoming a licensed architect in Michigan. But he brings the right people together to tackle any project no matter how small or big.

Since his return to Traverse City, Glowacki has connected with SEEDS and Andy Gale at BARC and worked on some De/Re Construction projects, which repurpose existing buildings slated for tear-down. They’re also working on a program together to start training local trades to learn sustainable building techniques while creating affordable housing at the same time.

"I think with his life experience he does bring a more unique styling to his designs that you might not see with everybody," said Jason Toner, a structural engineer and owner of East Bay Structural Consulting.

Toner is working with Glowacki and Gale on a De/Re Construction project and likes the idea of reusing and repurposing materials when possible to keep them out of the landfills.

"He really wants to try to bring some of that to this area and I think it adds a different flavor," Toner said. "He's got some unique ideas; he's got some unique designs."

Glowacki also has some ideas on how to address the affordable housing crisis plaguing the region with innovative design ideas and sustainable building methods.

He says it takes a community that is willing to back it and tax incentives for the industry to build it.

"We need to get away from the (not in my back yard) way of thinking first," he said. "I feel if we find or donate property where land is not so expensive and make a rent-to-own or co-op development, we could make it happen."

A EcoPhi-remodeled chiropractic office on 16th and Cass.

Communities also need to be open to building truly minimalist spaces to live and work. For Glowacki, going "tiny" or even building a small home requires understanding how people live and move through spaces.

"It's about how people live and work and how they want that space to actually operate for them," he said.

He worked on finding efficient solutions for housing in Indonesia, where they had a need for two million homes before the pandemic. Reducing the finish materials on a building or using precast insulated panel construction where finishes are not needed can help reduce costs.

Glowacki's passion is modular adaptable construction methods, where wall and roof systems are built indoors and brought to the site, and rooms or panels can be added or reconfigured based on the occupants’ needs.

"My own home is in the design phase and will be a modular panelized construction R&D project to test new technologies and sustainable construction practices," he said. "I’m currently looking for volunteers that would like to learn from this experience."

Glowacki likes projects that use reclaimed materials, which can save costs on lumber. For people with historic homes or cottages, there are ways to work with an existing structure rather than demolishing it and sending those materials to a landfill.

"I am always looking for a challenge and coming up with a creative solution to reusing what you already have or have access to," he said. "For me, it's fun and it is why I do this."

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