Biography
ANNETTE STELMACK, LEED AP, is the principal of Inspirit-llc, fusing environmental stewardship and creativity. With 30 years of experience in the building industry, Stelmack is a nationally recognized design leader, educator, and author—synergistically sharing her passion, knowledge, and strategies for green design.
Stelmack was named one of the "Top Ten Green Design Gurus" by Innovative Home magazine in the spring of 2008. She chairs ASID’s National Sustainable Design Council and has served on the Technical Steering Committee, contributing to the development and content of the ASID/USGBCUnited States Green Building Council (USGBC). Organization devoted to promoting and certifying green buildings. USGBC created the LEED rating systems. ReGreen Guidelines.
Green Story
Her green journey spans three generations.
It began when Annette Stelmack's 17-year-old father emigrated from Germany after World War II, arriving at Ellis Island with little more than a suitcase. Her mother emigrated from Germany, too, and the two of them taught Stelmack her first lessons in frugality. "I grew up with the mentality that you didn’t throw anything away," Stelmack recalls. "We used things until they fell apart." Sustainability was a necessity, then.
Her parents also gave her a vocation. "I was destined to be an interior designer, making the home a more beautiful and nurturing place," Stelmack affirms. As a youngster, she worked for her mother, a seamstress whose customers included interior designers. During the summer, Stelmack pitched in with her father, a bricklayer who became a homebuilder. "I would spend time with my father at his drafting table looking over blueprints," Stelmack remembers, "or go out to the jobsite and mix mortar, help with the rough carpentry, hang sheetrock, or paint."
It took a third generation, though—her son—to color her design efforts true green. The birth of her son, Stelmack says, "changed the way I looked at everything!"
"It made me realize just how much waste there was in the world and in particular the building industry," she continues. "I needed to do more to make the world a better and cleaner place, not only for my son but for all children."
An EnvironDesign conference she attended in 1998 gave Stelmack the knowledge she needed to turn her parent's sustainable philosophy into working concepts that will benefit the next generation. "That was a pivotal moment in my life," she says. "I decided that this is what I had to do."
To Stelmack, green building is a process that occurs when all involved focus on sustainability. The synergy that occurs when a project team's vision, mission, and goals are aligned, Stelmack says, is the key to success.
Answers & Comments