39 - Josh Oqueli - Bonsai Design + Build
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James: Hello, and welcome to Marketing Passive House, the podcast where we hear from architects, designers, builders, suppliers, owners, and other experts in the Passive House and high-performance building space. We'll be talking about what's working and what's needed when it comes to marketing buildings that meet or aspire to the Passive House standard.

James: I'm your host, James Turner, and today I'm joined by Josh Oqueli, architect and builder at Bonsai Design Build. Josh, welcome to the show.

Josh: Thank you for having me. I'm excited

James: My pleasure. So before we get into it, and for people who are just meeting you for the first time, could you share a little bit more about who you are, what you do, and how you started on your Passive House journey?

Josh: Yeah. As you said, my name is Josh Oqueli. I'm an architect that happened to acquire a GC license kinda early in my career and was able to start this practice, Bonsai Design Build years ago. Will be fourteen this October. So been doing this for over a decade at this point, this design build thing. But I took the traditional path to becoming an architect. Went to school for architecture got a professional degree, worked for architects during my apprenticeship years and later was able to kinda start working on some fix and flips that gave me the experience to acquire a GC license. And so that's how I paired both worlds doing the design build thing. So we're a licensed architect, and our focus is in custom residential. So we do whole house remodels, additions, and new builds all on the custom side of things. So we're not like a production builder, production architect. everything is definitely a one-off. And and then, we build our own designs. We're doing this design build thing from the architect's perspective where most design builders are kinda doing the inverse, where they're a general contractor will use an architect as a basically another subcontractor, no different than a plumber framer. We're, we're inversing that, so we're managing our projects from from that different mindset, if you will. Architect, professionals, organized all the things.

Josh: And we're building it. So we're essentially acting as an owner's representative for our clients from the design standpoint, so that, that has some continuity from start to finish. And then Passive House which is what this is about.

James: Yep.

Josh: I was, got interested in the subject pretty early on in my career. Just seeing how buildings were being built and just, living in crappy code-built buildings, even when they're new construction. You knock on those walls and they're hollow.

Josh: You're like: how is this even a thing? How are we building this way?" found, just doing the the research as to how to build better one thing led to another, and then you discover the Passive House thing. And then also had a stint going down the rabbit hole of biotecture. If you're familiar with Earthships,

James: yes.

Josh: down in New Mexico what's his name?

Josh: Michael Reynolds. And I didn't go to the academy, but I went down to, to check those out, stayed in them.

James: Very cool

Josh: Just went down a rabbit hole of like, how is this done? And so long story short, between Passive House education and the biotecture rabbit hole it just became evident that we have all the tools and knowledge building science to be able to build better. And so the question is, why aren't we building better? So that's where why Bonsai was born is just to explore building better, if you will. We've got this kinda niche in the market where everything we do is high performance. We're an architect-led design build that builds high performance. So that's our that's our forte there.

James: I like it. I love that it started in the earthship realm, or maybe not started, but but that was part of your journey. I think I may have shared with you, but that's also what got me ultimately what got me into Passive House was

Josh: Yeah

James: I started with Earthships are such a mind-bending thing, aren't they?

James: They're like, "Oh, you could live in a house like that?"

Josh: Yeah.

James: Then you start thinking like, oh, there's some like principles here that

Josh: Yeah

James: even if you step back from like the mud builds tire rammed earth construction side and you can still carry over the principles and just the idea that like we don't have to just build the way that we've, quote-unquote, "always done it."

James: Yeah.

Josh: I want I wanna say that biotecture was my first foray into kinda alternative building,

Josh: And then later was discovered passive house. It's been so long ago. I can barely remember what I had for lunch yesterday. But my memory is-- I just-- stuff falls off. It

James: Yeah.

Josh: the edge. But yeah, biotecture, it's, Earthships. Obviously what what's being done in New Mexico isn't for everybody 'cause, that for all intents and purposes, that's a bunch of hippies building, building homes.

James: Yeah

Josh: But you can take those principles and apply 'em to modern building. Within-- Obviously, you have to work within the confines of building code. You can't run raw sewage through the inside of a building, so you have to kinda work your way around it. Egress is an issue. 'Cause we've actually designed a couple of these homes in real life, outside of that experimental ground that Michael Reynolds has got in New Mexico, and it's challenging. So the-- there are things that you have to modify to comply with modern code, with our building codes. But those principles alone make it so that you can basically live in a house very low energy and off-grid. That's the point. That's the point of a, of an Earthship biotecture home. By the way, you can't call 'em Earthships if you're not trademarked. They're biotecture homes.

James: I didn't know that. That's the

Josh: yeah. He's

James: regular name?

Josh: Earthships, So

James: enough.

Josh: yeah.

James: That's cool.

Josh: It's just a word.

James: Yeah. Speaking of words, right? Passive house, passive building. Yeah

Josh: Yeah. Yeah. So that, that was the rabbit hole is going down the biotecture, we can do better, and then discovered the passive house thing. I became a certified passive house designer through PHI, Passive House Institute in Germany, and I held that for a number of years. But, going through that coursework to, to understand, how to put a building together so that it is efficient, it's-- that is some heavy science when you start, and calculus that is tough to get through when you're talking about moving the needle fractions of an inch to get you down to this super tight envelope. We have not certified a building because we've haven't found the ROI to make sense. But every one of our projects is always a high performance. So everything we do is we design it and build it so that it's head and shoulders above code built, and our clients are happy with it. We we do that sort of just as a standard and SOP. So we're not looking to, we're not looking to build code, if you will, and and then just pass that off as this is the way things are done.

Josh: We're moving the baseline bar. We're trying to raise the bar so that our threshold or bottom is already a high performance building

James: Nice. Yeah, it g- makes me think of the phrase I've heard now many times, like once you learn it, you just, you can't unlearn it. When you're making the assemblies, you just you know how to do it right, and you can't intentionally or not in-- you know, you can't like work against that.

Josh: Correct. Yeah.

James: Yeah.

Josh: once you learn it... Y- yeah, exactly. Once you see it, you can't unsee it.

James: Yeah.

Josh: so if there's a better way to build, why would you go back to building the poor way?

James: Yeah.

Josh: Yeah

James: So that's an interesting follow-up question that I think ties into this is the design build of it all. I think it, it seems to me, I-- and maybe you can check this for me, but like one of the biggest hurdles from the architect side of high-performance building is having builders build to the specifications that you specified,

Josh: Yeah.

James: that you wanted.

James: So does, is that kind of how... I know you were saying that you got into building through some jobs, but does that really work together, is what I'm wondering?

Josh: It's, it's-- there's definitely more friction in that process of design, bid, build, which is the traditional way that buildings done today. Owner goes and hires an architect designs in a bubble, and they'll design a fantastic building because that's what architects do.

Josh: We're trained to be artists in, for all intents and purposes, that's what architecture school is. and, a Passive House architect is gonna detail the building envelope, is gonna tell you where the weather barrier's at, how to seal it how much insulation, all the nine yards.

Josh: But then getting that to translate to a builder that-- hasn't been involved at all in the process that's a challenge, especially when a client isn't willing to pay for construction administration services so that the architect can stay on board and oversee the builder's work. It's it turns into a... It's a costly process to do it right, to design a building to the quality you're looking for to the, those high-performance passive levels. And then it's even more expensive to have that architect oversee that process where when the builder's not familiar with it. So yeah, that, that is challenging, and that's why we've gone down this path of design build where we are the builders.

Josh: And we can execute on details that we've come up with and the designs that we've come up with during the design process in the field. And then when challenges come up, the, it's the designer that's solving those challenges, so we can always solve them with that design intent.

Josh: The spirit of the building is largely there and the performance of the building is largely there even when challenges do arise.

James: That's great. It saves-- It feels like that would save everyone a lot of time.

James: And also as an architect you'd see your vision, your original vision

Josh: Yeah

James: much more likely to come to fruition, I would assume. Is that

Josh: It is, and it's fun, to like when, especially when the building is complete, you're finishing things up, you're like, "Wow, like I remember when this was a piece of paper. It was a drawing on a piece of paper that we were drawing." So it is satisfying to to see those things come to life and at your hands, if you will. Not that we're actually physically out there swinging hammers, we're overseeing that hammer swinging.

James: Yeah. And I feel as more like as a layperson, which is what I am, right? Like podcast host and layperson, but I'm not in the trade at all. I don't-- I think I would've assumed that the architect was involved through the process, and I didn't realize that was a,

Josh: Yeah. Not always.

James: not always.

James: Yeah. That's interesting.

Josh: Especially in the single-family kind of duplex world,

James: Right?

Josh: for any project that's developer-led, developers are notorious for doing everything as cheap as possible. They're-- developers won't hire us. We've had our bouts across the fourteen years of business here, that thirteen, fourteen years of business with developers, and they, they're not into paying premiums, if you will.

Josh: Not that we're expensive but it is expensive to hire an architect. So developers will hire a draftsman, and so anybody with a dr- a drafting certificate and has a little bit of creativity can design homes, and in most states in the country, I think you can, you don't need a licensed architect to do a residential. So any-anybody can draw a house, and as long as you engineer it, so you do need an engineer, for the foundations and whatnot and the structure of it. So you do need that stamped engineer drawing. But with that, you can go to town and get a permit, go to construction, et cetera. And so that's what most developers do. They're, they're not out there looking for, the cool architects that are gonna design the best-looking buildings and the highest-performing structures. It's-- That's not what developers are in game to do

James: Do you see a route to a develop design build firm?

Josh: Yeah. That, that's that's funny you bring that up. That's actually how Bonsai started.

James: Yeah

Josh: I was working for architects at my last job was at KTGY architect here in town that actually their main office is in California, but they've got like a branch here in Colorado. And while I was working there I was working on my side development. I was gonna develop a single family spec. once I got that, so I was drawing at night, doing the little architect thing after hours get, answering the city's comments, et cetera. Once I got the permit, that's what I launched the practice with is I I went off and managed the construction of that development. So development was always kinda, at the heart and center of Bonsai. Since I w- I got through that development and then later we went on developed a duplex did a few kind of remodels. We built up enough of a portfolio that people started calling us, clients. and ever since then, it's just been busy with clients and haven't been able to get back to the development thing.

James: Yeah

Josh: n-now that the market is soft, if you will 'cause things aren't firing all, on all cylinders as they have been in previous years things are a little slower on the client front, so we're looking to get back into the development side of things. So yes

James: Nice

Josh: high performance, architect-led development, that is in our DNA, if you will.

James: That sounds really interesting and a good way to, to use the shift in the market

Josh: Yeah.

James: your advantage

Josh: this house that I'm in, it, it was a development. So this is this is my office. It's a home office, but the building, certified although I'm looking at post-certifying it just for, the the badge of honor, if you will.

James: Absolutely

Josh: This is a passive house. It, it has all the principles. It has, it's a personal development. We live here now, and so we're gonna do this again.

Josh: We're gonna develop another single family that we will move into. And so that's the idea to kinda,

James: nice

Josh: experiment on the personal s- residential residence and and then hopefully bring that to market to more people.

James: And so do you use your existing office and home as like a, like a-- Do you do sales meetings there? I'm curious about... that's one of-- Marketing Passive House, that's the name of the podcast. Let's talk about that for a bit.

Josh: Yeah, that's exactly what we designed this space, this house to be is a showcase so that we can bring our clients in. So this area, if you ever come and visit us, we have a little conference room table and then kinda in the bathroom with-- that we set up the mechanical room so that you can kinda see the lungs of the building.

Josh: You can see the ERV and explain that to a client. We left the the vapor barrier wall open, so you can see the smart vapor barrier that's acting as our air barrier. It's got everything here. All the components of a high-performance build are here so that you can show and tell, if you will.

Josh: So that was the idea is this is a good way to, to market what a comfortable house lives in or feels like. Today's a really nice day it's not a good ex ex example. But yesterday was chilly, and I was in here hanging out in my T-shirt.

Josh: That's just a testament to how well this space is built and contains energy.

James: Yeah. And so when you've-- I'd love to hear more about the sort of interactions you've had with clients and like something I'm always after is take-- I-if there are people who come to you not knowing that a house can perform better tracking like when is the moment when their eyes light up and they're like, "Oh."

James: Do you have any kind of anecdotes like that or

Josh: I don't know because that might not be-- most of our clients, I'd say of clients that reach out to us are reaching out to us be- specifically because we have that niche.

James: Interesting

Josh: They find the passive or the high performance or the energy-efficient architects so that they're interviewing us because we have that experience. so mostly every-- most every client that's ever-- that we've ever engaged with, they have that, they've already got that kind of base understanding, and they're looking for that in their build, especially when it's new. Sometimes we'll get hired by clients that, we're doing an addition, and they just want us to do an addition as cost-effectively as possible, and there's no passive house or biotecture or anything c- considered as part of that project.

James: Right

Josh: W-we do those projects, because it's, we're in business, and it's difficult to say no to business.

James: Yep.

Josh: But the-- our favorite type of projects to work on are obviously the ones that push the envelope and let it, no pun intended.

James: Very cool. I think that's a testament too to the d- how the industry's moved, in the decade plus you've been doing this. I imagine 15 years ago there weren't as many people who would even be aware that high performance was a thing to look for. Have you noticed that? Are kind of people coming in just smarter than they used to?

James: Is there a kind of a

Josh: Yeah, I think I think I can say yes to that,

James: Yeah

Josh: 'cause we've been around for over a decade now, and from the time that we started to the, to, to now you can tell, the education level, the awareness of our clients is im- it's getting better, people are understanding what it-- that, a tight envelope is gonna make a difference in the long run, on a variety of different me- scales. For-- I think one of the big things that really sells this passive house thing for us is the comfort, the com- the comfort criteria. And I don't know if you know who Todd Collins is from AE Building Supply. He's been a big mentor of mine. He, he sells windows and vapor barriers and kind of weather barriers and all the SIGA stuff, the

James: yeah

Josh: He's gotten into like SIPs in the past. I've bought SIPs from him. So anyway, Todd's been a big resource and mentor in my Passive House journey, and he has that saying about about Passive House and how you should market Passive House to clients is push the comfort criteria. Because the other stuff, yeah, it's cool to us building science nerds, but a client, they don't really understand it. And it's gonna be impossible to try to educate a cl-- somebody that doesn't go through a Passive House course on how this stuff is gonna math out. I barely understand it. But the the important part is that you're comfortable in here, and you're not pushing your mechanical systems as hard as you are or you would in a code built where things are just leaking. I always use the the money out the window example or story. It's like when you're in a code buil- built building and you've got leaky windows and your machines are running, around the clock to keep your space comfortable because it's gonna be drafty because your windows are leaking, you're literally throwing money out the window.

Josh: And so that, that starts to click. And so that's that's one of the talks that I'll have with clients. It's with your leaky windows, you're literally throwing your money out the window. Yeah.

James: Yeah, and like even if the-- that, I think that's a really good... that's in addition to comfort, a pain point a human pain point, like this idea of waste.

James: Like I've got this thing that I'm just purposely wasting. Like no, no one... I think no matter how wealthy you are, you still don't want to waste money or waste, right?

James: Like

Josh: that's true. Yeah. Like when you realize like that you're literally wasting stuff, then you wanna do something about it to, to s- to plug that hole.

James: Yeah

Josh: I think part of the problem is that people don't know. They don't like... I don't know, they don't connect the dots that, an inefficient home, home or an old home you're literally wasting energy, energy is a resource, and it costs money and, all those things. Here in America, our energy is pretty cheap, so hasn't it hasn't become an issue. So that's-- I don't know if that's... I don't know. That's a it gets down to a political maybe, but the fact that we have cheap energy, I think has been a detriment in the long run because people,

James: take it for granted.

Josh: yeah, exactly.

Josh: It's

Josh: I'll just keep cranking my furnace and,

James: yeah.

Josh: keep my house warm." Yeah.

James: Yeah, that's, it's a fair point.

Josh: Yeah

James: And and I guess that's part of like why I think it-- I've talked to people now who have a space where they can bring people and like instead of just telling them it's gonna be comfortable, just

James: Show them that it is comfortable

James: And show them what's possible.

James: So I think that having your office

Josh: Yeah

James: be built to the standard's just the perfect way

Josh: Yeah. Yeah. The I don't-- issue is that when client-- when we bring clients in here, it's usually 'cause they're already clients. and so they're they're coming in here to, to, meet about a pro- a design or whatever, make some decisions, but they're already on board. so maybe I need to think about a way to, to bring potential clients in here.

James: Yes

Josh: yeah. That's a thing. And we'll note that.

James: Free drinks.

Josh: Yeah.

James: Non-alcoholic or alcoholic.

James: Just put a sign on the outside.

Josh: Yeah.

James: Yeah.

Josh: Wanna

James: All right.

Josh: house?

James: Owner's rep, I wanna talk about that 'cause I think that's interesting, and I think that it feels like a really good connector to being a design build firm, not just a design firm or a build firm, and being in the high performance space.

James: An owner's rep. I'd never heard of this concept until I talked to you. So could you kinda just talk about that a little bit?

Josh: Yeah. This comes from probably my background in working for architects and being an architect, and taking that traditional path. I spent about five years working for OZ Architecture. If you know-- if you've heard of OZ, they're-- I think they're probably the biggest firm in Colorado, architect in Colorado. And so they do cool stuff. They do big multifamily buildings, big corporate offices, all the things. they design them. And often the client that we would interact with was an owner's rep. because when you're developing, a big apartment building or whatever, it's not like one person. N-not very often. It's usually like a conglomerate of investors that will get together to pool their money to, push that development forward. And so that group of investors will hire an owner's rep to represent their interests. And so that owner's rep then goes and hires an architect, hires the GC, oversees the subcontractors, or is, involved in that selection process, is involved in, selecting the paint colors and the bathroom fixtures and the floor-- finished floors, owner's rep. It's basically the owner, but representing the owner.

Josh: And so that's where that whole thing came from. And then,

James: Nice

Josh: understanding. And then doing this design build we, found that we're essentially doing that service as a a baseline for our clients in a lot of ways. Our clients can be as involved or not involved as they want just, based on their preference. Every-- some clients wanna be in every last detail. They wanna understand how th-things are getting trimmed out and where the plumbing pipes are getting set because they wanna be able to understand that there, there's a pipe in this wall, 'cause it's, it's their house, and they wanna be able to maintain it or whatever, live in it long term. so-- But then there's-- you get some clients that live in another state, and they'll just send you a check as long as you build it to the design.

James: Right

Josh: Going to-- going through we realized that we are an owner's rep just by default. And then there are clients that really benefit from this because they're busy.

Josh: They are either like a busy doctor running a clinic or some CEO for some oil company that just, you know they don't have time to be in the paint selection and plumbing fixtures and all of that. We've been-- we've done this for that type of client where we'll s-essentially handle it, as, as long as the design intent is there. So this is this is something that's we're looking at how we're gonna market it as a as a true to the name owner's rep service with kind of that White Glove bent, if you will, where,

Josh: We'll conceptually design a project for clients and establish the parameters for the design intent. and the client wants, they can basically go away and we'll just keep daily logs.

Josh: They're seeing progress as often or as little as they want to log into our management portals to see where things are going. But, they can trust that we're gonna, we're gonna handle the build. and so that, that-- I think that's what it comes down to is a client has to trust that we're gonna be a good steward of their finance, of their money and that we're gonna execute on the design, per the plan, if you will.

James: Yeah

Josh: That's where that's coming from.

James: That's cool. And it seems like a really good match just for the high-performance thing if they're very interested in, like you know why they came to you and you know what they want out of the end project so you can-- the end product, sorry. You can represent their interests not only as like financially this makes the most sense, but also material choices or,

Josh: yeah

James: you do this, you're gonna sacrifice this thing that I know is really important to you, so we have to do it this way that, maybe unforeseen, something unforeseen.

James: I don't know, I don't know if I'm clutching at straws, but it seems like a really good match specifically for the high-performance building to my mind, just

Josh: Yeah

James: the-- there's more invested maybe in the choices that people are making

Josh: Yeah, I think so. A client that is gonna engage us for this kind of owner's rep service they're... bottom line is they're gonna be looking for quality.

Josh: And quality and high performance, they go hand in hand. So when you build a high-performance building, it's inherently a quality product because it, it took special design, special detailing. And when you compare that, a high-performance building, to a code built, a premium associated to that. So that type of client, which is our client base they're already kinda of that mindset. so when we get somebody that's looking for that white glove service the owner's rep, 'cause they're, they're too busy to handle the intricacies and the details of that quality build they, they're gonna trust that we're gonna execute that because we've got that expertise. so that's that's where it goes hand in hand, I think.

Josh: It takes a higher caliber build from... A higher caliber design and build to execute on these high-performance builds than a code built. These clients are looking for that. So it's just, it's a good fit, to, to use your words

James: Excellent. I'm glad it wasn't just clutching at straws.

James: Cool. Cool. Thank you. This is, this has been a really great insight into kind of the process maybe more than I sometimes get to. So that's been really cool for me. Probably part of the design build

James: Of your firm.

Josh: Get-- Yeah the design build lets you see how the sausage is made.

Josh: And it's a very messy, complicated process. and, we're taking that whole cluster of procedures that need to happen to get you to the point where you can move into your house, and we're simplifying them. We simplify them for all of our clients because we do this design build. But this owner's rep offering, it just makes it so that you-- it just alleviates your headache. But, you,

James: Cool. Thank you. This has been great. Before we go, where is the best place for people to find out more about you online, connect with you?

Josh: We have an Instagram so we do the thing there. You can look us up by just going Bonsai Design Build, and we'll pop up. We have a website, bonsaidesignbuild.com. and through that you can, reach out, contact us. I'm happy to meet with people and just talk shop or, talk potential projects whatever it may be. But

James: Nice.

Josh: we're an open door

James: Awesome. In your office.

Josh: Yeah. Yeah. Come to my office. Yeah. And fee- feel,

James: in the comfort. That's right.

Josh: Exactly.

James: Thanks so much, Josh

Josh: Awesome. Thank you. Thanks, James

James: You've been listening to Marketing Passive House. I'm James Turner, and I hope you'll join me again next time