Building A Community From Scratch

Steve Nygren dives into how to actually begin the build process when you're starting from nothing. He knew he had to save his backyard and had worked with his neighbors to go to the state to make the laws work for Chattahoochee Hills, but he didn't yet know he was going to create the Serenbe community. That realization was never a moment, but rather over a gradual course of time.

Ryan Gainey had wanted to develop a street to show a better way to incorporate nature into the build. Steve helped him find land, but then he thought he'd rather have houses inspired by Ryan Gainey in his backyard than those built by a tract builder. The whole project hit him when USA Today showed up to record the beginning of them building. Steve Nygren was really going to build a sustainable community in the woods.

This meant moving the financial stability that came with retirement and property ownership and into the unknown as Steve leveraged his assets to finance the project. To this day, he has moments where he thinks "how on earth did I do this?"

The first step once they were building was to hire a land planner that had experience with environmental planning. They asked Robert Marvin, who was in his 80's but had been following environmental and energy-efficient trends since he'd returned to the U.S. after WWII. Serenbe was his final project.

Next they determined what disciplines they wanted to incorporate and talked with experts in the arts, agriculture, education and others. During talks with experts and with Robert Marvin's team, Steve met Dr. Phill Tabb. There was an instant understanding, because Phill's research had been on English Village Systems and he was speaking to exactly what Steve envisioned for Serenbe. Phill knew he could make the vision a reality, and Steve brought him on board to lead the land plans. They came back together for a 3-day charrette where they walked the entire property and Phill drew up what he wanted to do. Those drawings are what is still being built today.

Once you have a plan, you need a civil engineer. The initial company they'd hired didn't work out, but after a year they hired Southeast Engineering who ended up opening an office in Serenbe and is who still works with Serenbe today. The engineers worked on drawings and interfacing with water, gas, cable, Internet and other infrastructure that has to be included in any land plan. Underneath any community is a maze, because each of these utilities is allowed to build their own trenches, which intersect and run next to each other every which way.

One plan that Steve had that was not able to be incorporated was routing stormwater through a filtration system so that it could be used as drinking water. The plan called for a water tower to be at the top of the Selborne neighborhood with enough water at any given time to be able to service residents for 3 days. Unfortunately, EPD and the City of Atlanta didn't allow this to go through because of what it would take to monitor and because it would remove future City customers.

For the few infrastructure items that were not included in Serenbe's build, there were several more that were, including certified energy-efficient housing, Gabion bridges and other small yet significant touches. And Steve says to stay tuned, because he hasn't counted out the original ideas yet.

Questions Answered

How do you build a neighborhood from scratch?

If not you, who? If not now, when?

When did Steve Nygren realize he was actually going to build a neighborhood to save his land?

How did Phill Tabb get involved in Serenbe?

Did Steve get to include everything he wanted to in Serenbe?

Why were granite curbs so difficult to get?

What goes into putting something like power into a new community?

How do we reduce our energy demands so we're not using up our resources?

How does EarthCraft differ from LEED certification?

What is a Gabion bridge?

Why do third-world countries have more environmentally-friendly stormwater routing than the United States?

Where does stormwater go?

People + Organizations Mentioned

Farmers Almanac

Proctor Creek

Robert Marvin

Dr. Phillip Tabb

Southeastern Engineering, Inc

Southface

USA Today

Atlanta BeltLine

Biophilic Leadership Summit

Blue Eyed Daisy Bakeshop

Bosch

Bruce Ferguson

EarthCraft Certification

Chad Epple

Teresa Epple