We have taken on this energy efficiency analysis of Brick + Mortar with strategic enthusiasm by treating ourselves as top-down socioeconomic engineers. This entails looking beyond the specific technicalities of Brick + Mortar to include the grander context of Easton and its relationship with the Simon Silk Mill. By gaining an understanding of Brick + Mortar’s roles in the city and the mill, we will be able to perform a more effective analysis.
Easton, Pennsylvania, located on the intersection of the Delaware and Lehigh rivers, is a historical city that played a vital role in the industrial revolution starting in the 1830s. Canals were built that connected the coal, iron, and steel industries throughout the Lehigh Valley. The Lehigh Valley Railroad, first chartered in 1846, was crucial in transporting “anthracite coal from the vast coal fields of Pennsylvania” all the way to upstate New York in the Finger Lakes region, but first stopping in Easton (Lehigh Valley Railroad History). Additionally, the once flourishing railroad created easy access to and from the nearby cities of New York and Philadelphia (Easton Main Street).
Easton has now developed into a center for art, significantly motivated by the Arts Community of Easton (The Arts Community of Easton). “ACE’s mission is to encourage and promote all the arts; foster an appreciation of the arts; and enrich the quality of life by offering arts involvement, education, and community programming to the Easton area,” writes ACE’s website in their mission statement. In and around Centre Square consists of many creative gift shops, unique clothing, and art galleries. For example, Mercantile Home, a home-goods shop in Centre Square, says “we design and produce artful personal and home accessories utilizing new, organic, and recycled materials” (Mercantile Home). Slightly further down Northampton road sits Connexions Gallery where Alice Kwiatkowski and Anthony J. Marraccini have grown Connexions “into a cultural hub offering not just fine arts and crafts, but also an array of music and poetry performances not to be missed, as well as interactive arts offerings such as workshops and classes” (Connexions Gallery). In addition to its shops, the city of Easton has also developed artistic landmarks. The Karl Stirner Arts Trail converges art and nature by thoughtfully placing artwork in a “transcendent natural setting” along the Bushkill Creek for 1.75 miles (Art and Nature Converge). This arts trail has become an integral part of Easton, as well as Lafayette College as it runs directly below College Hill.
The city of Easton is unique in that it encapsulates both history and art. The installment of the Simon Silk Mill exemplifies this by revitalizing a once prospering silk mill built in 1883. Self-defined as a creative live-work complex and cultural redevelopment project, the Simon Silk Mill houses 10 buildings consisting of apartments and small businesses, many of which are art related. The Brick + Mortar art gallery, one of the components of the silk mill is the focus of our study and epitomizes Easton’s uniting of art and industrialization.
Small businesses meet many struggles while trying to succeed. At the beginning, it’s necessary for business owners to look at all facets of their business to set themselves up for success. There are policies that surround work health, employee benefits, energy codes, and many more when considering a business. They need to consider whether there is sufficient work space or comfortable heating and cooling, for example. Implementing policies like these are costly and troublesome for artists.
With a usual lack of capital and a tough art market to impede on, the main focus for a small business is typically on expenses and limiting them as much as possible. Furthermore, artists typically see little revenue and struggle with keeping galleries open unless expenses are cut. Magnus Resch, a London School of Economic graduate and current art professor and advisor, released a survey on 8,000 art galleries’ revenues in his book, Management of Art Galleries. Bloomberg reports “fifty-five percent of the galleries in Resch’s survey stated that their revenue was less than $200,000 per year; 30 percent of the respondents actually lost money; and the average profit margin of galleries surveyed was just 6.5 percent.” With little incoming revenue, a focus needs to be on limiting expenses. Resch found that the highest source of expenses come from rent, followed by salaries, art fairs, and transport (Tarmy). Included in the rent would be energy costs, a cost that we see as an opportunity to reduce through various strategies.
Our approach to this project has been to serve as top-down socio-economic engineering consultants for Brick + Mortar. We set out to understand Brick + Mortar’s social importance of exemplifying the integration of art and industrials in the silk mill urban revitalization project and how it’s just one of many businesses at the site. By further educating ourselves on the importance of the silk mill itself, we were able to find what challenges, and benefits, for Brick + Mortar there are by being apart of such a grand project. We then delve deeper into these contextual aspects and investigate their impact on Brick + Mortar’s energy-related costs. We begin with their relationship with stakeholders in both the Simon Silk Mill and the gallery/studio itself.
Visiting Brick + Mortar, we felt tension between the tenant and the landlord, two very important players in the Simon Silk Mill and Brick + Mortar. This causes concern for the future of the art space because a lack of communication and support can lead to extra costs. There is a service contract that VM Development group requires each tenant to sign upon moving in, yet Mr. Hampton is only one of two business owners to sign the contract. The contract is meant to provide service for any unexpected damage or dysfunctions. Though, when a recent storm hit in early November, rain freely flowed through the ceiling of Brick + Mortar. The development group’s servicers failed to help, and so Mr. Hampton personally covered the costs. What’s further concerning is that these leaks are common and prove poor insulation in the ceiling. This is a typical theme throughout not only Brick + Mortar, but all of the Simon Silk Mill, a major drawback of using a revitalized historical location.
As a business owner, it would make sense to repair this lack of insulation for comfort and energy cost reduction, but frustrating policy restricts him to do so. Mr. Hampton was very excited to hear this space opened up. He sought it out as a way to get involved in a community that is meant to be an up and coming, trendy location. It makes sense from an artist’s perspective both perceptively and financially. Being a piece of what feels like a campus full of artists will help drive foot traffic and positively impact their gallery’s image. This was enough for them to give up their location in Centre Square, the heart of Easton. Their gallery was in the former space of Easton Dollar Savings & Trust Co., which was built in 1922, but later liquidated in 1932 amidst the Great Depression. Although a historic location, it doesn’t compare to the importance of the Simon Silk Mill, which brings in a new level of acknowledgement and regulation. The Simon Silk Mill is recognized by the National Register of Historic Places, which is:
“The official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources” (National Historic Preservation Act of 1966).
By being registered on this list,
“it shall be the policy of the Federal Government… [to] use measures, including financial and technical assistance, to foster conditions under which our modern society and our prehistoric and historic resources can exist in productive harmony and fulfill the social, economic, and other requirements of present and future generations” (National Historic Preservation Act of 1966).
This is an optimistic, progressive approach to historic landmarks. Though, the next condition’s focus on preservation is what puts pressure on the development group to maintain historical aesthetics and thus results in disbenefits like poor insulation in the ceilings. It states that the Federal Government “provide[s] leadership in the preservation of the prehistoric and historic resources” (Beall). Preservation is important from the government agency’s perspective, but it is a big proponent of many of the energy inefficiencies discussed in this report.
Our salient question for Mr. Hampton asks if aesthetics are more important to him and his business than energy costs. There is a clear tradeoff between the two and several barriers that make it difficult to balance. There are political barriers that place struggles between governments and the development group, but then there are social struggles between Mr. Hampton and the development group. As a business owner, it can be frustrating to not be able to do what you want with your own business, but from our perspective we wonder what he actually does want with his business. He chose the Silk Mill location for its rustic, trendy atmosphere, and would love to maintain that, but that comes with costs, many of which are energy related. We hope to prove to Mr. Hampton that there is enough opportunity in energy savings for him to spare some of the aesthetics.
The social contexts are arguably the most important of this feasibility study as they apply not only to our project. The broader themes of urban revitalization and community development are ideas that go past the geographic barrier that is Easton. Urban revitalization has been occurring for decades, with many small business owners seeing the benefits of participating in such development projects for a myriad of reasons. In Mr. Hampton’s case, he was compelled by the rustic and aged appearance of the mill. However, like Mr. Hampton, many suffer from inefficient insulation, heating systems, and lighting, primarily due to the dated infrastructure and construction of the facilities. As a small business owner of an art studio and gallery, funds are scarce, which is a main design constraint. By directly interacting with a member of the community and understanding his needs for his own business, it is imperative for us to acknowledge his desire for aesthetics and understand what motivates that desire. In the end, we need to consider Mr. Hampton’s desire for aesthetics but also need to confront energy costs. Ideally, the two would be balanced to optimize aesthetics and minimize expenses.
Next section: Technical Context