Stunning And Sustainable
One of the largest and best-known green luxury properties in the world is Acqua Liana. The home takes its name from the Tahitian and Fijian word for “water flower,” according to the Web site of luxury real estate developer and best-selling author Frank McKinney, whose company built the property.

The mansion, which recently sold for almost $23 million, stretches over 15,000 square feet, on about 1.6 acres between the Atlantic Ocean and the intracoastal waterway in Palm Beach County, Fla. The opulent seven-bedroom, 11-bath house has transparent, aquarium-like “water walls” and “water floors.” Other features include an oceanfront grand salon, a Hawaiian koa-wood oceanfront kitchen, two glass elevators, a wet bar with a 2,000-gallon aquarium and a courtyard pool with a floating sun terrace.

The property’s eco-features include solar panels that reduce electricity usage by 60%, a rooftop rainwater collection system that supplies the water garden and high-tech indoor air purification systems, according to McKinney’s Web site.

Showcase properties like Acqua Liana should go a long way toward dispelling the myth that green homes are either ugly tree houses or rickety grass huts, according to industry watchers. Williams says style is a critical aspect of eco-conscious luxury building. “Timelessness of design is important for longevity,” he says.

Blending luxury with green features is easier than one might think. “It’s a stupid notion that the two play against each other,” says Robert Fenwick-Smith, founder and senior managing director of Aravaipa Ventures, a Boulder, Colo.-based venture capital fund that invests in early-stage, efficiency technology companies.

Fenwick-Smith and his wife built the second LEED Platinum-certified single-family residence in Colorado. Like many green luxury houses, it’s designed to be visually indistinguishable from conventionally built structures. The home’s clean lines, modern style and native Colorado stone construction are what visitors notice. The solar panels on the flat roof, for example, are visible only from the hiking trails behind the residence. The geothermal pump system is completely buried, heating and cooling through pipes that run deep into the ground, where the temperature is warmer in winter and cooler in summer than the outside air.

There is one eco-feature that visitors notice immediately, says Fenwick-Smith. “The air quality in our house is at a totally different level from normal houses,” he says. The home, in the mountains outside Boulder, was constructed with non-toxic paints, glues and sealants, as well as green flooring and cabinetry. “Our number-one obsession was no VOCs [volatile organic compounds]—no formaldehydes, basically no off-gassing. Plus we constantly circulate filtered fresh air into the house,” he says.

Another invisible attribute common in high-end green homes is quality insulation. Williams describes a LEED Platinum-certified home that he built four doors down from Walton’s house in Encinitas as “super quiet.” “It’s so well insulated, you don’t hear the train going by, or cars on Highway 101,” he says. “You have acoustic comfort, but you may not notice the quiet until somebody points it out.”