Our 2025 Presenters

Our presenters come from a variety of green building professions and are invited to share their stories of innovative advancement in all stages and styles of green building. Each presentation is just 10 minutes, and all speakers are coached, to provide a highly entertaining and informative evening.

David Bennink
Beyond Reuse: Designing for Disassembly/Reassembly/Rebuilding 

 PROJECT TYPE: Industry Best Practice

Dave Bennink of the Building Deconstruction Institute has trained groups in 45 States/5 Provinces, helping start new sustainable businesses and diverting over 100,000,000+ pounds from landfills. He focuses on growing the circular economy, zero waste/energy movements, embodied carbon, and sustainable building. Re-Use has completed 5000+ projects and helped build over 200 reclaimed-content small structures. To keep in practice, Bennink also runs a reuse store and deconstruction contracting firm, markets reclaimed wood, and salvages and sells mature landscaping from jobsites. Voted National Deconstructor of the Year, he also recently won a Sustainable Leadership Award and National Reuse Educator of the Year.

Jan Spencer
Paradigm Shift and Eco Building

PROJECT TYPE: Remodel or Adaptive Reuse

Jan Spencer has been a resident of Eugene for 32 years. With a degree in Geography and great curiosity, he has traveled to 40+ countries over a period of five years. Jan’s interests are a fusion of care for the environment, sensible economics, urban land use, permaculture, social uplift and paradigm shift. Jan is vegetarian and car free. He is currently writing a book, “A Primer For Paradigm Shift.” The book explains why and how for moving towards an uplifted and sustainable present and future. The focus of the book is real life examples of paradigm shift. Jan’s 25 year suburban transformation is a good example of tactical suburban intervention and paradigm shift in real life.

Chris van Daalen
Boldly Go…Where Code Meets The Future

PROJECT TYPE: Policy or Program Implementation

Chris is a lifelong environmental, climate and green building activist who served as consultant to, and Director of the NW EcoBuilding Guild from 2018-2021. A pioneer of innovative solutions and collaborations, he worked with dislocated timber workers doing watershed restoration, built community forestry partnerships, and co-founded ShiftZero the zero-net carbon buildings alliance. He launched the Code Innovations Database for the Guild in 2011, a groundbreaking resource established as part of the Guild website. He enrolled at Oregon State University for a Masters in Public Policy to develop transformational building codes policy. He is now disabled (wheelchair bound) from a progressive neurological disease.

Annie Torgersen + Junjie Jiang
Net-Zero Affordable Homeownership Tukwila Townhouses – designed to Build Community – The Southard 

PROJECT TYPE: Affordable Housing 

Annie Torgersen will present on behalf of Valerie Thiel, founder of SAGE Architectural Alliance who had conflicting obligations. 

Valerie Thiel, AIA, LEED AP, founded SAGE Architectural Alliance in 2010. Valerie earned a Master of Architect and a Master of Structural Engineering from MIT. Valerie has over38 years of architectural experience and over 20 years’ experience in affordable and special needs housing. She is an expert in multifamily, senior, and developmentally disabled housing. Valerie has also been a passionate advocate for anti-displacement efforts in South Park and Skyway. Her credentials include certification as a Passive House Consultant.

Annie Torgersen With a keen eye for detail and a passion for innovative design solutions, Annie has successfully contributed to a variety of residential and commercial projects. Annie’s expertise lies in translating client visions into functional and aesthetically pleasing spaces, showcasing a blend of creativity and technical proficiency. Her commitment to sustainable and user-centric design reflects a dedication to shaping environments that harmonize with both nature and human needs

Junjie holds a master’s degree in architecture. During her academic studies, she developed a solid foundation in high-performance building design, which she has successfully applied in subsequent professional projects. Junjie was responsible for design refinement of The Southard, and she was lead designer for the construction documents of the Southard project. Her work spans from small renovations such as ultra energy-efficient homes for developmentally disabled residents to larger projects such as a tribal vendor’s market, tribal technical school, and 10-story, 144-unit work force housing project.

Ryan Lurie + Roy McGarrah
Joy on Lake Joy: Building the World We Want to Live In

PROJECT TYPE: Remodel or Adaptive Reuse 

Ryan is a founding member of Triple Bottom Line Construction, an employee-owned general contracting firm dedicated to mission driven construction. After earning a B.A. from the University of Chicago and a Masters in Philosophy from the University of Washington, Ryan began a career in sustainable construction in 2002. Ryan is passionate about all aspects of green building, from building science to carbon neutral materials to regenerative design. A Certified Passive House Builder, he has worked the spectrum from small scale state subsidized energy retrofits to high end award winning Built Green projects. In 2014 he delivered Yakima’s first certified Passive House. When not working, Ryan is an avid skier, climber, and lover of mountains. 

Roy approaches design through craft and community. They encourage people to connect through active and involved engagement with the built environment and enjoys projects which involve community collaboration. With a wide range of project experience, Roy finds satisfaction in a variety of scopes, scales, and sectors from private residences to cabins, to wilderness quest base camps, community centers, and animal sanctuaries. Roy was first inspired to bring a sustainable focus to the construction industry as a teenager working summers building homes. He translated this passion into a degree in Sustainable Design from The Evergreen State College. They attended graduate school at UT Austin and, later, the University of Washington, culminating in a master’s degree in architecture. It is their ongoing goal to build community around sustainable design, learning and growing together.

Ryan Temple
Diverse Pathways for Sustainable Wood Sourcing: Three Local Case Studies

PROJECT TYPE: Diverse Pathways for Sustainable Wood Sourcing  

As President of Sustainable Northwest Wood, Ryan is a regional leader in the effort to provide local and sustainable wood products to the green building community. Sustainable Northwest Wood is a B-Corp and the only wood distribution yard focused exclusively on offering local products from responsibly managed forests. Long standing relationships with Northwest sawmills, combined with an intimate knowledge of the green building community inform Ryan’s ability to ensure that each purchase for the built environment has a positive impact in the natural one.

Atticus Floqûet + Konner Franklin
SEADU by Eco-Build at UW 

Laura Elfline + Sage K. Saskill
Rooted & Resilient: Multi-generational Living

PROJECT TYPE: Estate Planning through Real Estate Development 

A Pacific Northwest native who has spent most of her life in the Greater Seattle area, Laura has over 25 years of experience in business, project management, and marketing. While Laura doesn’t weld a hammer, her adeptness in orchestrating the backend of both the business and projects is essential – ensuring projects proceed smoothly and that communication is clear. Passionate about protecting the spectacular Pacific Northwest environment she grew up in, Laura is constantly seeking proven methods that contribute to healthy and sustainable building [and life] practices to integrate into their work.

Sage – Architect and Wize guy – has always lived the ethic of reduce reuse and recycle ever since third grade art class. Mr. Saskill also boldly claims to be a Green architect long before Green was cool…. Sage has spent his architectural career since 1995 extolling the virtues to bosses clients builders planners colleagues and students the benefits of ecological design. He’s also a strong advocate for alternative construction techniques like strawbale and insulated blocks. When Sage is not at the drawing board he loves to catch live music and is very passionate about photographing bands in action.

Marcus Henderson + Sarah Smith
Teens Transforming Communities: Estelita’s Library 

PROJECT TYPE: Community Activation: youth-designed & built social justice library

Marcus Henderson graduated from Stanford University with a degree in Energy Resources Engineering but quickly pivoted into working on developing the skills needed to develop low-energy intentional agrarian communities outside of the current capitalist paradigm. This search for intentional ways of living led Marcus to Moab, UT where they worked with Community Rebuilds as an intern and then apprentice to learn about natural building and low-income housing development. Outside of Sawhorse, Marcus also works on urban farming projects and building community equity around food. (they/he)

Sarah Smith is an educator, jill-of-many-trades, and co-founder of Sawhorse Revolution, a non-
profit that teaches high school youth carpentry and design through inspiring community projects. She received a BA in English Literature from the University of Puget Sound, graduated in 2008, and promptly realized the importance of hands-on skills training. Since then, she has been working to develop experiential learning programs for youth. Sarah received a M.Ed from the Harvard Graduate School of Education in 2012, researching maker spaces, neuroscience of learning, experiential education, and the philosophy and history of education. Her life-long question is how hands-on learning intersects with 21st Century challenges and social injustices; in short, how can we live the possibility of another world, if only for a little while? In 2010, Sarah and several collaborators founded Sawhorse Revolution, both in response to the loss of shop class in the city, and to elaborate her unique vision for youth education and community transformation.