Lonely at the Top
For those seeking a truly green home, Atria is pretty much the only game in town
| Text : Elizabeth Kerr |
Until boutique developer Atria Green Residencies started leasing its retro-fitted eco-friendly apartments a few years ago, it was working as a consultancy, helping out like-minded friends and colleagues become a little more green. Two years later, Atria is still one of a scant few developers to dive into the eco-conscious movement with both feet. For all the talk of greening Hong Kong and living more environmentally ethical lives, little has actually come to fruition. In fact, “I’m confident to say that when it comes to low-rise, urban stuff in the heart of town we don’t have [any competition],” states Amil Khan, Atria’s director. To that end in July CHI Residences announced its own eco-flats in Wanchai would be ready in 2013, which will provide one more option. “When it comes to some of the larger operators, what we’ve noticed is that they’ll apply one or two green features and say they’re full on ‘green serviced apartments.’” From a comprehensive point of view, the greening process is still green.
Since 2008, Atria hasn’t actively expanded its property portfolio. Instead Khan and Co. have zeroed in on perfecting their existing residences. “What’s a challenge for us is to make the whole eco-conscious experience as complete as possible … We’ve looked further into the user experience for our properties.” The “sick building syndrome” — the relative health of any buildings’ users — is a major issue that has jumped to the head of the line. From the management perspective Khan aims to be as eco-friendly as can be.
For a lot of people, the concept of a “green home” is abstract, and the diffuse definition of a green home has made it easy for anyone to slap a green label on a property that has some big windows and recycling bins in the basement. So what? Big deal. “Exactly,” declares Khan. “It’s so easy to say you’re green and end up green washed simply because you’re not looking at it from a holistic viewpoint. You must, otherwise it’s not good enough. As time goes by more and more people will get educated as to how to live green. And they will demand more.”
So what separates Atria from the rest; the men from the boys as it were? Atria’s properties — clustered around Central and SoHo — focus fundamentally on waste management, energy-efficiency and materials, down to the choice of products used in housekeeping. Though Atria has a relatively tiny number of properties to lease, it boasts 85 percent occupancy. Khan sees this as a sign of the times, and likens the green living movement in Hong Kong to the organic food boom and a general move toward healthier living.
But that’s not to say it’s easy to convince people this is the way to go. Most of Khan’s tenants come from parts of the world that have more rigid green standards and have chosen to pay a premium to continue that in Hong Kong. Atria’s flats range from $17,000 up to $45,000 per month. “Our properties are kind of on the pricey side. It fits the mould of organic foods or fair trade … They do cost more than ‘normal’ products.”
The message is a hard one to get out, and it’s made even harder when suppliers are resistant to changing practices that have worked (or haven’t depending on your point of view) for years. “As a boutique developer, as a company that emphasises leading by example, there’s definitely a very important educative side to it all,” Khan says. “[Fighting ingrained beliefs] is normal. By nature, a contractor that’s never been educated as to what a ‘green building’ truly is … would have no idea how to approach it. Setting a foundation through education is naturally taken on by people leading the charge. Working on tenement buildings is the best way to start. The buildings themselves are from the ‘50s and ‘60s, so if you’re talking about the ultimate form of structural recycling it starts from these building in Central and SoHo.”
Policy is another area where Hong Kong is lagging behind cities like Vancouver and Sydney. “It definitely would help for the government to come in with subsidies or incentives,” Khan reasons. “If you look at the green movement worldwide, the most successful outcomes are the ones have been where the government has been involved from the foundation.” In Hong Kong major policy change usually works the other way around, with business leading the way. For now though, not that many are up to the task.
Hong Kong is also hampered by the base nature of the property market. Atria’s flagship Lyndhurst Terrace property is blessed with five hours of sunlight that the building’s solar panels can exploit. However, Khan estimates there should be about eight, which the high-rises bracketing his building make impossible. “I can imagine in three or four years’ time you’ll get two hours of sunlight … Adapting solar panels, in a place like Hong Kong, with time is going to be difficult,” he laments. But as there is nowhere else to go but up, working on mid-rise towers and moving into the middle-class market is where Khan hopes will be in Atria’s future. “In time we’ll probably get into larger structures, mid-rise buildings. Who knows? That’s probably our next step.”
In the interim, Khan continues to work on the brand and the message behind it. “As an operator, that’s what the brand stands for. A lot of people misconceptualise what a ‘brand’ means. We live in a day and age and [place] where a brand is just a beautiful logo. No. It’s a whole philosophy behind it obviously. So we make sure the story behind the brand is as A to Z as possible,” he says.
Khan recognises there has in fact been movement on green living. As little as a decade ago low-flow showerheads and dual-flush toilets were rarities; now they’re almost standard in new-builds and renovations. As it stands, green living is still the purview of the affluent, but as more and more property developers at all levels incorporate green features in their buildings, prices should become more accessible. Atria is keen to stay in the tenement game as opposed to branching out into easier new-builds, but for Khan, “My hope, my belief, is that one day it will become the norm.”
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