Local home-building design company gets featured in Huffington Post
By Nelson Daily Staff
A local couple received some unexpected press for their home-building design company from Huffington Post Canada.
Lars Chose and Rachel Ross own and operate Mandala Homes, a company that uses sustainable B.C. wood to build energy efficient houses.
“We’re thrilled to be featured in such a high profile publication, because — though we are a relatively small company based in Nelson and we support the local economy by hiring local workers and purchasing from local businesses — we provide sophisticated pre-fab energy efficient homes for the global market and the Huff Post article makes it easier for the world to find us,” Rachel Ross told The Nelson Daily.
“Our virtual “phone has been ringing off the hook” since the article came out and our Mandala Homes facebook page has grown from 38 to 39 thousand in the last few days.”
The Huffington Post is an American online news aggregator and blog founded by Arianna Huffington in 2005.
The Huff Post, which has a Canadian version that featured the Mandala Homes article, covers a wide range of topics that includes politics, business, entertainment, environment, technology, popular media, lifestyle, culture, comedy, healthy living, women’s interests, and local news.
The article was posted April 11 and featured a photo feature of Mandela Homes products.
Mandela Homes, founded in 2000, is a company that designs and crafts homes that are good for the planet and cost effective for the clients — using BC wood to construct passive solar homes that are energy efficient.
The company also built BC’s inaugural Energy Star qualified home in 2010.
“Lars and I are blessed with an incredible team of creative, high energy, positive minded people and we are full-on busy these days,” explains Ross, who is the marketing director for Mandela Homes while Chose is responsible for the heavy lifting and designing.
“And, we can always adjust our production schedule for more projects if there is interest.”
Ross said the company is engages in some exciting projects on the horizon — Net Zero Energy homes in Alberta this summer (Net Zero Energy are homes that don’t require external energy sources and may even feed back into the grid), a gorgeous home for a poet and his wife and baby in Massachusetts, the first Energy Star 6 (the highest rating in AK) round home in Alaska and the first of a series of TECH 10 homes in Norway.
There are also some interesting projects in Hawaii as well as some local projects.
“We are so happy that we can enjoy the quality of life that we have here in Nelson and feel that we are contributing to our passion for a sustainable world for our children’s children,” Ross said.
Check out the full story in the Huffington Post.
