海角视频

Circularity is emerging as one of the most consequential shifts in the built environment 鈥� moving from a fringe sustainability concept to a defining challenge for the global construction economy.

Across the built environment, the ground is shifting. Design teams are being asked not only to decarbonize buildings but to account for the environmental and social impacts embedded in every beam, panel, finish, and fixture. Global supply chains, once treated as opaque and unchangeable, are now under scrutiny as cities, clients, and regulators demand safer materials, transparent sourcing, and dramatically lower waste. Circular design, once synonymous with recycling, has evolved into a systems鈥憀evel discipline reshaping procurement strategies, capital planning, and manufacturers鈥� business models.

At the center of this evolution is Kathleen Hetrick, Associate Principal and Circular Design Lead at 海角视频. With an engineering background and deep expertise in healthy materials, embodied carbon, and supply鈥慶hain policy, Hetrick has emerged as one of the industry鈥檚 clearest voices on how circularity must – and can – transform the way buildings are conceived. She argues that circularity is as much about people as it is about materials, and that designers hold far more market power than they realize. In this conversation, she explains why circular design demands a holistic rethinking of the supply chain, how it affects communities worldwide, and what it will take for the industry to meet the moment.

Innovation thrives when you deeply understand how buildings work. That鈥檚 why engineering is the backbone of circularity.鈥�

Kathleen Hetrick, Associate Principal | Circular Design Lead

Q: When people talk about circular design, they often reduce it to recycling or waste reduction. How do you define it?

Kathleen Hetrick: My definition is probably broader than most. Circular design isn鈥檛 just about what happens at the end of a building鈥檚 life – it鈥檚 about rethinking the entire supply chain. Where are materials coming from? Who mined them? Who manufactured them? Who鈥檚 living next to those facilities and absorbing the environmental burden?

In the AEC industry, we鈥檝e drifted away from designing with intentionality. Circularity pushes us to reverse鈥慹ngineer our choices and to build with authenticity again – using materials that reflect place, improve health outcomes, and support local economies.

Q: How does circular design affect people and communities, both near and far?

Hetrick: The impacts are everywhere; they appear at every stage. Demolition releases dust and pollution that harm nearby neighborhoods. Upstream, miners, factory workers, and families living next to industrial plants are exposed to toxic substances every day. We like to believe we鈥檙e designing sustainable buildings in isolation, but we鈥檙e making choices that influence health outcomes globally.

Circularity forces us to trace the entire chain of custody and ask: who鈥檚 paying the price for this material? Your 鈥済reen鈥� building in one city could be harming communities hundreds or thousands of miles away. Circularity requires us to map those impacts and take responsibility for them.

We鈥檙e not just talking about waste. We鈥檙e talking about people, communities, and the entire ecosystem of our supply chains.鈥�

Kathleen Hetrick, Associate Principal | Circular Design Lead

Q: Can designers really influence manufacturers to clean up their supply chains?

Hetrick: Absolutely. Some of the biggest changes in the materials industry happened because designers started asking questions. Years ago, many manufacturers couldn鈥檛 even tell you what chemicals were in their products. Now we have Environmental Product Declarations, Health Product Declarations, Declare labels – entire frameworks built around transparency.

We鈥檙e not demanding perfection. We鈥檙e asking manufacturers to join us on a path of continuous improvement. When manufacturers see demand for cleaner, healthier, lower鈥慶arbon materials, they respond. That鈥檚 real market power.

Circularity asks us to redesign with intention because every material choice has a human impact.鈥�

Kathleen Hetrick, Associate Principal | Circular Design Lead

Q: Much of this requires integrating new thinking into traditional engineering workflows. How is 海角视频 approaching that shift?

Hetrick: What excites me most is how energized our teams are. Our structural engineers have created working groups devoted to circularity. Our fa莽ade and MEP teams are actively brainstorming how circular principles show up in high鈥憆ise projects, museums, campus buildings – everything.

And our advisory and sustainability teams are scaling it even further by helping universities, cities, and corporations create circularity strategies that touch entire portfolios. It鈥檚 not siloed work. Circularity is influencing how every discipline at 海角视频 thinks.

Q: What makes this moment feel different from past waves of sustainability ambition?

Hetrick: The momentum is real now. Cities, clients, and manufacturers understand that supply鈥慶hain health is not optional. They鈥檙e ready to act. The engineering community is ready. The transparency tools are finally there.

We鈥檙e going to clean up our supply chains, electrify buildings, and hit the climate targets we鈥檝e been talking about for years. Circularity is a major part of that shift, and it鈥檚 happening project by project, city by city.

I feel incredibly lucky to be doing this work right now.