Early in Eric's career, he worked in Santa Fe with an architect named Ed. Houses in Santa Fe were built mainly out of straw bale and adobe; as a result, Eric felt this was very limiting on what he can do as an architect. At the same time, a lot was happening in San Francisco. Exciting articles and events were coming from there, so he went to to the city to search for a mentor or firm to work with. He couldn't find one, so he started his own firm, OrganicArchitect! He did not know much about finding clients, but he knew he wanted to share his passion with everyone he came across. A lot of people ran away from him when he shared his passion, but his business grew slowly as he met more clients.

He made a shift a few years ago of incorporating a new endeavor of convincing everyone, not just the rich, to build sustainably. He was going to lecture and share with others. Now, business is easy for Eric as clients come to him for projects.

about the speaker: Eric Corey Freed is the principal of OrganicArchitect and author of Green Building for Dummies