Brad Pitt Helps Missouri’s Drury University Go Green

Thanks to Brad Pitt and his brother Doug Pitt, Drury University in Springfield, Missouri will soon have a new LEED-certified building. The Pitt family donated $600,000 in honor of their father, William A. Pitt, to help pay for the O’Reilly Family Event Center’s Leadership in Environmental Energy and Design gold certification.

From the Springfield Business Journal Online:

The 65,000-square-foot center will be the first Gold LEED-certified arena in the country, according to a Drury news release. The playing surface of the 3,100-seat arena will be named the William A. Pitt Court.

The original arena design called for a minimum of Silver LEED certification. Features will include low-flow water fixtures, a dedicated recycling area and a solar-reflective roof and pavement materials, the release said.

Springfield’s O’Reilly family donated the lead gift for the project – $6 million – and the remaining cost will be covered by a $1 million matching grant from the Mabee Foundation, Drury and Drury donors, according to the release.

Brad Pitt is known for his enthusiasm for architecture, and for dedication to sustainability as well. This donation brings together two of his passions – and all in honor of his late father. How sweet. Seriously, can this guy do anything wrong?

Link [SBJ]
Photo credit: Drury Mirror

Who’s Who in Green: Brad Pitt

With the Make it Right Foundation celebrating its first anniversary this week, it’s a great time to celebrate the notable environmental and philanthropic efforts of Brad Pitt, the famous actor who’s much more than just a pretty face. Pitt is passionate about architecture – especially green architecture – and he puts that passion to admirable use in helping rebuild the city of New Orleans after the still-visible destruction of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Pitt fell in love with the city of New Orleans while filming there, and became determined to help it bounce back from the devastating blow of Hurricane Katrina. He founded Make it Right NOLA to build 150 sustainable, eco-friendly homes in the Lower 9th Ward district of New Orleans, believing that it’s our responsibility when rebuilding communities to take the opportunity to build green. Make it Right has achieved a lot, and this week – just in time for the holiday season – six families will be moving into completed Make it Right green homes. Two more homes are under construction and another 14 will be built in early 2009.

“I’m really happy for the families that are going to be here, but I can’t help but think about the families that aren’t,” Pitt said Monday. “It’s a push-pull for me. The excitement is that it’s being proven, that it’s working. The frustration is that we have a long way to go.”

“You’re going to see 100 homes here, mark my words,” he said. “It’s nice to see a few, but I’m anxious to see 100, 150, 1,000.”

The homes feature enough solar panels to cut back the electricity bill by up to 75%. Pitt revealed to Larry King this week that every single Make it Right NOLA home meets platinum LEED certification, the highest rating a structure can get. That’s not too much of a surprise considering Cradle-to-Cradle architect William McDonough is one of Pitt’s partners in the project.

Pitt has also worked with Global Green to sponsor an architectural competition which aimed to generate ideas about how to rebuild sustainably. This competition actually spawned the Make it Right project, giving it the foundation it needed to create truly green homes for the 9th ward.

It’s easy to see how much of an impact Pitt’s work has had in the world of ‘green’. Just search for his name on Ecorazzi, the green celebrity gossip blog, and you’ll find that he’s contributed a lot over the years. Pitt worked with Kiehl’s to create the fair trade, organic Aloe Vera Biodegradable Body Cleanser, which benefits environmental charities (including Make it Right NOLA) and comes in a post-consumer recycled bottle. He also hosted a series about green design and architecture on PBS called ‘Design: e2’.

Brad Pitt and his partner, actress and activist Angelina Jolie, have also been extremely generous with their own personal fortunes in terms of giving to charity. Pitt recently donated $100,000 to the No on Prop 8 campaign against gay marriage discrimination, and has been known to give substantial amounts of his income to various charities.

Yes, it’s true that Brad Pitt is a mega-celebrity who enjoys all of the finer things in life, including traveling on private jets. But he has also made outstanding and laudable contributions to the green revolution, and for that he’s earned a place among the green elite of the world.

Brad Pitt’s Green Score: 43,765

Brad Pitt’s Make it Right Foundation Builds Eco-Friendly Playground in New Orleans

Kids in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans now have a safe and healthy place to play thanks to a collaboration between Brad Pitt’s Make it Right Foundation and the Play Green Initiative. On Wednesday, Make it Right’s 1-year anniversary, the playground was dedicated to the children of the neighborhood. Since Hurricane Katrina caused catastrophic damage to the Lower Ninth Ward in 2005, not a single playground had been built. This new, $500,000 eco-friendly playground was made possible thanks largely to donations of equipment, landscaping and labor.

From Market Watch:

BNIM, a national leader in sustainable design and also one of 12 design firms for the Make it Right Project, designed the overall site, and JWA, a New Orleans architectural firm, served as a local collaborator. Both the equipment and the site are designed using sustainable methods and materials that minimize the impact on the environment while providing exceptional play value and a quality community gathering place. The play space will be constructed in an environmentally sustainable way, using local suppliers, native plantings, and natural means to control water flow, thereby reducing pollution, runoff, and other problems associated with asphalt and more traditional playground design. The playground equipment is constructed using sustainable methods including the use of non-toxic, recyclable and environmentally friendly materials. Solar energy will also be used to power the electronic components on the new equipment.

Thanks to this project, the Lower Ninth Ward is now home to the greenest, most technologically advanced playground in the country – in fact, it’s the first of its kind in North America. Considering all they’ve been through, the families of the Lower Ninth Ward really deserve this.

The Make it Right Foundation’s efforts in New Orleans are really remarkable. It makes so much sense to rebuild in a green way after a natural disaster, and the things they’re doing in the city are worthy of all the praise they get. Check out the rest of their efforts at Make it Right New Orleans.

Link [Market Watch] + [Make it Right]

Plenty Magazine’s Top 10 Overexposed Green Celeb Stories

Plenty Magazine’s editors are sick of hearing about green celebs – especially the stories that have been regurgitated over and over again all over the web. We hear them. Some news seems to go on forever, to the point that it’s still repeated as news nearly a year after the fact. It’s easy to OD on celebrity news. Here are some of the stories they’d like to bury forever:

10. Natalie Portman’s vegan shoe line. A pretty young actress made herself a vegan shoe line that includes fetching shiny red pumps. Got it.

9. Kate Hudson’s natural haircare line. A pretty young actress made herself a natrual haircare line which allows her pretty blonde hair to continue to look pretty. Got it.

8. Punky Brewster’s eco-baby store. Hey, remember Punky Brewster? Oh, you do remember because there were 3500 articles about her opening an eco baby store? Me too! I also remember because I enjoyed watching the televised adventures of that sassy little scamp. She’s all grown up now.

7. Brangelina are saving the world several babies at a time. Gorgeous actress Angelina Jolie paired up with pretty actor Brad Pitt, who bears an alarming resemblance to the young version of her dad, and now they do lots of good green deeds for redeveloping post-Katrina New Orleans together. Good for them.

Some of the others include Adrian Grenier, Ed Begley Jr. and Oprah. Get Plenty Mag’s take on all of those stories at The Dirt.

Link [Plenty Mag]
Photo credit: People Magazine