Holy Wisdom Monastery Achieves Platinum Certification from U.S. Green Building Council

In late March 2010 the U.S. Green Building Council awarded Holy Wisdom Monastery a Platinum rating – the highest level of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®) certification available. The monastery earned 63 out of a possible 69 points under LEED-New Construction (NC) version 2.2, making it the highest-rated LEED-NC building in the United States to date!

We partnered with Hoffman LLC who designed and constructed Holy Wisdom Monastery, which opened in August 2009.

Aiming for such a high level of sustainability fits perfectly within the values of 1500 years of Benedictine tradition. Additionally, we hope the newsworthy nature of such an accomplishment will allow us to educate others about care for the earth, increase the size of our ecumenical Benedictine community of sisters and finish raising the remaining $1-million of our $2-million campaign. Already, over 1300 people, including a group from China, have toured the monastery.

 “For us, sustainability is not a trend,” says Sister Joanne Kollasch, “but a commitment to the earth—a 21st century expression of 1500 years of Benedictine tradition.”

• Holy Wisdom Monastery is a 30,000 square foot, two-story structure with a detached, 4,000 square foot remodeled maintenance building on 130 acres. The monastery was built to help carry out the work of the Sisters to weave prayer, hospitality, justice and care of the earth into a shared way of life.

• The original building, Benedict House, was responsibly deconstructed and 99.75% of the 60,000-square-foot building was recycled or reused.

• The new monastery contains spaces for worship, concerts, conferences, lectures, interfaith dialog, dining, reading, and administration.

• The building is “right-sized”, providing 50% less space than its predecessor, Benedict House.

• Andersen® windows provide daylighting to 85% of regularly occupied spaces.  Each window was customized based upon its location and orientation to the sun. This reduces glare and minimizes unwanted solar heat gain inside the building. Neither draperies nor blinds are needed in the building. Chapel windows, including those near the ceiling, are operable to expel hot air and reduce the need for air conditioning.

• Storm water runoff is reduced to 13% below pre-development levels.

• Geothermal heating and cooling system uses 39 closed-loop wells, each 300 feet deep.

• The goal is to eventually provide 100% of the monastery’s energy needs, on a net basis, from on-site, renewable sources.

The new monastery was designed and constructed by Hoffman LLC at a cost of $246 per square foot. This figure contains all project-related costs (except land), including the responsible deconstruction of Benedict House. Both the Sisters and Hoffman take great pride in the fact that one of the greenest buildings in the United States was built for such a moderate cost.  

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Press release: Wisconsin Monastery Achieves Platinum Certification from U.S. Green Building Council

Read media coverage of our LEED certified building

View more building photos

For more information about Holy Wisdom Monastery, contact Carolyn at info@benedictinewomen.org or (608) 836-1631, ext. 119.

LEED Award Ceremony on June 24, 2010

On Thursday, June 24, the Sisters received the LEED Platinum award from the US Green Building Council. Punit Jain, a member of the USGBC Board of Directors, traveled to Holy Wisdom Monastery from St. Louis to present the sisters with the award. Also present at the award ceremony were Paul Hoffman of Hoffman, LLC, Madelyn Leopold of the Aldo Leopold Foundation, John Alberici of Alberici Corp., co-workers at the monastery, AcreMaker donors, volunteers, and other supporters. To view photos from the celebration, click here. To hear sound clips from the ceremony, please click on the following names to listen to a .MP3 file:

• Neal Smith, Holy Wisdom Monastery delivers welcome address (time: 6:09 / 2.8 MB)
• John Alberici, Vertegy - a project of Alberici Corporation (time: 3:19 / 1.5 MB)
• Madelyn Leopold, Aldo Leopold Foundation (time: 3:42 / 1.7 MB)
• Paul Hoffman, Hoffman, LLC (time: 8:17 / 3.8 MB)
• Mark Hanson, Hoffman, LLC (time: 6:47 / 3.1 MB)
• Punit Jain, US Green Building Council (time: 5:50 / 2.7 MB)
• Sisters Mary David Walgenbach, OSB, Lynne Smith, OSB and Joanne Kollasch, OSB reflect on LEED Platinum award (time: 12:25 / 5.7 MB)
• Or listen to the entire award ceremony! (time: 47:51 / 21.9 MB)