Build It Forward

John Straube has spent a career breaking buildings on purpose and investigating the ones that failed by mistake.

Test huts exist so that when the experiment goes wrong, nobody gets hurt. The forensic work is the other half. As John puts it, the experiments he could never ethically run himself get run for him, by architects and builders, on real projects.

In this conversation on Build It Forward, recorded in the Building Science Corporation Test Hut at Summer Camp 2026, Nick Falkoff sits down with John, a building scientist and engineer who teaches at the University of Waterloo and consults through RDH.

John argues that most builders and designers never see enough failures to calibrate their own sense of risk, which is why they can walk along the edge of a canyon in the dark without knowing it. The conversation covers how he teaches people to read a detail, why a wall schedule should list what each layer does and not just what it is, the difference between an aesthetic mock-up and a performance mock-up, and why he thinks a code compliant building is the worst building you can legally build.

It closes on what makes a great building scientist, which turns out to have less to do with physics than with actually cutting wood and pouring concrete yourself.

Thank you to Betsy Pettit for graciously hosting us.

Connect with John Straube:
https://www.johnstraube.com

Thank you to our production partner Benjamin Obdyke. Build Better(TM) with samples of their roof and wall products:
https://benjaminobdyke.com/get-a-sample-build-forward-podcast

Work with Auburndale Builders on your high-performance build:
vision@auburndalebuilders.com

00:32 Who John Straube is and how he got here
02:13 Why test huts exist and what forensics teaches
05:29 Teaching students versus teaching professionals
08:42 If it doesn't get wet, it won't leak
11:18 Labeling what things do, not what they are
19:07 Having the uncomfortable conversation
21:29 Three kinds of mock-ups
23:58 Solving material compatibility
29:55 Why we are bad at judging risk
41:30 Code is the worst building you can legally build
49:26 What makes a great building scientist

Music:
Welcome to the Johnsons from the album Bird Mode by E*Lightning aka Jon Erickson, CPHB
https://open.spotify.com/artist/0J8B8c2DKgBKOopmjXK3E8

Made with @PRMEABL at the Building Science Corporation Test Hut

#BuildItForward #AuburndaleBuilders #PassiveHouse #HighPerformanceBuilding #BuildingScience #BuildingScientist #GreenBuilding #NetZero #JohnStraube #BuildingEnclosure #BuildingScienceCorporation #BenjaminObdyke #BuildBetter

What is Build It Forward?

Build It Forward is about the people, ideas, and decisions shaping the future of high-performance residential construction. Hosted by Nick Falkoff, GM of Auburndale Builders, and produced by PRMEABL_, the name is a play on “pay it forward.”

Conversations range from technical decisions and process to people, culture, history, and collaboration — exploring what’s working, what isn’t, and what might be interesting to try next.

These conversations are worth having, and worth sharing, because the best buildings come from communities that share what they know and build forward together.