For over 20 years, I have been developing the Estonian Golf & Country Club (EGCC) and the Golf Village. During these years, 50 houses have been completed in the Golf Village, most designed more than 15 years ago. These houses, sized between 200 to 250 square meters, were built with electric heating—when nobody had yet talked about energy efficiency.

The world has changed significantly over the last few decades, affecting design, construction, and our way of life. Fortunately, I am only halfway through the development of Golf Village, making now the right time for major changes, and this IS THE MAIN REASON WHY I STARTED THE HOUSING FAIR.

Many Estonians have visited Housing Fairs in Finland multiple times and are well-acquainted with them. However, my aim isn’t to replicate but to reimagine and expand upon this concept here in Estonia.

It’s incredibly powerful that the Housing Fair will showcase 15 modern houses. As many houses don’t yet have end buyers, architects have been presented with a unique opportunity to fully utilize their professionalism, unleash their creativity, and create excellent new house projects.

Fortunately, energy efficiency is now a given with many new technologies and products available for testing in new houses. I am excited and pleased that companies participating in the Housing Fair embrace this theme. But that’s not all.

The newest and most crucial issue is creating a sustainable living environment. Everyone is talking about climate neutrality and making numerous promises. But where do we actually stand? Specific figures and data are often not discussed because they simply don’t exist yet in the construction and real estate sectors.

We have set ourselves the ambitious goal of developing the Housing Fair as a Circular Village. As part of this development, we are creating a ‘toolbox’ based on life cycle analysis that defines what data a project must have to claim that the developed living environment is sustainable. Our goal is also to create a Circular Village model that can be used in real estate development to assess the sustainability of a developing area based on ESG principles.

This is the most critical issue we are addressing, and it sets us apart from the Finnish Housing Fair and other similar initiatives. The market has already turned towards sustainability and resource conservation, so there is no longer a choice.

I want to contribute to this change with something tangible and hope that we can accomplish this challenging task together with my partners. I am convinced that we will see a lot of innovation at the Housing Fair. It will undoubtedly show me the direction for further development of Golf Village and set an example in this regard! The Housing Fair is an exciting challenge, and I’m looking forward to it!

And change, after all, starts with small steps!