While watching HGTV or any home improvement television show it’s hard not to marvel at the perfectly decorated and designed homes that you wish you could have a pinky’s worth of talent to create. How do they always choose the right color pallet for that room? Where did they buy that furniture? How can I get those contractors to work on my house?

Well, since we are located in Colorado, we were lucky enough to tour the new HGTV Green Home in Stapleton and see all their genius designs in person! During the next few weeks we are going to showcase pictures, talk about the green elements that were used throughout the home and share our experience with you!

To begin, here’s a little background of the HGTV green house straight from their brochure:

“Built by Infinity Home Collection, this year’s HGTV Green Home reveals hundreds of creative new ways that green can be beautiful. Influences by Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1908 Robie House, this home shows the distinctive character of the modern prairie style with its low-pitch roofline, broad over hanging eaves and dramatic window wallscapes.”

This modern home is approximately 2,400 square feet of living space built on the old Stapleton airport runway. Construction started in August 2010, and after every green feature was put into place, the estimated annual cost for utilities  is $1,477. To give you some perspective, we read on Bundle.com that the average monthly cost of utilities is $183, which totals to $2,196 per year. That’s a savings of $719! We can think of several fun home improvement projects with an extra $719 laying around!

While the tour was fascinating, the question on everyone’s mind was who gets to live here? Who’s the lucky person to win this house? Well, on June 28^th it was announced that a woman named Debbie, from New Jersey, won the home! For all the glass half empty people out there, Debbie only entered her name twice out of the 22 million other entries. Lucky duck!

Since the tours have ended and the home is no longer open to the public, we will take you on a photo tour of the house in the next three weeks. Each post will cover a different segment of the house beginning with the first level, second level and then landscaping and patios.

To start the picture tour, check out Part 1 of the first floor, featuring the living room, kitchen and dining room!

To start a discussion, have you heard about the HGTV Green home before? What have you done to go green in your home?