The Alice Rich Northrop Memorial Camp is a camp in the Berkshires devoted to the environmental education for New York City children.  For four weeks at a time, boys and girls from the city were immersed in the natural world at this rustic camp.  When the main meeting hall was destroyed by fire in 1993, the Board of Directors determined to rebuild with a new green facility.  Coldham&Hartman Architects completed Schematic Design on the new camp buildings with a fresh concept at the heart: Camper-Regulated Technology.

The essence of the Northrop Camp vision was the idea of "Camper Regulated Technology" in which the campers were challenged to understand the impact of their living needs on the environment.

The building systems were in place to provide for the campers based solely on renewable resources.  It was to be up to the campers to energize that system, through physical effort (chopping wood, e.g.), observation and planning (weather prediction would help plan a week of electric usage), behavior (lights left on by one could limit the ability of all to listen to the radio at night), and expectation (as each one is challenged to fit their living patterns to the rhythm of ambient resource flow).

The following table outlines two routes for resource usage.