We're Back - A New Chapter

After almost 5 years we are back! Our absence was not because we stopped caring about homes or that we ran out of things to say (like that could ever happen!) 

We have been working on something new, something huge that will redefine the residential construction industry. 

Welcome back! We are so grateful for your support!

And if you want more information, check out our website: https://detailbydesign.ca/wellbuilt/

Start with Tier1 today!

Transcript

Hello, and welcome back to the Renovation Secrets podcast.

If you’re a longtime listener and you’re thinking, “Wait… didn’t this podcast disappear?” — you’re not wrong.

It’s been almost five years since the last episode.

Not because I stopped caring about homes. And not because I ran out of things to say.

It’s because over the last several years, I’ve been quietly working on something much bigger than an episode.

I’ve been watching patterns.
 I’ve been connecting dots.
 I’ve been testing ideas.
 And I’ve been building a framework that finally puts language, structure, and science around a problem I’ve seen for most of my career.

So today’s episode isn’t just “I’m back.”

Today is the official beginning of a new chapter.

Because I want to talk to you about why so many beautiful homes still feel bad to live in — and what I’ve built to finally fix that.

"Intro Music" - courtesy of Hill Makes Music

Here’s the uncomfortable truth:

We are building more efficient, more expensive, more visually stunning homes than ever before.

And yet, more and more people tell me things like:

“I’m always tired in my own house.”
 “I don’t sleep well anymore.”
 “This place just feels… stressful.”
 “I love how it looks, but I never really relax here.”

And these are not broken houses.

These are often very well-built, very high-end homes.

So what’s going on?

The problem is that modern homes are designed to satisfy:

• Code
• Budget
• Aesthetic trends

But they are almost never designed around how the human body and nervous system actually work.

Light is treated like a finish.
 Air is assumed instead of measured.
 Sound is ignored until it becomes a problem.
 Layouts are optimized for photos, not for daily life.
 And comfort is treated like a luxury instead of a biological need.

The result?

Homes that look great — and quietly drain the people living in them.

Here’s the reframe that changes everything:

Your home is not a backdrop.

It is a biological, neurological, and behavioural system.

Light influences hormones and circadian rhythm.
 Air quality affects cognition, immunity, and sleep.
 Sound affects stress levels and nervous system activation.
 Layout affects fatigue, cognitive load, and daily effort.
 Colour and contrast affect perception and emotional regulation.

Whether we design for these things or not — they are still happening.

Your body is still responding.

So the real question is:

Is your home quietly helping you recover…
 Or quietly working against you every single day?

And here’s the part that really matters:

Most residential performance failures are not caused by one big mistake.

They’re caused by dozens of small, well-intentioned decisions that were never evaluated through a human lens.

Over the years, working in residential design, I kept seeing the same pattern.

Projects would meet code.
 They’d meet budget.
 They’d photograph beautifully.

And yet people would still be tired. Still uncomfortable. Still struggling to sleep. Still overwhelmed in their own homes.

And I realized:

We don’t actually have a shared framework for evaluating homes based on how they perform for human beings.

We have standards for structure.
 We have standards for energy.
 We have standards for fire and safety.

But we don’t really have a standard for:

“Does this home support human biology, cognition, recovery, and daily life?”

So over time, I started pulling together:

• The WELL Building Standard
• Building science
• Lighting science
• Neuroscience and sleep research
• Environmental psychology
• Human factors and ergonomics

And I started building a system.

Not a style.
 Not a product list.
 Not a trend.

A decision framework.

That system is called WELLbuilt.

WELLbuilt is a science-informed framework for designing and renovating homes that support human health, performance, and long-term wellbeing.

It treats the home as:

• A health system
• A nervous system environment
• A recovery environment
• A performance environment

It focuses on five core elements:

1. Lighting
2. Indoor Air Quality
3. Sound & Acoustics
4. Colour & Perception
5. Comfort, Accessibility & Long-Term Use

And most importantly:

WELLbuilt is not about being perfect.

It’s about making better decisions in the right order, before mistakes are locked in.

WELLbuilt is structured in tiers.

Tier 1 is the foundation.
It’s the knowledge and thinking layer.

It explains:

• What actually matters
• Why it matters
• And where most projects quietly go wrong

It is not an assessment.
It does not look at your specific house.
It does not tell you what to buy or how to build.

It upgrades how you think.

Tier 2 applies this framework to an actual project.

Tier 3 is training and certification for professionals.

Right now, Tier 1 is live.

Because before we fix houses, we have to fix how we think about houses.

People are more stressed.
 More tired.
 More burned out.

And we keep talking about lifestyle… while ignoring the environment people spend most of their lives inside.

Your home should not be another source of physiological stress.

It should be a place where your nervous system stands down.

If you’re a homeowner planning a renovation or build…
 If you’re a builder or designer who wants to do better than “good enough”…
 If you’ve ever felt like your home should feel better than it does…

Start with WELLbuilt Tier 1.

I’ve structured this system so it makes sense to builders, designers and homeowners. It’s the foundation to thinking about our homes as a catalyst to better health and wellbeing.
 Its the lens in how we should consider the impact of how lighting and indoor air quality truly influence how we feel on a daily basis.
 It will become the language that needs to be used in order to create the solutions in an industry that has been missing the mark for decades

You can find it on my website at :

Detailbydesign dot ca forward slash wellbuilt

Here's a quick description:

WELLbuilt™ was developed in response to a growing disconnect between how homes are constructed and how they are experienced by the people who live in them.

Over the past decade, residential construction has become increasingly efficient, visually refined, and technically complex. Yet many occupants report homes that feel uncomfortable, fatiguing, difficult to maintain, or quietly detrimental to their health. These outcomes are rarely the result of a single failure. More often, they are the cumulative effect of dozens of small, well-intentioned decisions made without a unified framework for human health.

As a designer working at the intersection of residential construction, building science, and wellness standards, I repeatedly observed the same pattern: systems were designed to meet code, budget, and aesthetic targets—but rarely evaluated for how they function biologically over time. Lighting was treated as a finish. Air quality was assumed rather than verified. Sound, colour, and accessibility were addressed reactively, if at all.

WELLbuilt was created to close this gap.

The purpose of the WELLbuilt framework is to translate established research—drawing from the WELL Building Standard, the Illuminating Engineering Society (IES), public health data, and environmental psychology—into a practical, decision-based system for residential design and construction professionals.

This program is not about achieving perfection or prescribing luxury solutions. It is about making informed, evidence-based choices that measurably improve comfort, functionality, and long-term health—without relying on trends, marketing claims, or assumptions.

WELLbuilt challenges conventional practices where necessary, not to be provocative, but to protect outcomes. Its mission is simple: to ensure that homes actively support the people who live in them, across all life stages, by treating health as a performance criterion rather than an afterthought.

This podcast is back now — and we’re going to be talking a lot more about:

• Why homes affect us the way they do
• How to design for actual human beings
• And how to build spaces that don’t just look good… but work properly for life

Thank you for being here.

And welcome to the next chapter.