vertical farming for the workplace

The ‘Green & Healthy Places’ podcast series takes a deep-dive into the role of sustainability, wellbeing and community in real estate, offices, hotels and educational facilities.

This episode is with Square Mile Farms - providing biophilia in the shape of vertical farming for the workplace.

In this episode we talk to Johnathan Ransom, Co-Founder and CEO of Square Mile Farms, a business bringing vertical farming to the home and workplace with the aim of promoting healthier, more sustainable lifestyles. I first came across them a couple of years ago and have kept an eye on their steady progress.

Biophilia with vertical farming

In this episode we talk to Johnathan Ransom, Co-Founder and CEO of Square Mile Farms, a business bringing vertical farming to the home and workplace with the aim of promoting healthier, more sustainable lifestyles. I first came across them a couple of years ago and have kept an eye on their steady progress.

These mini vertical gardens are about more than just quirky wall decor, they represent a tangible connection with nature in urban environments, have a practical function in terms of producing a respectable quantity of edible leaves each month and go one better than a largely passive garden wall in a corporate office reception.

An indoor office garden, or vertical farm, like these help promote engagement amongst staff, adding intrigue and even a little fun into the office experience, right when it needs it most post-Covid.

GUEST: JOHNATHAN RANSOM, SQUARE MILE FARMS

• https://www.squaremilefarms.com/

• https://www.instagram.com/squaremilefarms/

• https://www.facebook.com/squaremilefarms

• https://www.linkedin.com/company/square-mile-farms/

• https://twitter.com/SM_Farms

FULL Transcript follows courtesy of Otter.ai

Matt Morley 0:14

Welcome to Episode 12 of the Green and Healthy Places podcast, in which we take a deep dive into the world of sustainability, wellness and community in the real estate and hospitality sectors. I'm your host, Matt Morley, founder of BioBlu yacht sustainability, Biofilico wellness interiors, and Biofit nature gyms. If you see value in this type of content, please hit LIKE, SHARE, or consider subscribing.

In this episode, we talk to Jonathan Ransom, Co-founder and CEO of Square Mile Farms in London, UK, a business that's bringing vertical farming to the home and workplace with the aim of promoting healthier, more sustainable lifestyles.

Healthy Buildings and ESG

I first came across Jonathan and square mile farms a couple of years ago, and I've kept an eye on their steady progress since then, as I look after the ESG and placemaking for a commercial real estate development fund in London, I'm aware that their product aligns neatly with both LEED, BREEAM green building certifications on one side, and WELL + FITWEL healthy building certifications on the other, which in turn has the knock on effect of helping with the property funds annual ESG assessment score means you get two or even three hits for the price of one.

Beyond the box ticking though these mini vertical gardens are genuinely about more than just quirky wall decorations. They represent a tangible connection with nature in urban environments, they have a practical function in terms of producing a respectable quantity of edible leaves and hubs each month, and frankly, just go one better than what is often a largely passive, vertical plant wall in a corporate office reception. A garden like this helps promote engagement among staff. It adds intrigue, and even why not a little fun into the office experience. Right when offices need it most in the post COVID era….

Jonathan, thanks for joining us. Great to have you here on the green and Healthy Places podcast. Perhaps you could give a quick introduction to who you are and what you do as co founder and CEO of square mile farms in London.

Jonathan Ransom 2:40

Yeah, okay. So my professional backgrounds in in property. I'm a chartered surveyor by training. I spent a lot of my career working in financial services, though, but with a with a property slant to it most recently was the CIO or the FinTech business in the UK called lend invest. And I think, what what what got me into doing what I'm doing today, and we'll come on to perhaps a bit more description of what that is, but is that I got a little bit disenfranchised by the world of finance, and I guess, you know, you you, there's an obvious career route in in financial services. But ultimately, it can be a little bit unsatisfying, and I was looking for a career in in a sector that is more personally rewarding and fulfilling. And my now business partner, Patrick, and I got talking about this prospect of growing fresh, healthy vegetables in the built environment, which played nicely to my professional experience with the built environment. And I guess the backdrop to all of that is a both of us having a pretty, you know, they say be being a little bit conscious or even worried about the state of our agri food sector and the impact that that has on our on the environment, but also on our personal health.

Matt Morley 4:13

And so the name square mile farms for anyone who's not familiar with it, square mile is London's financial district of CBD. And so essentially you're you're proposing or you're proposing you deliver urban vertical farms specifically to London but what's your geographic focus now?

Jonathan Ransom 4:36

Yeah, at the moment with we're focused on London and the the genesis of that that name was really that the original business model was to look at putting controlled environment farms within a square mile of the end consumer which naturally then cuts down on food miles but also re engages the, the consumer with the with the food system and the food they eat also has benefits on the nutritional content of Food as well, because food tends to lose some of its nutritional qualities, the further it travels. So that was really the genesis of square mile farms, obviously also because we're based in London and it was going to be a very urban model. So you know, that's that's why that name came about

Matt Morley 5:20

and the business model then focusing specifically on homes and offices, you're not in the game as yet of, of sort of agriculture itself a growing food for for sale and distribution. It's more about a provision of the this piece of, of hardware effectively, that produces greenery in a home or in an office environment.

Jonathan Ransom 5:42

Yeah, well, maybe I'll just take a quick moment to take you back over some of the history of the business. So we've been around for a couple of years now. And the original model was a grow to sell model. And we set up our first self built control environment farm in in Bermondsey back in towards the beginning, beginning of 2019. And we tested that market, you know, growing within the built environment to sell to local restaurants, and local chefs and local consumers ultimately, as well. And so we build what we call a flat pack farm, which and the idea was that it's something that can easily be easily assembled or disassembled within tight urban spaces. And it became quite apparent quite quickly that that model of growing to sell is very hard to make work economically, particularly if you're not doing it at large scale. And most of the controller work environment farms that you see are doing it on massive scale, but even even they I think, would be struggling to kind of turn a profit based on their operational overheads as of today. But what that meant was the we we quickly turned to what we knew a bit more and that what we knew was more about corporate big corporates and, and the built environment and go talking to big property company called British land over here in the UK, and they invited us to build one of our flatpak Farms on the roof of their a building in Paddington Central, and actually just so happens that Microsoft occupy the building that that we have that farm and the roof off. But whilst we were there, we were then able to, you know, talk to a lot of the big local occupiers such as Vodafone, these, you know, Microsoft Richland, and it became quite apparent that what they really wanted was something that helped them engage with their employees to create an experience for their employees, but also help to address some of their kind of sustainability and, and, say, community responsibilities. And so we came up with this idea of office farming. And the idea with Office farming is that we put a hydroponic farm up inside the office and run, basically an engagement model around it. So we get the employees involved in the running of the farms, they get to take home the fresh produce, but we also educate them on sustainability and, and personal health, both physical and mental health with a focus on the food you eat, where it's coming from, how it's been produced, how you consume it, what it does to body, those sorts of things. So it's going beyond the kind of this the sustainability of the building that we're located on has some benefits for that also, but also helps a company say educate their workforce and how they can live healthier, low impact lifestyles.

Matt Morley 8:58

So I was going to ask you for a clarification on the or distinction between what's commonly referred to as say, like a vertical garden wall, or a green, a green wall, which obviously in one sense plays to biophilia, a place to reconnect with nature in an urban environment, possibly it can play into productivity and potentially an air purifying benefit. But clearly, once you open the door to this being in a consumable natural leaves you open a whole discussion around the food system and relationship to food and urban farming, which is clearly where you sort of make a big right turn away from just being a decorative object right?

Jonathan Ransom 9:45

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I mean, there's there's a lot of benefits of having plants in buildings as he touched on and and there's this this phrase or word by failures is bandied around quite a lot of them. But ultimately, what it boils down to two things, one is, how does it improve the environment in which you are. So whether that's within the Office or at home, and that environment is both about, you know, air quality. Air Quality can be around acoustics, it can be around, you know, just having greenery in the office as an on may benefit to the office. But it but on the on the flip side, this is biophilia benefit, which is that that kind of goodness that humanity gets from being with nature and interacting with nature, and that's a very, can be can be a psychological thing, but it's also a physiological thing. So it's, you feel better for reason for, for reasons of, you know, 1000s of years of evolution alongside nature, the benefit of having edible plants in the office is that that interaction becomes enhanced. So if you've just got a green wall, that looks great, you know, there's a novelty there, it does look great. And it does have some benefits in terms of the quality of the air etc, in the office, but you're not interacting with it, you don't, you don't have that same interaction that naturally we might have with with nature. Whereas if it's an edible farm wall, you do interact with it, you're you're harvesting it, you're eating the produce from it, you're you're helping to plant it up. So every time you walk past it, you see the fruits of your labour, and you get some satisfaction from that. So it goes further than just sort of urban greening that say it brings in that element of engagement and an experience and, you know, it's a physical activity as well. So it does, it has some fiscal benefits as well.

Matt Morley 11:49

So when you think about the problem that you're solving, or the the unmet need that you were trying to address when you when you got started on this, what what if you like would be your competitors in that sense, or what else is in is typically in an office or a corporate office environment, such as a Microsoft or wherever it may be that is doing something similar? Because, you know, obviously, the walls have more of a passive element, whereas you're talking much more about an experiential piece, right?

Jonathan Ransom 12:17

Yeah. So I guess, what might be worth just just dwelling quickly on who the buyers of the service that services are so so one of the buyers would be someone that's responsible for fitting out the office space and making it look good and making it work well, for the employees, the other buyer is, and sort of competitors and might fall into that space might be your typical kind of office, or interior, landscaping companies. On the on the other side, the buyers are the, you know, the HR team is responsible for employee wellbeing and engagement and even recruitment and retention. And they're more interested in the kind of engagement and the experience element of it. So on that side, the people that that I guess we might come across in terms of competition for budgets that say spoil it down to that would be your people like, you know, Nuffield health, for instance, the thing about the the, and they're providing a well being service around this focused on, let's say, fitness and exercise. The thing about someone like Nuffield health is, of course, they're taking you out of the office. to to to get that experience, what we're doing is keeping you in the office, which really plays to the kind of the future of the future vision of the people have or the office post COVID. We're keeping you in the office and creating an experience for you in the office, which can get you away from your desk, create some physical activity, create some mental activity takes you away from the kind of day to day thinking about, you know, what's on your computer screen. But then alongside that we do also provide other services, such as workshops might be, you know, nutritional consultations, and we do supper clubs and things like that, which is, again, some of those things you'd expect enough field health type business to offer alongside the gym membership. So there is some similarities that say, but but we feel that our model combined so many different of the different, let's say needs of a of a big corporate.

Matt Morley 14:28

I think the activation pieces is really strong component to what you're doing to the sort of overall service offer. You mentioned. COVID and how have things been? I'm guessing budgets are being reduced, offices are being closed, therefore it's had a direct impact on perhaps new orders, or perhaps, yeah, your your pipeline of potential clients, but how are you seeing the next 12 to 24 months in a in a post COVID world and how do you think you're Duck will, will emerge from the ashes of this current crisis that the workplace is going through.

Jonathan Ransom 15:08

So, I think that the world is looking for the type of services that we offer, fortunately, admittedly, the last say nine months have been challenging, mainly because the types of the people that hold the budgets for this, this type of service are really need to have some visibility on when people come back to the office. But they're also going through, you know, a pretty involved process of trying to think about what they want that office to be for in the future. And I think even before COVID, there was a shift towards, you know, more experiential office, places that are less about places where people come and sit behind the computer screen, like a battery and, and churn out work, because you can do that at home. Frankly, it's more about engaging and say, growing your workforce, and about experiences and about interactions. And so consequently, you know, the office, the Office of tomorrow will be full of things that help foster those type of activities. They won't they won't be crammed full of desks where people perch with their laptop cell belt, they'll be more loungy in, in, in appearance. And so, you know, one thing we've been working on with Vodafone in Paddington is this idea of a Zen Garden, which is, you know, their, their idea where they create create a kind of area for people to relax and chill out. And what better kind of place to put a allotment wall, then in a, in a Zen Garden, within when the off within the Office. So it's, you know, it's very, it's very topical. And a lot of a lot of companies that we talk to now have task forces put together that are tasked with making the office suitable for the post COVID world. And so so it seems that there's there's quite a lot of activity going on in terms of reconfiguring refitting spaces to make to make it appropriate for that post COVID world, and that's where we fit in, because they want something normal, you know, lots of offices of the past might have ping pong tables, or table football or computer consoles, or whatever. But you know, an office farming model brings both the experience but also the educational side. And, and, and it takes a lot of boxes from a kind of office sustainability perspective as well. Yep,

Matt Morley 17:59

I get it. I mean, it's fun, it's engaging, it's a talking point, it's, it's a water cooler moment, in a way. So just to dig into to that process, then the idea of, you might have HR on one side, perhaps sort of brand director or marketing guys on the other, perhaps the facilities manager, or management team, around the table, who else is is involved in that process, when you go from identifying a suitable location, and perhaps you might be able to comment on what would would make up a suitable location within an office environment. And and describe that process of going from initial introduction through to actually opening one of your, your vertical farms, presumably, a few months later.

Jonathan Ransom 18:45

Yeah, I mean, it varies depending on where the kind of entry point was to the conversation, but just take one, one example. So that say, the offices, the company is looking to refurbish their space, and in light of changes that are needed post COVID. They might they, the likelihood is, then we're talking to the person responsible for the fit out, so maybe a, you know, workplace strategy person or, you know, the, in the old world, we call them kind of corporate real estate managers or something along those lines. So they then obviously, we'll be engaging with their interior designers. And at some point, they, you know, once they've got an idea of the sorts of things that they can get from us, they then introduce us to the interior designers, and we have a chat about where it can go, whether whether we, we sort of integrate it into the building services such as the plumbing or whether we have it as a standalone unit that has its own water source. We find the location and we then talk to the contractor about, you know, what services, we do need and And, you know, often if it's a wall hung unit, then we might need a some reinforcing on the wall. And then just sort of bet into that project management as the fitout goes along. And normally where they're kind of lost people in and just mounted on the wall at the end. And off it goes planted up, and people can then start engaging with it.

Matt Morley 20:23

So irrigation, the load that goes on to the wall, if it is a wall loaded piece of preferably sort of a structural wall, and some component of light, I'm guessing, or does the vertical farm come with its own lighting system integrated into the hardware?

Jonathan Ransom 20:43

Yeah, so actually, the loading isn't isn't so much of an issue, we've just mounted one in sort of double thickness plaster board. So I it's a consideration, but isn't, often doesn't become a limitation. But what it needs is a either a water source that we can plummet into for the irrigation, or relatively near to a water source so that it's quite easy to get water to the to the wall itself. But it but it's recirculating, so it doesn't need to be continually topped up. And yes, it does need a light source. But because we're talking about edible plants, they require higher intensity light than then some of the kind of conventional office plants would need. Because it you know, the light intensity does affect the growth rate, and also the flavour of the plants as well. The system has a integrate integrated lighting, which needs a little bit of thought because it does come off the face of the wall. We also use what we call hydroponic towers, which are sort of standalone units, which is literally a tower with plants growing out the side of it which have lights integrated again in like a halo effect, which we can put anywhere in the office. It doesn't doesn't need to be mounted on the wall.

Matt Morley 22:15

What are the options that in terms of the actual type of foliage that the farm is producing? And the sort of nuts and bolts of all of this at the end of the day? Is it a bag of lettuce leaves the flowers woody would typically you do? Or would you recommend growing for sort of maximum productivity and limited amount of maintenance required and so on?

Jonathan Ransom 22:38

Yeah, so you touched on a couple of good points. I wanted one. Yep. productivity is important. plants that are the kind of give you the opportunity for engagement are important. But also from an operational perspective. We don't want to be going there too frequently to replant things that you know, in the case of a lettuce, for instance, you read the entire lettuce head, so you end up having to replant the entire plant. So we do focus on leafy greens and Herbes. You can grow fruiting crops, so tomatoes, strawberries, that sort of thing in in these types of systems, but they do require a higher intensity of light. So if for instance, we're putting we have some outside space, we might use outside space to to put up put up a farm wall, an exterior farm wall or one of our hydroponic towers outside and in the summer, you could then grow things like strawberries and tomatoes, but in the office, we're growing things like lettuce, but that also like kale, chard, both of which you cut the leaves and you can leave the plant and they they grow back so you can get multiple harvests of them. And they look great as well. So you know, Rainbow rainbow chard, lots of different colours on your wall so they look fantastic and they're relatively quick growing as well. We also then Basil's as a is a very popular one. And again, you can cut the leaves and come back and it smells fantastic. So particularly when you're harvesting it creates a lovely fragrance around the office, you know, rosemary, thyme, all the all the stuff that you might grow in a English garden, the difference being that you're growing in the office, and you can do it all year round, because the office environments a lot more stable than, you know, the seasonal environment outside in the UK. So yeah, in a in a kind of nutshell. It's leafy greens and Herbes.

Matt Morley 24:38

But then you do also have now a home farm alternative, which would be presumably on a smaller scale that's more manageable. That would be more of a residential product.

Jonathan Ransom 24:50

Yeah, correct. Yeah. And, and it's worth saying that one of the main challenges with growing indoors is the lighting And, and so with with the home farms that there is much about, you know, making the most of limited outdoor space that you have as they are about indoor space. So in some homes where you have a lot of light, you can, you know, put put one indoors, and we have a lighting solution that supplements the light, which means that you're not relying on natural light. But if you're growing outdoors on a terrorist for instance, then, you know, the world's your oyster really, and it doesn't, you know, if you're growing outdoors, you might be just as inclined to grow flowers, flat flowering plants as you are edible plants. And if it's sort of overwinter, then you might put some evergreens in and our systems modular, which means that the plants each have an individual pot that you hang on to a frame that sits behind it, but it means that you can easily take that port out and replant it with different plants, or indeed create patterns on the wall of different colours. So whatever takes your fancy, really, and I think I think just touching on the this concept of a pollinator pod and a productive productive pod and those sort of things. What we're trying to do there is just in simple terms, demonstrate that, you know, each plant plants have different functions. And both in the environment, but also in terms of what you humans get out of them. Some of them are about, they look great, which are the flowering ones, and also they produce flowers. So they're great for insects as well. So the pollinator pods are great for attracting insects into your garden, which has the knock on effect of pollinating other plants that you have in the garden, so you can start creating, you know, fantastic biodiversity. And then the producer pods are, you know, edible plants. So stuff that that you can cut and eat in your kitchen and replant and off you go again. So that's that's the idea really there. We just thought that was quite a fun a fun idea of bringing bringing to life though different sort of plants that you can, you can grow.

Matt Morley 27:17

Yeah, it's exciting. It is really, yeah, sort of makes you want to grab one and get started. And there's no excuses. Once you've sorted the lightest you rent man, one can always complain about how hard it is to grow plants or wants to terrorist. But in a way, this is a different approach. You've also gone through a crowdfunding process recently. So you've raised some capital, what are your What are your plans in terms of rollout expansion or growing over the next few years?

Jonathan Ransom 27:42

So yeah, we did the crowdfunding last year, which was a fantastic success. And I think it was well timed in that a lot of the people that get involved in a lot of the investors or get involved in crowdfunding campaigns were, you know, spending a lot of time at home during lockdown, but also we're reflecting on the sorts of things that are important. And obviously, health and well being. are, you know, they're they're important, increasingly important to people. And I think our model resonated with with the crown. So we we raise half a million pounds through that process and can had nearly 900 in investors contribute, which was a fantastic, fantastic to see. So the idea is that now what we want to do is really focus on getting these farms into offices, but also into we've got a new push recently into getting farms into co living spaces. So working with the operators of the sort of apartment buildings, and putting farms here, sort of communal farms in apartment buildings and helping people then also get some production going within their apartments themselves. So we're the this year is all about kind of rolling that out, and really demonstrating how it can work and then sort of scaling off off the back of that. So I think we'll have you know, we're optimistic about getting about 15 Farms in over the next nine months or so. And you know, that that for us would be a good achievement start with,

Matt Morley 29:20

it does feel like the whole sort of biophilia movement biophilic design, made its name with with office environments, and now does seem to be being adopted, probably, I'd say both at the very, very high end of the residential market, but also with the sort of more millennial focused co living spaces. So I think I think you're onto something there. I think we really interesting to see how you, you get on with the with the CO living new business strategy. One final question, if I may, if you were to send one message out to the real estate hospitality sector in a post COVID world if you could see one change in this industry of ours over the next few years. What would you ask for?

Jonathan Ransom 30:04

I guess I'd encourage them to listen to their customers, particularly in in the sort of residential space because the the sort of types of accommodation that that people have been living in, up to now it can be pretty, you know that the urban world is a pretty cramped world, and in a world where we're spending a lot more time at home, we have to be a little more focused on people's, you know, what they need to live healthy lifestyles. And, you know, it doesn't mean you have to give them huge amounts of space, but it does mean you need to give them amenities. And and those amenities have to be beyond the kind of normal stuff of maybe having a gym in the basement, or, or what have you, it needs to be broader than that. And from from kind of combining those two, you know, the residential space and the office spaces, it shouldn't really be thinking about them independently. Because as we're seeing now, the concept of an office isn't so much about the the kind of physical manifestation of a building that you go and work it's about. It's about where you work and the the kind of immediate amenities that are provided to to be able to work in that environment. So is joining those, the kind of living environment and the working environment together and how we balance those, those two things. So I'd just encourage some kind of novel thinking around that space.

Matt Morley 31:32

Very cool. I think you are uniquely positioned to have to make your contribution to that whole process over the next few years. Good on you. So if people want to connect, what's the best way for them to reach out square mile farms?

Jonathan Ransom 31:46

The numbers on phone numbers on the website, there's an email address on there as well. We're also very active on social so if your thing is his Instagram, then follow us there you can see see what we're doing. We tend to put videos and pictures of what we're up to on there. And by all means, ping us a message. And we'll get back to you ASAP.

Wellness Eco-Luxury Resorts with Revivo

The ‘Green & Healthy Places’ podcast series takes a deep-dive into the role of sustainability, wellbeing and community in real estate, offices, hotels and educational facilities.

This episode is with Laurie Mias, CEO of Revivo Wellness Resorts

Revivo Eco-Luxury Wellness Resorts

In this episode we are in Hong Kong to talk to French-born Laurie Mias, CEO of Revivo Eco-Luxury Wellness Resorts. They have a successful property already up and running in Bali, a second resort opening this year  in a historic chateau near Toulouse in the south of France with others in the pipeline in Malaysia, Barcelona and Sri Lanka. 

Health & Wellness in the Revivo brand DNA

Our conversation covers Revivo’s sustainable resort development strategy, how Laurie juggles her role as Revivo CEO while leading the development of sister brand Pavillion Hotel’s residential project in Niseko, Japan;  ultra local procurement policies, the benefits of on-site farms for the restaurant menu, mindful movement for neuro-plasticity and slow-aging, their deliberately soulful version of a hotel workout sessions, integrating local healing traditions, the benefits of artistic therapy sessions, plant-bars for guests to blend their own tinctures, teas and bath salts; nighttime sleep rituals and even a 16th century salt cave for underground halotherapy. 

GUEST / LAURIE MIAS

https://www.revivoresorts.com/ 

https://www.pavilionshotels.com/niseko/

In this episode we are in Hong Kong to talk to French-born Laurie Mias, CEO of Revivo Eco-Luxury Wellness Resorts. They have a successful property already up and running in Bali, a second resort opening this year in a historic chateau near Toulouse in the south of France with others in the pipeline in Malaysia, Barcelona and Sri Lanka.

FULL TRANSCRIPT TO FOLLOW COURTESY OF OTTER.AI - excuse the typos

Matt Morley 0:13

Welcome to Episode 13 of the Green and Healthy Places podcast, in which we take a deep dive into the world of sustainability and wellness in real estate and hospitality today. I'm your host, Matt Morley, founder of BioBlu eco yachting, Biofit nature gyms and Biofilico wellness interiors.

In this episode, we're in Hong Kong to talk to French born Laurie Mias, CEO of Revivo eco luxury wellness resorts. They have a successful property already up and running in Bali, a second resort opening this year in a historic Chateau near Toulouse in the south of France, with others in the pipeline in Malaysia, Barcelona and Sri Lanka. My conversation with Laurie covers the Revivo sustainable resort development strategy, how she juggles her role as CEO or for Revivo on one side, while also leading the development of sister brand Pavilion Hotels residential project in Osaka, Japan; ultra local, or hyperlocal procurement policies; the benefits of onsite farms for a restaurant menu; mindful movement for neuroplasticity and slow aging; their deliberately soulful version of a typical hotel workout; how to integrate local healing traditions into the guest experience; the benefits of artistic therapy sessions; their 'plant bar' concept for guests to blend their own tinctures, teas and bath salts; nighttime rituals, and even a 16th century salt cave for underground halotherapy!

Laurie, thanks so much for joining us today. Perhaps you could give us a quick introduction to your role because I know you're working both on the Revivo wellness resorts and with Pavilion on the other side?

Laurie 2:18

Yeah, that's correct. Revivo Bali we started from scratch. So it's my, my DNA if you like, and it's all about wellness, and it's more luxury positioning. So my job is pretty much CEO supervising everything. However, for Pavilion Hotels and resorts, my role is just supervising the constructions of houses in Japan in in Niseko so I've been busy doing that for the past three years, we built four houses. And originally it was a huge land. So it was really interesting because we had to bring electricity and drill the onsen. And yeah, just just you know, make it make the road. So yeah, and lots of constraints that I never I never had to figure out before such as the snow everything is ruled by by the snow with a snowing in Niseko in this area because you can snow up to 10 meters in one night. So it's kind of crazy. And and then you have to do everything around the snow clearing issues.

Matt Morley 3:38

So that's a development role getting new dots on the map, new hotels open for the Pavilion, but then on the Revivo side what was the process in terms of creating and defining the DNA, presumably identifying a gap in the market and creating a concept or effectively a new resort brand to fill that gap?

Laurie 4:11

So yeah, I was pitching the main investor of Revivo wellness resorts to invest into my own business back then, which was a green juicery I had launched in Hong Kong and I needed money to expand the capacity of production. And he told me - no not interested but what are you doing next weekend? Do you want to go to Bali? I have houses in south of Bali. It's called Aman hotels. I'm sure everybody's familiar and yeah, I have those houses and now they're going to lose the lease, so we need to find a new operator. So why don't you go there next weekend? And just tell me what you think? Sure. So that's what I did. And then it came back. And I said, Yeah, it's an amazing properties. Okay, can you make for me a spa resort out of the four villas that I have? And I was like, yeah, sure, I'm sure I can do that. But you know, spa is a bit competitive, everybody has a spa nowadays. So eventually, I convinced him to make something much more comprehensive than just a luxury Spa Resort. And that's how Revivo was born basically, around that idea. And that was a very lucky encounter, obviously, because I mean, Hong Kong is a type of city that is really rewarding. And people don't really look at your resume, or how old are you?

Matt Morley 5:59

So you had that amazing opportunity, then you get dropped into this project in in Bali? what were the next steps from there? were you running feasibility studies? How did you recruit? What was the the team that you built around you in those early days?

Laurie 6:17

Yes. So eventually, I recruited the team of Aman that was already there, that was the easiest, because they've been building houses for the past 10 years. So I was in contact with the architect. And yeah, looking a lot, they wanted to continue because they had started this project. And so they wanted to continue. And then I, I asked them, you know, what, the properties so pretty, and I'm not an architect myself, I don't want to change anything, I just want to expand and create the spa, turns on rooms into treatment rooms, turn the main library into the bar area, you know, some small ish modifications like that. So it was quite easy. But then in terms of customers flow, you needed to think also, because the property is huge. So you didn't want people to have the change room 50 meters from the sauna, or the you know, so it was just this type of, of problematics that we're thinking about, and the rain as well, because you can rain a lot in Valley. So again, you don't want people to to be under the rain for too long. And the property is three hectares and only 16 villas. So yeah, we were thinking like that in terms of customers flow, and service.

Matt Morley 7:44

And a big piece of what you do then is clearly around sustainability. We can get on to the wellness section in a minute. What I've found interesting is you have this combination of the green and healthy, not just one or the other. And it's a big part of how you communicate online. So this idea of sustainable resort or sustainable development strategy, where you're reducing plastics, could you talk to us a bit about what that equates to?

Laurie 8:23

For me you don't see it, because you are in a luxury five star hotel. And it has to be normal at some point that for the price you pay you expect that you don't find a plastic bottle on your bedside table. For instance, I mean, to me, at least that's the definition of luxury nowadays. Because if we don't do it, if a five star hotel don't change a plastic bottle for a glass or refillable one, then who is going to do it, you know what I mean? Because, see, I mean goes without saying glass cost five, five times more than plastic. But everybody knows that. And it's convenient. Of course, when you look at the p&l, or the pre opening costs just to make the switch again, what drove this and we will think about about it later, but that's what I wanted to avoid to me. every single detail matters and and yeah, we have to show the example I feel like when you in the luxury, hospitality and especially I got so lucky to learn from the Armani hospitality that is really really, really ultra luxury. And they they've they don't get any any corners, you know, so I was like, Okay, I'm just gonna continue what they started to do and every single stone has been sourced in in Bali to build this project. And it was 25 years ago. You know that the first. The first house is the first hotel they built. Part of this project. Everything was sourced locally, the wood, the hats, the way they you know, the way they build. And yeah, every single sarong, every single hat was made in in Bali. It's also quite easy in Bali, because there is a really high tax on every single product that is imported. So to be honest, you don't really want to import anything, but But yeah, I think it's beautiful. Also, when people travel all around, I mean so far, and they arrive in Bali. And they I think they really appreciate that. Whatever they could find in our bedroom, let's say, we furnish yoga where because people come most of the time for yoga retreat, and our yoga were all made in eboard, in north of Bali with an organic cotton. And so you can go and visit a factory, same for our ceramics. Same for our soap. All our soaps are natural, and made in eboard. So again, people can go visit the factory, and I don't know, you really adds up, you know, we all those small details they add up. And that's what creates a luxurious, memorable experience. I think.

Matt Morley 11:19

Hotel brands have been talking about this concept of 'a sense of place' for so long. But it feels like only now, are they really delivering on that promise and doing exactly what you described, which is, every detail, not just in terms of the aesthetics, but in terms of where things are sourced and procured and actually made at a local level. So there's, there's so many layers to that sense of place. Now. Presumably, it's it's sort of embedded right into the DNA of each particular person. Yeah. And how do you how do you then move that forward, then into the idea of even producing your own food or ingredients for the kitchen? I know that you have hydroponic gardens on site in Bali? Is that a again, is that a? Is that a financial decision? Is it is it a huge capex investment? Has it proved to be a good decision?

Laurie 12:07

100%, I will do it again. Because, again, it adds a lot to the customer experience and those type of ideas, you also get them when you surround yourself with like minded people, and especially the nutritionist chef, who had put together our our menu. Her name is Ali walu. And she is Spanish also and for her. Yeah, it goes without saying that all the products that we use in our kitchen, they are 100% natural, they're 100% made in this kitchen, we don't buy any seasoning or any anything that is a premade kind of except the wine I would say or the alcohol, you know, but otherwise, everything is made in our own kitchen. So she was beautiful like that. And she really pushed me to, to really do everything with with our own product and locally sourced. And she was amazing in the in the procurement phase. And she only wanted to work with and cook with seasonal as well products. And she found for instance, I don't know, a fruit supplier, who is only picking up the fruit that he that he found on the floor, you know what I mean? So they arrived by themselves. So yeah, this type of of stories that I was so grateful for her to bring this, this content if you'd like to join us and yeah, thanks to people that you surround yourself with, when you have a good intention. And you know, all the dots kind of align, because you find people with similar intentions.

Matt Morley 13:55

Yeah, it's beautiful, it makes complete sense. So that in a way it gives you that neutral concept. And then I know you also have the movie or concept around movement and particularly I'm interested in the idea of combining the movement and mindfulness You know, a lot of every every hotel resort has some kind of a gym that usually not that exciting but very few of them do anything a bit more interesting with the gym and even fewer resorts. Think also about how movement and mindfulness can both be practiced. So how did you how did you go about creating that movie of fitness or wellness?

Laurie 14:28

So it was important for me, I'm not a gym person. I've never was but I knew we needed to have a resort gym design, so men, they like the high intensity workout. And so I tried to infuse mindfulness into even the gym that to me sounded without soul. And so for instance, if you come to to our Resort, which I hope you will one day, You will find that the teacher is starting the personal training class with breath work. And sometimes, maybe it's ending also the the class with the sound, the Tibetan bowl sound. just to connect because you are activating all your your body and it's already an amazing thing that you can do for for your body and for it for your mental health. But if on top of that, you you managed to integrate mindfulness I would say the benefits are 10 times better because you would be 100% aware and when you when you are aware and when you do things with mindfulness, basically your brain and your your connections, your your we call it neuroplasticity, the plasticity of your brain is much, much better. And like that you you can reduce the risk of having a neurodegenerative disease. So it's it's a bit complicated, but not really. But if you want to Google it, there is a lot of research that has proven that mindfulness, increases your neuroplasticity and reduce the risk of contracting a neurodegenerative disease. So you live longer and healthier and happier.

Matt Morley 16:24

reminds me a little bit of, I guess of two things - yoga And then also from my perspective on martial arts, you know, there's a moment before you, you step onto the mats when you practice, most martial arts where you take a breath, kind of you bow to the, to the studio to the to the gym, where you're training, and you have a mindful moment before you start practicing. And obviously Yoga is that sort of Mind Body connection. So there's integrating that into the fitness side is is fascinating. It also raises the question of how the Asian influence is part of the brand, as a whole, or whether it was more to do with your first location in Bali. So when you go to open your next resort coming soon, this year, I believe in France, how are you translating that brand concept? Is it is it still a essentially an Asian brand that's coming to Europe? Or are you adapting and finding that local inspiration for each new property?

Laurie 17:23

Yes, exactly. It was really important for me that in each place you feel the the sense of place, as we call it before, and that the treatments and the workouts are inspired by local healing traditions. So the food is an easy easier is the easier one, I would say because of course you work with local food. So that's kind of the adorn I would say. But more what we bring, for instance, to the Chateau. The shack that you won't find in Bali is the art therapies. I mean, it's not exactly it's not called out therapies, but it's therapies around the the art activities, such as painting, or pottery or writing, we have dense, dense classes as well. Because again, it's working around the idea of mindfulness. And when you do something with your both hands, you are obliged to be mindful more than when you you type on one hand, and on the other hand, you're cooking something that's when you make your toast. Burnt basically, because you're really concentrated doing anything, right. So yeah, we hope that when you're painting this, you're 100% to your your painting. So we have that we have art pavilions and we will animate every day workshops around around art. And there is also a Phyto bar which is a plant bar if you like where you will go and you will do your own tea blend or your basalts assortment, and you can also do your tincture. You will do some inhalation for a better respiratory system. And yeah, that's also a mindful place where people will do on their own but in a in a mindful way because you need to think when I'm going to put in my tea, a little bit of common mileage will have lavenders you know, you just have yourself and so that's also inspired by local French culture because everything around perfumes, a lot of lot of aromatherapy workshops, I would say that are specific to the Chateau de sciacca property. And another thing as well that is quite unique in the in the Chateau is the Have a salt cave. So we found a cave that that has been dig six meters above the floor underneath right underneath the floor. And that has been built way before the castle was built. The castle was built in the 18th century. And this cave was built probably in the 16th century. So yeah, people can go there and there will be some salt on the floor. So it will be Hallo. Hallo therapy, you just lie down in this cave for half an hour, one hour in. Yeah, that will be feel very unique, I think. So even without the salt is already very, very unique. Yeah, and then something quite specific also about shadow the shark is that I really wanted to push the the mindfulness side, of course, it will be in all our reviewable properties, but especially the slow aging and slow aging through the plasticity of your brain that I was just talking about. So there will be every night brain games. So brain games can be puzzles, or can be Mikado, I don't know. Like, it can be very simple things but just dedicated sometimes, everyday to that. And also, if you come by yourself, that can be an opportunity to mingle with other guests around because I realize in Valley, people often come on their own. And it's nice to I mean, it's also necessary to, to find your own space, especially when you when you have done such a long trip and you arrive in a new place. But after two or three days, it's nice also to start to talk to your neighbors and realize they have been a bit in the same tree than you. They may be lonely, you're overwhelmed or overachieved and they needed a break. And yeah, you know, it's, it's quite nice and reassuring to talk to people that are like minded.

Matt Morley 22:04

It sounds to me almost I mean, there's certainly elements released from looking from outside almost of a kind of, you know, like a Buddhist retreat or mindfulness retreat, you're imagining people, or is the typical length of stay for three to seven nights. I mean, it's more than it's more resort than hotel, right? It's more somewhere, you come for a few days to sort of absorb all of these different experiences rather than somewhere you drop by for an overnight stay. It's more a resort holiday experience. Is that right?

Laurie 22:34

Yes, definitely. I mean, it's something that is very transformative in a way that I don't think people have never experienced anything like that before. Because very comprehensive. And we give you a lot of tools, if you like a lot of like, healthy takeaways that then you can apply on the daily basis. So you feel it's transformational. But you feel it even more after, once you have left the retreat, or other people are crying when they leave the resort in Bali. It's very strong, the kind of reviews we can have some people, lots of people, they say you don't know how much you change my life. You know, some people yeah, we were on the verge of a divorce with my husband. And since we discovered re vivo, you, you change so many things. re vivo from the Latin means I will live again, it's a bit. It's also the last Asana, the last pose when you do a yoga flow. And at the end after the Shavasana you turn on your right side and you're on the features pose and this pose this concept is called the reverse pose. So it's the feeling how you feel after a very good yoga class where you've been 100% into the into the flow, you know, for 60 minutes you were anywhere else you felt like you were at the right place at the right moment. And that's this feeling that I hope and I really wonder the river experience to procure to feel like now you are completely reset, and you are with with yourself and you have everything you need inside you to to be happy and you know, you feel like you're at the right place at the right moment.

Matt Morley 24:17

Because you can obviously reach that that state at the end of a 90 minute yoga class in a in a crazy urban environment like Hong Kong, or indeed somewhere like Barcelona, but then how do you translate the vivo concept into an urban environment? If you're looking at somewhere like Barcelona to set up a future resort is there do you have to adapt your your offer around that the idea of being in a city rather than being in a natural environment because obviously a lot of what you offer is that connection, the peace and quiet of being in a in a non urban environment surrounded by nature.

Laurie 24:53

Yeah, I would say it's easier if you're surrounded by nature because it's really relaxing as a I mean, as the opposite of office city, you know, sometimes you just finished a very peaceful and yoga class, and then you go out in the street, and it's noisy and smelly. And it's, yeah, very busy. And so all of a sudden, the relaxation is gone. If it's even more difficult, I mean, of course, it's achievable. But what is good? We've been approached, let's say, by some hotel, they're like, Oh, can you maybe do this bath for us? Can you do, and I'm a bit against, because if he works, he works in a comprehensive way. Any, any, if any change happens in people in the people people's mind is because they understand it and they have felt it you know, you need something to click in your new mind to for the change to begin. Otherwise, if it's just if it's can can be like a train passing in front of you, you know, when you stay on the, on the platform, you don't really feel like the train was passing, you felt like Oh, it was nice to watch this yoga class or I felt a bit like that. Sometimes I go to a resort or Thalassotherapy. And nobody explained to me really what is happening in my brain, in my soul in my body, and I do all the treatments, but then I'm like, Yeah, that's great. But okay, maybe I lost two kg, because we mentioned he only ate greens. But then when I'm back home, I rushed into the first step burger place, because I, they created the sense of probation, probation. And so for the change to last people need to understand So for us, it's very important that we guide them through and that we guide them through the four pillars that are the movement, the movement of the breath, the movement of your of your body, and also the movement of your neurons, the neuro bikes, we call it and the spa Of course, which is a Roma therapy, your environment, you know, like how you take care of yourself, how you pamper yourself to take some time for yourself, the supplies of food, there is no order of importance here, but it should be the first otherwise, but the food and the beverage of choice, of course, is very, very important part of the, the healthy lifestyle if you want. And the fourth is then the new trio that the three the do nocturno, which is all around the sleep, because you can be full of very good intention and wanting to change something in your in your life and wanting to have a better version of yourself. If you cannot sleep, you will find it very, very difficult to achieve that inner peace. So, yeah, all our retreats are based around those four pillars, I would say, whether you come for detox or weight loss or slow aging, it will always be built around those four pillars. And so to answer your question, it can be achieved in a in an urban environment, but it will be more difficult because you need a consistency. You know, it's not just like, you do it once and then you forget all about it. And as I said, Yeah, lost 2kg, but then eventually again, 5kg back because nothing changed really inside my brain. Nothing clicked. So for it to click, you need to practice a little bit every day. And for you to practice every day, you have to think learn. So yeah, it's easier if people they are in our in house, I would say and so we can better teach. I don't want to say teach but just show them and then they can do whatever they want with the knowledge. And

Matt Morley 29:05

how do you the sleep piece is really interesting. I think that's something that's now becoming more and more recognized as a key component in health and overall well being. How do you assist a guest in if not improving their sleep at least thinking about sleep as a form of nutrition and wellbeing how does that manifest itself in the guest experience?

Laurie 29:32

so what we call lock to noise, all the rituals, it's very important. So I was just saying that to create a pattern, you know, you have to work a little bit every day. Becoming mindful is a bit like when you learn a new instrument of music. If you want to play guitar, you try to play guitar for six hours in one day and then you don't touch the guitar for one month. You will never be able to play The guitar. However, if you practice a bit, 20 minutes every day, eventually in one month, maybe less, you will, you will know how to play the guitar. So, the same for mindfulness. So it is same for the for the sleeping ritual, you need to maybe do some aromatherapy ritual in your room, you know, have as sleep, they call it pillow pillow spray, that you spray on your pillow, you know, create some ritual like that, before you go to bed, maybe half an hour before you put your, your phone in airplane mode dim down the light, you leave, maybe it's I like to have a notebook on my bedside table where I write my thoughts. Because that's also what is keeping you awake, sometimes when you have thoughts in your mind, and you're like, I'm gonna get it, you know, tomorrow, I will wake up and I will have forgotten this idea. Or I forgot to answer this email. And you know, and so you can actually you keep thinking about stuff that that are keeping you awake. So I like to have a notebook and just to write your thoughts on it. So at least your mind is free of that. And then other tips is also to take a bath again, just to relax your your mind, relax your body, you know, create this type of ritual, this type of little routine, maybe give yourself a face massage, you know, And in repeat that every day.

Matt Morley 31:40

So looking ahead to the next 12 months, what happens next?

Laurie 31:42

Yes, so we have been quite lucky because even though we are quite young, we have already assigned at some franchising contract. So we will open in France this year. And we have also a beautiful project in Malaysia that is going to open in 2023. But it's a big one you would be at rooms. So yeah, we'll be very busy. And then we have also a property in Barcelona and land in Sri Lanka, that will be also built at some point. Yeah, depending on the situation, but maybe I hope within the next four years, some exciting pipeline.

Thank you, Matt.

building wellness & sustainability with evalore spain

Talking green buildings & healthy buildings with Pablo Munoz, CEO of Evalore, Building Wellness & Sustainability

The ‘Green & Healthy Places’ podcast series takes a deep-dive into the role of sustainability, wellbeing and community in real estate, offices, hotels and educational facilities.

evalore building wellness & sustainability

In this episode we talk to Pablo Munoz, Co-Founder and CEO of Evalore, Building Wellness & Sustainability with offices in Barcelona and Madrid. Founded three years ago, it’s a team of engineers, architects and energy modelers with an entrepreneurial spirit that immediately caught my attention.

indoor air quality, wellness villas ands more

We discuss air quality strategies for indoor environments such as corporate offices, the integration of both green building and healthy building strategies in each project, their first timber office building in Spain called WittyWood that is currently under construction, active design strategies to promote movement in an office building, their healthy home strategies for a WELL Villa at PGA Catalunya residential golf resort in Spain, their own in-house Air First air purification certification and their Evalore Method intended to push the green & healthy building movement forward with a focus on Spain and accessible price points.

healthy & well become commoditized

We also look ahead to the next 12 months in our industry and Pablo highlights the risks of well-washing, whereby an increasing array of products and services are branded as being ‘healthy’, meaning a dose of skepticism is going to become increasingly important for those on the inside of the healthy building movement in order to protect its reputation.

air first rating system

One of the topics we touch on in the podcast is Evalore’s Air First air quality management system that sets out to offer a more accessible alternative to the more extensive and capital intensive certifications such as WELL and LEED.

For me, this looks like the first in what may be an entire new generation of such accreditation systems that adapt what works for corporate America to a more local context, in this case Spain and its commercial real estate sector.

The protocols cover Purification, Disinfection, Monitoring & Training tin protocols to enhance Indoor Air Quality.

GUEST / PABLO MUNOZ

• https://evalore.es/

• https://airfirst.es/

• https://www.facebook.com/EspaciosEvalore/

• https://twitter.com/Evalorewell

• https://www.linkedin.com/company/espaciosevalore/

In this episode we talk to Pablo Munoz, Co-Founder and CEO of Evalore, Building Wellness & Sustainability with offices in Barcelona and Madrid. Founded three years ago, it's a team of engineers, architects and energy modelers with an entrepreneurial spirit that immediately caught my attention.

Full transcript below…

===============

Matt Morley 0:14

Pablo, to get things going perhaps you could just give us a really quick introduction to who you are, and also to the business Evalore that you're CEO of here in Spain?

Pablo Munoz 3:05

Hi, Matt and thank you so much. It is a pleasure for me to be here with you today. My name is Paolo Munoz. I'm an architect. I was licensed here in Spain but I have worked for most of my career abroad. I first worked in London for a couple years where I worked for a small architecture company then I went in Europe for a Masters of Science in Sustainability in the urban environment. I worked for a pretty big consultancy firm in sustainability then at some point I had the opportunity to come back to Spain. I founded Evalore with two co-founders And this has been going on for three and a half years almost now.

Matt Morley 4:02

You've been up and running now with the business for about three years, as you mentioned, what does your team look like today? And I guess I have to ask this one - how how has your team had to adapt with your offices over the last 10 or 11 months during the COVID-19 crisis?

Pablo Munoz 4:36

Yes, we have a team made out of consultants, architects, engineers, and also energy modelers. For the type of services that we provide, we need to have to have a pretty diverse backgrounds for our company and for sure COVID has been a challenge for us, as well as for everyone. And we are right now working remotely for most of the time. But we also come to the office, there's a part of our work that's difficult to conduct when we are not connected. There's a piece of commitment that is renovated every time we see each other and we talk about our projects, so even though we're trying our best to not be at the office, there is part of our work that has to be conducted in person.

Matt Morley 5:57

Thinking about the indoor environment within the Office. Are you monitoring air quality For example? Have you had to install plastic privacy panels or desk dividers to break up your office space? What kind of changes have you applied using your knowledge of, for example, the WELL building standard and applying it to your own home office environment or your own corporate office environment?

Pablo Munoz 6:22

Right, so the first thing was the protocols. We had to set the way we use the office, and how often we go to the office, we try to not be all at the same time at the office. How's the schedule, and when people use the office, that was the first thing that we had to think about. But independently from that, we also adapted the office so that when we are using it, we are safe. The first part was ventilation. And this is all related to the importance of the air quality in the office. It is funny, we've been talking about it now for three or four years. That was the that that's sort of how about already started. And we started talking about the importance of taking care of the built environment we live in and the importance of the indoor spaces. And so one of the things that we do at the office is we measure the quality of the air we're breathing. So we try to ventilate and we have a system that ventilation is connected to sensors, we can make sure that ventilation is high, we also have space so that desks have separation from each other. The same thing happens in the main meeting room where we have physical barriers to separate from each other.

Matt Morley 8:34

Are your air purifiers integrated into the air conditioning HVAC system or are they standalone domestic air purifiers, like a Dyson system?

Pablo Munoz 8:49

So in our case, we have purifiers standalone on the floor, because the system we use for the air ventilation air system or a heating system did not allow for incorporating those systems.

Matt Morley 9:13

You mentioned the idea of there being more awareness now and if there is any positive change to come from what we've all been through over the last year it is an increasing awareness amongst a wider portion of the population about what indoor Environmental Quality is. Where are you seeing the growth or increase in interest for your products and services coming from?

Pablo Munoz 9:51

We have certainly seen growth in consultancy, we're seeing that people are finally more aware and more interested in the impact that spending time in buildings has, right, like, over the last year, we spent so many days, stuck in our apartments or in our homes, we all finally realized that it had an impact on our physical and emotional well being. And I think that's working in our favor in the way that finally not only clients that are people who want to buy a house or want to build their home for themselves, but also companies are integrating this thinking their projects. But also, I think we cannot forget that this is, at the end of the day, this is a sustainability crisis. In a way it is an environmental crisis. It's not very clear what the origin of the virus is. But most experts agree that it has to do with pushing too far the limit of where humans meet nature and getting to areas where we were not supposed to be. And so I think in a way, this is also helping us realize that we need to do something, we need to build in a better way, when it comes to my sector to architecture, okay, we need to be building a more efficient way for in a better way for the type for the environment.

Matt Morley 11:58

That relationship with nature can be positive, it can bring health benefits But clearly, as you say it can also bring huge risks if not treating or not respecting nature in the right way. Or we're taking it for granted that it will only bring good because clearly, you know there are certain situations such as certain animals and certain markets in China or wherever, where Yeah, we can put ourselves at risk. But to get into that the idea of of reconnecting with nature in in urban environments... I know that you'd be working on a timber built construction project in Barcelona, that's been getting quite a lot of press attention recently. Can you talk us through what that looks like and describe that project?

Pablo Munoz 12:53

Yes, for sure. This will be the Wittlewood building and it will be the first timber building of offices in Spain, a five storey building in the district of Poblenou where most new offices have been built. And it is a very cool project. We're very, very excited as it is not only going for LEED certification. )LEED is one of the most renowned green building standards in the world together with BREEAM the UK version, and USGBC is the US version). It looks into all aspects of sustainability and not only does it look into making sure that the building doesn't consume too much energy, we are using a district heating system And of course, solar panels for photovoltaic production will be available in the building. The building envelope is very sophisticated so that we can decrease the energy demand of the building for both the winter and the summer. We're looking at using sustainable materials. We're looking at using materials that do not come from very far away, and that are produced in a sustainable manner. And often we're looking into making sure that they are using the circular economy system for production. One of the really cool thing about this project is that there will be a water collection system, the water will be used for both irrigation and also for, for bathroom use. WELL is the most, in this case, the equivalent of LEED but in the health and wellness area, it is based on six years of medical and scientific research. And so the strategies that were proposed are not random, they are based on very, very specific parameters that have been proven to improve the health of the people that spend time in those buildings. And in this case, we're talking about the quality of the lighting, or making sure that the lighting doesn't interfere with the circadian needs of the people that spend time in the building. Once we've looked at in a very holistic way it also has to do with acoustic comfort, with thermal comfort, with biophilia, which is the strategy of integrating nature into the interior side of the building.

Matt Morley 16:57

How did you address the nutrition and fitness components of the WELL certification? There just might not be space for a fitness room or a gym facility or there might not be an on site restaurant facility, how have you have you addressed those chapters of the WELL certification process?

Pablo Munoz 17:23

That's, that's a challenge very often. But it is interesting, because people sometimes think that fitness has also has only to do with being able to integrate a gym facility into building, but sometimes it has to do with the way we move, for example, if we place the staircase, in an area where it can be seen then we are promoting the use of it, instead of using the elevators. Something that's appealing to people, let's say, with art pieces, or music, or with coral reefs, or even nature, we're helping people to be more active. And so that's one of the strategies that WELL addresses. Then the nutrition part is a little more challenging here as well, because there is no restaurant in this building. And in this case, one of the things that we are looking at is the vending machines, we're making sure that the food offered in the vending machine is only healthy food.

Matt Morley 18:59

Then when you're focusing on something like a single family home clearly there are even more restrictions there. However, you do both the commercial and the residential side. So if you when you're applying those WELL building philosophy or design concepts to a residential project that's maybe just made for a family such as the one you did, at the PGA Catalunya resort, what does the process of transferring that same knowledge to a completely different context where it's really more about one one family living together rather than lots of co workers spending eight hours in an office each day.

Pablo Munoz 19:49

Right, I mean the principles are the same. We need to take care of the people who work for us and that makes them more productive. And that's pretty much the main reason companies are integrating WELL into their daily lives, because they know it is profitable for them. But when it comes to us making decisions on where we decide to live, don't we want the same thing for our health? We want our family to live in a place that cannot really compromise their health. And so the same principles have been implemented in a pilot study that was the first time in the PGA Catalunya that the WELL standard was applied to a single family home. We need to make sure that the air quality is optimal, with air monitors, sensors, ventilation, high performance filters , optimal quality water We also looked at all the materials being used in the project and we were very careful to use materials that didn't have any ingredients that could be harmful for human health. People listening to us might be surprised like, oh, are there products that are allowed in our homes or in our interior that are bad for our health? Yes! I could talk for hours about that.

Matt Morley 22:45

One of the really interesting things about what you're doing is not just providing consultancy services, as architects and as experts in LEED and WELL but you seem to be taking quite an entrepreneurial approach to this whole scene. And in a way I think, genuinely making your own contribution to that. I was really interested to read about your Air First air purification certification, which seems to be inspired by the bigger players in the market, but perhaps adapting it for Spanish or local requirements. Where did you come up with that initial idea? And what was the the objective in presumably not just creating something to compete with existing certification systems, but perhaps something better adapted to the local market?

Pablo Munoz 23:51

Yes, we actually realized that there was a hidden demand that was not being satisfied. We know that there's a big demand for big health and wellness projects in Spain, in Europe in general, especially in the office building sector, but what about those smaller projects that cannot really implement those measures, because simply don't have the budget to do so? We thought, okay, how can we make it available to them too? How can we make it more simple for those smaller projects? Why can't we choose those strategies that make the most difference? And that's how Air First came about, it is a certification that looks at one of the things that nowadays is probably the most important topic - air quality. So yes it is based on WELL but while it's an open standard, that said, it has been proven to work. So let's make sure that those authorities are available to everyone right, it is a way to democratize those standards for everyone.

Matt Morley 26:08

So then a separate piece of intellectual property compared to what you describe, is your Evalore Method, is that just your process? Or is there more to it?

Pablo Munoz 26:31

It is a way of working, we have set a very clear way of first communicating with a client, making sure of understanding what would they need and what are the goals of the project. And then working together through the process to make sure they they reach those goals through the strategies that we propose. And then helping them communicate those strategies that they have implemented at the end of project, that's the method or first would sort of be one of the forms that the Evalore method can take. Imagine that could be an office project, or it could be a building project for for a residential project or it could be a school and also a co-working has been one of our projects.

Matt Morley 28:45

It really looks to be about democratizing that knowledge and the scientific backing behind this whole approach to creating healthy buildings. But in a sense, it's almost like the next generation coming through now where the parents will be LEED and WELL, now there's the new generation, taking that knowledge and moving it forward and adapting it to new markets and new demands. I know you mentioned before we started talking today that you're also working on a modular homes project, perhaps you could is that is that also a healthy home concept that you're developing?

Pablo Munoz 29:45

Yes, yes. What you said about the parents being LEED and Well, all those standards in fact, what we've seen over the last few years is that codes created by the administration are little by little catching up and getting closer to our standards. And the main purpose, in my opinion, the main value of those standards, is to set a very high standard for those codes to catch up to, and so this is very, very interesting to me. And those standards are not a goal in itself, they are a tool to take buildings to the next level. And so that's the way we like to work, we don't make projects just to reach those standards, we make projects to reach certain levels of excellence. Right?

Unknown Speaker 31:00

So what about the modular homes project?

Pablo Munoz 31:15

Yes, this is a new project we're working on at the moment, we're working with a partner that create modular homes made out of silver concrete, which is a very, very interesting product, because it has really high benefits, it is a high performance material, because it can be used as a structural material, but same time, it has very high insulation benefits, both on the acoustic side and also on the thermal side. And it allows us to work in a modular way. So this is sort of like a research project we have started recently, but it is one of the new things that we have started to work on and together with this company that usually builds concrete homes, we are integrating all those health and wellness and sustainability measures. We are very excited to see that come to light.

Matt Morley 32:48

It feels like there's just so many different small niche corners of the real estate market that have yet to be touched by this kind of sustainable and healthy building approach. Right? There's just still so much to do. It sounds like you guys are really innovating and pushing the boundaries and hustling hard, which is great to see. If you were to look a year down the line into the future, what do you see as being the key trends?

Pablo Munoz 33:36

Well, I think one of the main trends is that wellness in general is going to be much more integrated in projects all over the world. It happened with sustainability and green building. Actually we reached a point of greenwashing in which everyone and everything and every product was 'green'. And then that was when the standards took on greater importance. I think a similar thing is going to happen with wellness and we need to be careful not everything is going to be labelled 'healthy' in the future. Every product is not going to take care of your health, it's not going to kill Corona.

Matt Morley 34:27

Amazing. Well, best of luck with the next year and I'm sure you have a very bright future with the business! Where can people find you online?

Pablo Munoz 36:02

Well, they can find us in our website, which is Evalore.es and also on social media and on Twitter and LinkedIn. So thank you very much for the time Matt it's been a pleasure for me to be here with you.

Restorative Mindfulness in the Workplace

The ‘Green & Healthy Places’ podcast explores sustainability, wellbeing and community in real estate and hospitality.

This episode is with Yinshi, a company promoting restorative mindfulness in the workplace.

The Role of Restorative Meditation in Workplace Wellness

Today I’m with Leigh Chapman, Founder of Yinshi, a workplace wellness start-up focused on facilitating meditation at work. 

His business model is both hardware and software, providing physical meditation pods that can provide a safe haven for an office worker to escape to for a little quiet time, as well as a suite of services to facilitate and encourage a greater acceptance and understanding of the value meditation can bring to the workday.

We discuss the pros and cons of open-plan offices on mental health, the benefits of biophilic design, micro-napping at work, the ‘Six Whys of Meditation’, how mindfulness improves productivity and the human-centric office post-Covid. 

yinshi.co.uk

===========

Today I'm with Leigh Chapman, Founder of Yinshi, a workplace wellness start-up focused on facilitating meditation at work. His business model is both hardware and software, providing physical meditation pods that can provide a safe haven for an office worker to escape to for a little quiet time, as well as a suite of services to facilitate and encourage a greater acceptance and understanding of the value meditation can bring to the workday.

A full transcript follows courtesy of Otter.ai - apologies for any typos lost in translation!

===========

Welcome to Episode 14 of the green and Healthy Places podcast, in which we explore the themes of wellness and sustainability in real estate and hospitality. I'm your host, Matt Morley, founder of BioBlu sustainability, Biofilico wellness interiors, and Biofit nature gyms.

Today, I'm with Leigh Chapman, founder of Yinshe, a workplace wellness startup focused on facilitating meditation. at work. His business model is both hardware and software, providing physical meditation pods that offer a safe haven for an office worker to escape for a little quiet time, as well as a suite of services to facilitate and encourage greater acceptance and understanding of the value meditation can bring.

To the work day, we discussed the pros and cons of open plan offices or mental health, the benefits of biophilic design, one of my favourite topics, micro napping at work, what he calls the six Whys of meditation, and how mindfulness is linked to productivity, and his views on the human centric office post COVID. It's an interesting conversation.

He's a super bright guy, with big plans to make an impact on the workplace in London. If you like this type of content, please consider subscribing…..

So, Leigh thanks for joining us. I'm excited to talk to you today. I'm really keen to hear more about your your new business inchie. So perhaps you could give a quick intro to what you're doing and the products that you currently have on the market.

Leigh Chapman 2:05

Hi, Matt. Thank you. Yeah, thanks for thanks very much for having me. Today, really excited to talk to you. So yeah, just give you a quick, quick overview. He and she is a product service solution, all sorts of different things, which is primarily born out of the need to combat the issues that we've got stress and mental health in society in general today, which cost the UK economy up to 45 billion a year.

And obviously, that's a societal wide problem, but we look specifically workspaces and how we can improve and help contribute to better workspaces. And part of that is about the appropriate spaces or having the appropriate spaces for physical, mental health.

And in particular, we are really passionate advocates, advocates of meditation. And that comes from, from my backstory, I won't go into it too deeply. But I found meditation at a time when I was suffering from stress quite badly at work, difficult points in my life. And helped so profoundly, I can't begin to tell you hopefully, we'll get into that a little bit later.

But the problem that I had was that I couldn't find space to do it every day. And in actual fact, at the time, I was doing a type of meditation, which required you to practice twice a day.

So if you couldn't find a space to do it in the morning, then, you know, there was even harder to find a space later in the day, because offices just for most offices just aren't cut out or designed to have that type of space for mental wellness.

And I had the typical problem where I would find myself in the toilets, once a day, trying to find some kind of peace and someone in the cubicle next to me trying their best to not let me find some peace. And one day I just had a bit of a spark a light bulb, and just thought this gotta be a better way of doing this, really. So that's where the idea was born.

And we our main products are meditation pods that provide a quiet, peaceful, private, secure space for people to meditate in their own time. And we suppose we're kind of retrofitting these spaces into offices, because it would be great if they were designed in that way in the first place. And those kind of aspects of well being well thought about and integrated into the design process, they obviously starting to be which is great.

And some offices do have areas for for meditation, but not many. And actually, those areas that they do have sometimes aren't ideal because a lot of people have a self a sense of self consciousness that they can't get over and end up don't using those spaces at all. So our spaces are a little bit more private than that.

So yeah, we're kind of retrofit retrofit in these spaces in So offices really and and trying to make a meaningful contribution to people's mental health and stress levels while they're at work.

Matt Morley 5:08

Okay, so a couple of things you mentioned that I thought were worth picking up on. Clearly, the subtext to that is that the shift towards more open plan offices, one of the side effects of that has been there is effectively a limit to the number of spaces or options available to someone where they can have a private moment where they can

Yeah, just just pull away from, from the hub. And I think that's the challenge for that has become the challenge more recently around workplace wellness, and particularly around design and layout for a lot of sort of the big corporates is, is how you balance that that sort of free flowing movement, hot hot desks and what have you, but also creating enough areas of privacy. So clearly, in a way you're responding to that because there are fewer people in their own private offices now than there were, say 20 years ago, right. So in a sense, it's a response to that or a solution to that problem.

Leigh Chapman 6:09

Yeah, definitely. I think there's, there's a lot been said about open plan offices isn't the real Marmite kind of area, some people love them. Some people, some people hate them. And you're right, there's so much good about them, you know, I can talk about things like collaboration, creativity, ideas that are sparked through random encounters, that kind of stuff.

But you know, there is the flip side as well, and that they aren't good for everyone's mental health, I don't think they don't suit every type of personality. I don't know, if you listen to Bruce daisley at all. He's SVP of Twitter, in the UK, and he does a lot of stuff around working environments. And that's the company's kind of thing. Now, he's really interesting.

He came out with quite an amusing comment on one of his podcasts recently, which was open plan offices are the best way to get everyone in the company to absolutely hate each other very quickly. Because there's so many things that really wind people up about those spaces. You could be sitting next to someone and you know, you don't get any work done for an hour, because all they want to talk about is you know, what happened in, you know, the Queen's gambit last last night or something like that.

So they don't say absolutely everyone, I think there is an acknowledgment of that. Now, I think people are starting to question that. It can be really interesting to see how the workplace evolves, I think when we go back, post COVID, and all the challenges that that's obviously going to throw up. And it'll be really interesting to see how people start to re examine those a lot more when they're thinking about office design, and what's really sort of best for our productivity and mental health at the same time.

Matt Morley 7:46

So even before COVID, this was a year and a half, two years ago, I was involved in a sort of biophilic design consultancy project for a big corporate in Switzerland, just outside of Zurich. In fact, they do natural foods, and they're all in there were completely into this whole space, but they had a big big issue with the headquarter building around acoustics.

And it was it got right to the top of the tree and that the the global HR director was was really pushing hard to try and address the problems around acoustics, sound levels, background noise. And it got to the point where by you know, we needed to take sort of quite drastic measures we created with sort of acoustic panels all over the place, acoustic paints, acoustic underlays, for the carpets, all kinds of things.

And then in fact, we ended up with a what we call the wellness room, which was effectively a mini space dedicated to, to just kind of chilling out in a sense. So clearly, that's something that's that we're seeing emerging on the market.

But to describe your your pods a bit more in detail, then like, this is a space that you sort of you literally walk into and in a way cut yourself off, right, and you have that quiet moment in a dedicated space by yourself. Whereas a wellness room, you know, might be other people in there in silence or not. But then in one of your pods, it really is a sort of personal moment, right?

Leigh Chapman 9:11

Yeah, exactly. And you know, we're not saying by any means that wellness rooms are not a good idea. And they of course, are totally open for, you know, people to use those and harness them in the way that works for their mental health in the best way.

But you know, a lot of people it doesn't work. And like I said before, there's just too much of a sense of self security for them to go in there and really, properly relax and switch off. So. So our environments on our pods are designed to be a little bit more private.

They're hard to describe verbally, I'd say to anyone, probably best to go to our website. If you just Google the inchie you'll find that quite easily and you'll be able to see them. There's two two parts that we've designed The word pod one is a kind of an open circular spiral design. It's made with birch plywood, which we chose for it's kind of calming natural materials and colours, as well as it kind of feeling quite restorative as well.

And it's a biomimetic design, which is inspired by the golden ratio, which I'm sure you've heard of before, which is a really common sort of spiral pattern found throughout nature, from galaxies down to plants, and the way they kind of pattern out spiral. And enter in the pod is really a bit of a journey, I suppose we were trying to create its likes of what we wanted to do was it really feel like you were stepping out of your current environment into a different one, one that was more instantly more relaxing, and you could straightaway just feel a little bit more ease and breathe more easily.

And we supply noise cancelling headphones as well, really comfortable noise reducing headphones that come with guided meditations, as well as sleep enhancing audio, because we believe in micro napping, as well as lots of studies that, that back that up is a really useful tool as well.

Matt Morley 11:07

Yeah, I was gonna ask about that. Because it's, it's, I've seen some interesting stuff coming out around lactation pods or lactation rooms. For young mums who bring their kids to school at camp, their kids don't go to school, so they bring their kid into the with a baby into the office. And then obviously, in parallel with that yet sleeping pods or giving staff within the Office permission to have let's say, a power nap during the day. And then so in a sense, I can see how the your pods would would really fit into that.

So a lot of it then clearly is about having or sensing that there is permission to do this. Right? And so how do you how do you pitch the and obviously around sleep and the sort of the 20 to 30 minute power nap there's there's lots of research around that when you when you talk about meditation in terms of its benefits for restoring concentration levels?

Or what are the the touch points that you tend to fall back on when you're when you're talking about specifically meditation as opposed to going outside for a walk or having a coffee or, or whatever else someone might do to try and relax at some point, say mid afternoon when they have that energy dip.

Leigh Chapman 12:22

Hmm, yeah, good question. It's a bit hard to know where to start the story on this one sometimes, because you can come in at very different points in different angles. But I think everyone has probably heard this sort of anecdote about the amygdala, right, the part of our brain, which is the reptilian brain, which Yeah, kind of responsible for our fight or flight responses. And works by activating cortisol in our system for when we do need that fight or flight response.

And it was kind of designed for us to you know, fend off woolly mammoths, rather than actually deal with having 152 on opened emails in our inbox. And that's kind of what it's doing at the moment, right to us. We're working ridiculously crazy hours, a lot of us under high pressure, stressful jobs. And cortisol is just bad for us in so many different ways. You know, it's been shown to increase anxiety, depression, have physiological issues, digestive problems, headaches, heart disease, sleep problems, lots and lots of different health issues that that's attributed to.

But the good news story in all this is that we can change all that, you know, in terms of how we actually change the neuro plasticity of our brains, to rewire them to react differently to external pressures that we face on a day to day basis.

And meditation is one of the ways that you can do that. And we talk about when I actually go into companies and try and launch the part and embed meditation as a practice, we talk about the six Whys of meditation. And they are reduces stress, improves attention and creativity, the fact that it's foundational wellbeing practice, the fact that successful people are doing it, which I'll come on to a bit more in a second. The factor is great for relationships.

And also the last one, which is a little bit tongue in cheek, but you look younger, which I'll come on to, in a bit with detail in a second. The reduce stress one is kind of linked to what I just said about quarters up.

And there's there's all sorts of studies that have been shown that just one week of 20 minutes a day of meditation leads to a significantly slower response in our amygdala during meditation, which is kind of interesting in its own right, but actually, when you look up studies that went a bit further, they showed that eight weeks lead to the same effect during a baseline states and not just when you are during meditation, but slower amygdala response rate when you actually just ignore Your day to day level of consciousness.

And the second one I mentioned was about improved creativity and attention. And there's studies on that as well that show free 10 minute sessions of breath counting was enough to appreciably increase attention skills in a control group.

And then other studies around open monitoring meditation, which is kind of like body scan meditation. And that was shown to stimulate divergent thinking, which is a really key driver of creativity, which is the type of income using brainstorms and coming up to Business Solutions. The third was a foundational wellbeing practice.

So meditation didn't just help with, you know, being good in meditation in itself. And the other aspects I've mentioned already, it helps with all aspects of life, you know, you look at the different spheres of wellness, you know, it's not just kind of spiritual, emotional, psychological, but you've got physical, environmental, financial, occupational, social.

And this is one of the biggest things for me about meditation. Because it has a positive feedback, loop effects and all these different areas, you know, once you start meditating, you tend to have better decision making and better intuition. And that creates a bit of a domino effect across these different areas.

So when you're making better decisions, you start to eat more healthfully. When you're eating more healthfully, you do more exercise, you do more exercise, you sleep better, and so on, and so on. And all these areas tend to have like a compound feedback effect, which, which just gets better and better in all the different areas.

And I think this is really critical for businesses, because one of those areas is relationships. And what meditation tends to do is, just puts that slight barrier between the thought and the action sometimes so rather than getting blown around, you know, in the in the winds of your emotions and thoughts, it just gives you that extra seconds sometimes to be aware that actually, this is an emotion that I can be detached from, I can observe it, I can decide how to react to this.

And I've only wish I discovered this early on in my life and avoided some of the compensations that I've unnecessarily had at work, I think. So I think just about building better relationships and a more harmonious kind of work environment, I think it's really, really helpful.

Matt Morley 17:21

I think there's a lot in that I really do. And I've come to think of my modest meditation practice of, you know, 20 minutes a day, as really the the other side of the coin of, of an ongoing, yeah, essentially sort of therapy.

The two really do go together working on understanding your own triggers, and your own the baggage that we're all carrying around with us. I think in a way, you know, there's just so much being put out there right now around the benefits of mindfulness, the benefits of meditation, that I think there's a good, good chance you sort of ride that wave.

You mentioned Silicon Valley, and a lot of those big tech companies are are the innovators, you know, that the first on board, when it comes to biophilic design are the first on board when it comes to workplace wellness, and they're really leading the way. So no doubt, you know, it will be, it will be a very interesting pitch to be in on when you when you get in front of someone Amazon or Facebook, for example, forget your pods in there, but thinking sort of slightly more of a wider market, you know, into sort of London's corporate world of legal offices and insurers and so on, or even banking offices.

How would you How would you imagine if there were, say, a well being champion within that business, who was able to at least get you, you know, introduction in there. And then obviously, the questions start coming up around what, you know, how do we, how do we know?

How do we monitor its use? Or how do we know beyond someone sitting there all day watching to see how many people are going in or coming out? How long people spend? How could you collect some kind of data to corroborate or at least show that it's being out well adopted by by the staff on that particular floor? Or within that building?

Leigh Chapman 19:08

Yeah, it's a really crucial point, Matt, and something that I've thought about a lot from the start of this and how we bake that into into the offerings. I don't think enough companies are tracking this in terms of the wellness space.

And the industry does sort of get let down by that, I think, and some people do have a slightly sceptical view of some of the wellness offerings as a result and I think really important for internal stakeholders, obviously to have that justification and take people on the on the journey with them and have that story and, you know, data to sort of back up that yes, this is working is providing us some some return on investment and some value.

You know, when we instal the pod, we make sure it's got a booking calendar set up with it so we can tell occupancy rates and who's using it. So repeat usage. You know, we need to kind of market it or make the awareness of it more known to who who aren't using it currently. And then, you know, obviously, qualitative measures, like employee feedback are really useful as well, you know, the anecdotal measurements such as, you know, people's performance, who are using it, like self assessment in terms of their well being.

And then also, you know, we do offer to sort of help advise on more, especially larger scale testing to assess the effectiveness of it as well, which isn't always possible for some companies. But there's some amazing studies out there at the moment, you know, there was a famous one in the US by insurance company, Aiden, who showed that the introduction of a mindfulness programme led to an extra $3,000 a year in productive productivity from their, from their teams, you know, so that so there are also large scale testing programmes that you can put in place to measure that. And also be really looking at stuff like healthcare costs, you know, the reduced amount of claims that they see as a result of that this is a preventative medicine, really.

nd then you'd have reduced rates of absenteeism, presenteeism things like staff turnover. Yeah, there's all kinds of sorts of things that you can measure, it really depends how how deep they want to go. Really?

Matt Morley 21:20

Yeah, that makes sense. And to be fair, I'm putting you on the spot there. But the reality is from the, from the owner or developer, or from the corporate side, you know, clearly there is no one answer to these problems. It's a it's a case of creating a nurturing environment that fosters productivity and creativity and positive relationships.

And there is no magic bullet for that. It's about putting a number of strategies in place of which I'm fully convinced that meditation kind of should have a seat at the table, for sure. I'm just wondering, you know, clearly, we're discussing this within the context of a global pandemic, that looks like it's going to have an impact, the lasting impact on the return to work, but not just that, in terms of also, you know, how we how we use offices in future, I'm wondering how you've had to adapt your business strategy over the last year, or how you add a date how you see things over the next year, because it could well be that you get a sort of slingshot effect off the back of all of this right with an increased interest on behalf of on behalf of businesses in, in creating innovative, interesting and engaging workspaces, right, where meditation can be a part of that.

Leigh Chapman 22:36

Yeah, absolutely. And he gets it. Yeah, it's an incredibly interesting time, like you say, you know, I think there's a short term, medium term change, and then a long term change as well. I've read a blog post recently, actually, around this exact topic, actually called human centric offices.

You know, it looks undoubtable, that we're going to be going back to a sort of more hybrid approach. You know, I think the the stats have been coming out overwhelmingly in favour of that, I think there was a yougov survey recently, which showed I think, four in 10. People, you know, want to don't want to sort of carry on in the same way as it was before.

So there's some, there's some really compelling reasons for, for going back to the office, but also some compelling reasons for how we can sort of carry on all the goodness that we've got from this remote work and experience.

Because I think, you know, this, it works for more experienced sort of staff, you know, with this remote working, but we've got to remember that there's, there's a whole swathe of of people coming into work at the moment who are missing out on that sort of face to face collaboration, the relationships, you know, we spoke about, you know, being able to solve complex problems, the ease of conversation, you know, not dropping out halfway through because of bad Wi Fi, all that kind of stuff. So there's lots of good reasons for getting people back to the office.

But I think we need to kind of convince people a little bit, and certainly people who are kind of resistant to that at the moment. So I think there's a short to medium term job to do that. And part of that is making sure mental health is put as a key priority. Obviously, there's all sorts of kind of measures that we can put in place to that.

And I think there was a study done by the Prince's Trust youth index recently that showed it one in four people have been unable to cope during the pandemic. And there's obviously huge mental health issues that are going to have to be addressed.

So mental health really needs to be at the top of the agenda and enticing people back making them feel comfortable about coming back to work or the safety measures that that obviously have to be put in place as part of that are also critical. I think, looking at sort of more medium to long term. Really this idea about and it's something we've been seeing, obviously already, but I think it's only going to accelerate this idea about the office being a destination And somewhere we really kind of want to actually go into and we see some value in it and we see some some positive kind of mental health benefits from it at the same time, this idea about kind of premium eyes in the office. Similarly, I think the to sort of go hand in hand, and all the all the subjects that obviously, you know, close to your heart, like biophilic design are going to be really crucial here.

But you know, other stuff like, you know, almost like ideas, like making the office like more of a Art Gallery, you know, making it interactive, making it more experiential, making it very shareable. You know, I think there's going to be huge talent flight to companies that really get that right. And clearly, you know, we're not going to need quite as much space as we did before, in the medium to long term because of this new balance between working in the office and working at home.

So I think there's a real opportunity, and I think people are starting to really sort of cottoned on to that. And hopefully, yeah, we can, we can be part of the solution for for people that want to be involved in that as well.

Matt Morley 26:03

Another trend that you're you're nicely positioned to, to fit in with, I think is around the shift to environmental, social and governance or ESG, oriented policies at the real estate developer and an owner, landlord level.

There's, there's details in there now with the latest ESG guidelines, particularly around mental health, and the idea of there being a mental health officer, someone who's done a modest piece of training around understanding how to help someone who, if there isn't a full HR department available, at least there's someone there who's kind of the dedicated go to person that you can, you can talk to you and I think, you know, these systems, I know I've mentioned it to you offline previously around the kind of green building and healthy buildings certification systems, for sure, are a way to sense kind of encourage the industry to move in the right direction.

So that then leads me on to the idea of the green buildings and sort of the materials and you mentioned briefly how you're you're producing or the materials that you're using for the pots in terms of like the manufacturing process itself. Talk to us just briefly about how you've, you've gone about that because you're effectively it is a product you manufacturing in the UK, are you manufacturing abroad and importing like what's what's your current setup in that in that sense?

Leigh Chapman 27:34

Yeah, we UK manufacturing at the moment, it was it was tempting to go down the road of Far East or Eastern Europe, because obviously the the value is extraordinary. But we really wanted to keep our carbon footprint to a minimum. So we decided to take a bit of a hit on that and produce in UK and keep it as local as possible. In terms of the materials that we use, the main material in the pod number one is birch ply.

We chose that because it's a really fast growing species of trees, so it's relatively easy to replace. The wood wastage of plywood, during the manufacturing process is also significantly less when compared with traditional lumber practices.

And it also tends to be much more durable as well. So it tends to last longer. We use walling off or near in pod number two. And obviously that has also got some good eco sustainability creds. In fact, that veneer is a very low wastage, you know, option for for word. So yeah, there are there

Leigh Chapman 28:39

are main kind of ways that we're trying to help sustainability in terms of the materials that we that we use, but we also, you know, donate to the world land trust as well for every pot that sold. And I think generally just maybe, slightly less tangibly, but I really do passionately believe that.

Meditation helps to raise people's consciousness generally, you know, it puts more community on things like so puts more emphasis on things like community, and looking out for each other, and the world.

And I think that has to be good for sustainability as a whole, you know, you're talking about sort of creating a greener and happier planet, I think we need to create a greener and happier mind, if that can be such a thing.

And really, we're passionate about exposing more people to how meditation can can really help open their mind and be more aware of sustainability and, and the decisions that we make and how they impact everything else.

Matt Morley 29:43

Yeah, it's it's definitely, you know, very closely aligned with that the idea of the people on planet and community as you mentioned, I think that's increasingly becoming a bit more than just a buzzword.

A lot of the green building certifications are shifting in that direction now and in response to events over the last 12 months just to sort of wrap things up if you could send if there was one message if there's one piece of content that you want to get out to the corporate workplace community or to people are considering how to adapt or adjust their, their workplace environment going back in after, yeah, a year or perhaps more of working from home like what what's the what's the one thought that really is driving everything you're doing that you'd sort of put up on a billboard.

Unknown Speaker 30:32

But I mentioned an article that I recently wrote, it's on our website called human centric design, I'd urge people to go there and have a read, this is a very practical guide or my take on on what the guide is for managing that transition for us back into the workspace.

But I think if something on a billboard would maybe say, just really urge people to consider in making space for meditation in their business as the benefits are transformative. You know, your, your teams could be so much happier, more productive, resilient, creative, collaborative, cooperative, and just all around nicer to each other. And that stuff is viral, you know, it spreads and it creates economic as well as societal and psychological benefits. Okay, best of luck, man.

sustainable masterplanned community Quinta do Lago

our ‘Green & Healthy Places’ podcast series takes a deep-dive into the role of sustainability, wellbeing and community in real estate and hospitality, for episode 16 we are with Sean Moriarty, CEO of Quinta do Lago in Portugal

For episode 16 of the Green & Healthy Places podcast we are in my old home of Portugal, specifically in the idyllic Algarve region in the south to talk to Sean Moriarty, CEO of Quinta do Lago, a sustainably-minded, masterplanned community development with 50 years of history behind it.

A sustainable masterplanned community

Today we are in my old home of Portugal, specifically in the idyllic Algarve region in the south to talk to Sean Moriarty, CEO of Quinta do Lago, a sustainably-minded, masterplanned community development with 50 years of history behind it.  The residential resort focuses on outdoor living with 2500 acres of land with only 25% can be developed on.

As well as being home to some, it’s also a tourist destination in its own right with water-efficient golf courses, boutique hotels, a sports campus, restaurants and retail as well as its own nature reserve and a white sand beach, even their own on-site farm.

GUEST  / Sean Moriarty, CEO, Quinta do Lago

https://www.quintadolago.com/en/

• Real estate

• The Campus gym

• Golf

• Farm

===============

Full transcript follows, courtesy of Otter.ai (excuse typos)

Welcome to Episode 16 of the Green and Healthy Places podcast, in which we take a deep dive into the themes of wellness and sustainability in real estate and hospitality. Today, we're in my old home of Portugal, specifically in the idyllic Algarve region to the south. Talking to Sean Moriarty, CEO of Quinta de Lago, a sustainably minded, mixed use development with over 50 years of history behind it.

The residential resort focuses on outdoor living with two and a half 1000 acres of land which only 25% can be developed on, as well as being home to some. It's also a tourist destination in its own right, with golf courses, hotels, sports, campus, restaurants, and retail, as well as its own nature reserve and a white sand beach, even their own on site farm. If you like this type of content, please hit subscribe. You can find my contact details and those of the logo in the show notes. So let's get into it. Here's CEO Sean Moriarty.

Sean, thanks so much for joining me today. It's a real pleasure. There's so much we could talk about, you've got a huge project and a huge remit. Today we're going to focus on more the green, health and wellness aspects but perhaps just for those who aren't familiar with kin to the logo, just a very brief introduction to the project and its various components.

sean 1:41

Yeah, good morning. And thanks. Thank you for inviting me. It's, it's great to be joining you. So Kindred Lago is in the very south of Portugal, it's 12 minutes from from faraway airport. And we really are spoiled with nature here. It's 50 years old. Now Quinta do Lago was first founded. And it's changed a huge amount in in those 50 years. And I suppose in the last number of years, and some game changes for us was the campus. That's one of the latest inventions. We built new homes, but very much focusing on outdoor living, which is a huge part of Quinta do Lago - also safety, nature, outdoor living, a sense of community, and which was a big element of what the campus brought. So it's built on 2500 acres of land, we respect the greenbelt. So you can only build on 25% of the land. So, there's no high rising buildings, all the buildings are all built at the same height. It is an architectural dream world because they can have different styles. But it's, everything's built at the same height. Everybody's got big gardens, you know, it looks, it looks very good.

Matt Morley 3:10

So just to put that in perspective, essentially, it is a residential community, first and foremost. But then you also have the golf and you have the hotel component. So you're open to the public but you also have those who invest by and live on site for at least part of the year.

sean 3:30

Exactly. So it's residential, it is a big part of our resort here. So you've got a number of villas, mainly villas, and then you've got some condominiums which would have mixture of townhouses and apartments. So as over the last number of years, and now in particular, during COVID. We're seeing residents living down here more often, and for longer periods of time. But Quinta do Lago is open for tourism, we get a lot of passing through traffic, but it's, you know, it's from generations of all right now we're seeing some amazing things here of three generations of people that are quarantining at Quinta do Lago. So the age profile is very much changing over the last 18 months or 24 months.

Matt Morley 4:24

Getting younger?

Unknown Speaker 4:25

Younger, younger. So, you know, if you go back maybe six years ago, the average age of our real estate buyer was in the late 60s, late 60s, probably even early 70s. Now it's mid 40s for 85% for buyers.

Matt Morley 4:43

I think that's one of the things that really interests me most is just how, obviously, the project's got 50 years of history behind it, but it does seem to now just be hitting this crest of a wave right which is suddenly a turn to Healthy Living - health has become the new wealth. And it feels like you are neatly positioned to capitalize on that. But clearly, it wasn't the case, necessarily, as I understand it 50 years ago, right? So I mean are you seeing the effects of that yourself?

sean 5:15

you know, you see a lot of marketing throughout the world of trying to get in on the buzz of, you know, it's a healthy place to be and invest in your wellness and this kind of stuff. Quinta do Lago is situated on the national park, which is an amazing place, if you haven't been there, you need to take a walk or cycle along, it really is mind blowing. so Quinta has probably been saying this for a long, long time - it's the kind of environment that it is low density, you know, clean air. And now it's really become more important over the last two years, and in particular, in the past 12 months for, for the reasons that we know, but it really is top of mind, I think for people, it's top of mind for younger generations, I think schools now in most parts of the world, you're in better parts of Europe, in particular, they're really getting behind the whole sustainability piece. My nine year old can have conversations with me about sustainability that I don't fully understand, I have to admit. And that's a great, great place to be.

Matt Morley 6:33

clearly, in one sense, there's wider external factors that are turning in your direction, but how have you, as a team, strategically had to respond to what's going on around over the last two years at what it's been a case of new packages, new facilities, how have you tweaked or adapted the offer?

sean 6:53

You know, we really want to be the leaders, we want to be leaders of change. And that's been a part of our journey for the last number of years. And that's why we invested so much in our resort. Over the last eight years, nine years, we've we've invested over 70 million in just a resort in in revamping it in various different things. And, you know, during this lockdown pandemic, we said, let's now take advantage of this time, and start on our golf courses. Our golf is a huge part of our business. And we've had the number one golf course in Europe for a number of years. But, you know, it's it's no longer about having great greens and clean bunkers, you also have to have really play a huge part in the environment. And we went on a heavy audit on on the machinery we're using on our resorts, in our golf courses, in particular water pumps, and the how accurate these guys were. And it was a surprise to us, to us huge improvements to be made. So that got us then on the movement of investing in our in our golf course, in particular, we're putting in 7 million into that at the moment. But you know, one of the big results out of that is and we've completely changed the water system that we've put in, we've redesigned or got help to redesign our pumps because they weren't efficient enough. And at the end of this we're going to be using 20 to 30% less water consumption per annum, which is massive in an area like this, where water is so important in the warm weather environment. So that you know that's that's one piece with hundreds of pieces I could speak to you about including our farms and everything else...

Matt Morley 8:40

you mentioned the onsite farm and that was going to be one of my questions... Is that more of a soft marketing piece? Or is it literally a functional working farm that contributes to the restaurant?

sean 9:02

Well, to be honest with you, we had that piece of land a number of years ago and we really wanted to get into we want to evolve our restaurants quite a bit. And to buy local is very important for us to buy local is actually harder than it seems even though we've got amazing fresh markets here. You know, I think there's still quite a bit of work to do in local, which I support by the way on local governments and and food safety controls of how they can help the local food market producer and the restaurant owners to get that traceability of food product from A to B, I think there's still quite a bit of work to do not and that will be a game changer for everybody when that happens. So, you know we found it hard to get certain types of vegetables, certain types of products. So we said let's use this piece of ground and grow Our own and it started from there, it then became a wishlist for the chef's, I want this and I need this, I can't get this anywhere. And it evolved from there, then we have another couple of acres land on the road that wasn't being used. We farmed that. And we've turned it into five acres of farm now for vegetables are grown, and we've got greenhouses in it. And it's To be honest, it's only right now, in the past couple of months, two years later, that i'm really seen the impact of this, we do a lot of takeaway food now on home delivery food for customers because of lockdown, and the colors of the different vegetables, the freshness of it. It's really amazing. Now we're going to expand quite a bit, I've got some exciting things happening this year but yeah, it's not something that we're making a lot of money out of. But it's it's bringing a huge change in our footprint, of course, but also the quality of service we're providing.

Matt Morley 11:05

You mentioned, your relationship with the wider community. And obviously, we talk now about community often in the same breath as sustainability and wellness. Just wondering if there are other things that you're doing or how else you're, you're engaging with the community? Has that been a piece of your your CSR plan from the beginning?

sean 11:30

Yeah, we've we've always had a great connection with the community here with the residents and guests that come in, we've got a quite a large database. You know, there's, we've got a lot of golf club members in the campus, you know, games like paddle it brings together people together, you've got various different groups. I think what really stood out very quickly here last year, when the pandemic started off, ourselves and the rest of the residents very quickly, within one week pull together at the very beginning to raise funds for the local hospital. And I think it took nine days, and there was a half a million donated to the local hospital to get some machinery that they really needed. And that how quick that pulled together was amazing. The residents just grabbed it, lead it, I didn't have to be very much involved, and got involved a few times. And it was just completed. And I was just looking at my WhatsApp groups lately, they're still talking on it, there's still pieces going on, that showed a sense of community, you know, whereas at times, it seems it's very transient here, people plugged in very fast. I spoke to seven or eight residents this week about a new restaurant, we're opening up and bounced a few names off them to get their feedback. Funnily enough, all seven of them had different opinions, it didn't make my life any easier. But you know, we do engage quite a bit.

Matt Morley 13:18

There's that interaction then with your key stakeholders, I'm just wondering within the context of sustainability in your efforts there. Because you have been putting out a lot of content recently around your new sort of eco strategy. And there's clearly a lot of thinking that's gone into that. Is that being driven, if you like by those residential stakeholders, or is that come from above, from from sort of the boardroom level?

sean 13:50

the main driver is probably from within, you know, it wasn't pushed upon us to say you should be doing this. the basics of sustainability is a given, you know, it's frowned upon if you're still talking about how are you getting rid of plastic? Like that's, that's like in retail in the 90s when we had some great customer service people going around saying they can really train your staff to be the best trained people ever. Really, how are you going to do that? I'll train them how to say hello, please and thank you. That's a given. You know, that's the basics - if you put out a plastic straw, it's just frowned upon, it can't happen. But we really need to take it way above and beyond that, food is one of the quickest and easiest ways for people to realize that what you're doing and why we're doing it and to do it and eventually we want to have Carbon menus that you understand the carbon footprint of the food that you have on that menu. Where does it come from? And I think it's eventually that's where we'd like to get to in one or two of our locations and explain if we look, you really love figs, figs are out of season now, so I had to get them from Brazil.

Matt Morley 15:20

you mentioned the campus. And that would be perhaps another example of where you really push the boundaries. So the question begs asking, again, did that come from demand from the market? Or did you just say, you know, what, we're not going to do a standard gym, we're gonna completely raise the bar on that and set a new standard for hotel and resort residential gyms.

sean 16:20

I think to be fair, our shareholder no matter what he does, it's not going to be standard, it has to be above that. And I think that's what the demand is, if we're going to maintain this leadership role of resorts , it's expected that it's going to be above and beyond what the norm would be. And, you know, today, we really wanted it to be a game changer when it came to the log of so the campus ideally, in our mindset, when we set it out, we wanted the campus to become a flight to destination, not just Portugal to be a flight to destination. It took two years to build. Our first teams, they came from Beijing, they came from the Premiership in the UK, they traveled from all over the world , PSG, with various different teams here, football teams, and they haven't been in Quinta do Lago before, a lot of those players have never been here. So they came here because of the campus. So and that's really what we wanted to wanted to do. But the important thing about the campuses, it's built to the standard for the elite athletes. our tagline is very clear, be elite, whatever your level. And so it's open for everybody. So you can train with the elite athletes at your side, we don't close off parts of it, you know, unless there's a big football team here, and they need some privacy. We've got all the machinery, all the techniques, and the coaches that will train an elite athlete, and it's open for everybody. So for residents and guests, you know, I use it every day, and I'm elite at my level, I'm not at somebody else's level. And that's what we want it to be. You know, it's it's, it's a we're a big believer in backing the underdog.

Matt Morley 18:29

clearly, the temptation with the gym is to say, Okay, we'll put in some hardwood flooring, with the mirrors on the walls, but some lighting in perhaps a plant in the corner, and then you get Technogym in and and they just kind of do the rest, right? They just fit it out with all that the usual gear and sell you lots of strength machinery. At some point, you said, okay, no, we're gonna do it differently. Did you then have to factor in the additional revenue streams around bringing in and attracting pro teams? Because there's a gap, right? There's a big step to go from your standard investment. Or was it a bit of a leap of faith that there was just demand out there, and that if you, if you build it, they will come?

sean 19:22

You know, we were lucky enough. We met a lot of contacts. And we were able to speak to some football teams and managers and ask them, you know, of places you go to where's the best. And we didn't want to know why it was the best. It's what was missing from it. And we ended up with a list of things that was missing. And that's what we went after is those things that was missing, because the rest of it would pull together. But if you have stuff that nobody else has, that's unique selling point Right. So the pitch was the biggest, probably a big game changer and a big investment, it's 95% natural grass and the rest of it is made up, we're the only one in Europe that you can hire that pitch from. But yet, that's the pitch that PSG will play on, the pitch Man City play on in their stadium, and they, everywhere else, they were going to have their camps didn't have that pitch to train up. And that was a huge investment compared to the normal pitch that we could have put in, a huge difference. But the difference if you've got a big game coming up the Champions League game coming up, you know, you'll get your stats off the pitch of how much water you're going to have on it, what's the role of the ball going to be the distance of it, what's the bounce is going to be, we can replicate that pitch in three days. And that's that was unique. So that's clearly was a decision, the hope that that would be a hugely important week, we believe that would be important. And that was what we were gambling on. And it has turned out that it is quite important for people.

Matt Morley 21:13

So there's in some cases where you make these interventions, and you make a bet on the being demand out there for it. And other times, clearly a large part of your your strategy is just to leave nature where it is and not intervene. You mentioned the low density strategy. How do you plan ahead in terms of leaving certain amounts untouched and encouraging people to connect with nature, because clearly, there's this big shift now towards that spending more time outside in the fresh air? You've obviously got commercial demands on the one side, but then the in the same sense, at the same time protecting your future by allowing enough nature to remain untouched. So how do you how do you juggle those two?

sean 21:56

Well, you know, there's, there's a master plan in place for almost 50 years now, since the since it was founded, of protecting that amount of greenbelt. And we've never moved from that. And in fact, we're extremely strict on it. So when people are building houses, buying plots, here, there's only a limited amount of plots left. And there's a huge demand , the buildability per plot is clearly marked out. that's your maximum. And it won't budge from that. And everybody in these areas, not us, architects, municipalities, designers, they're all clear about that. That will never change, we will never be going back to redesign the master plan to say, Can we have a bit of this greenbelt back or take a bit here, take a bit there.

Matt Morley 23:01

So your role clearly then is to is to steady the ship and guide it on that path because you sort of know where you're going to some extent, but then within that, obviously, there's lots of room to, to experiment and to do what you're doing, which is to innovate and create new products and services. So looking ahead to the next one to three years down the pipeline, what do you have coming up, like, what are your next new launches that you have coming?

sean 23:27

Well, my next immediate one, which is quite exciting, and then in a lot of places that might seem like a small thing for us, it's a big piece, it's expanding, continue to expand the farm we have, but we're going to build a bee farm. And we've got a number of guys that work for us that are very qualified in this field. So they're very excited to get into a new new project and a new role. And that's, I think, gonna be exciting for us. Like I see this as every customer that comes and rents a villa from us or stays in our hotel, we'll get a jar of honey leaving and it will be another unique piece of of Quinta do logo and the Algarve. We're going to continue to evolve the outdoor living, you know, you mentioned that and the whole health and wellness piece of it we're really starting to become comfortable with that and providing a good service on that. You know, we've got good golf, we've got good tennis, we're evolving our cycling routes. Right now we've got since you were here a couple years ago we've got a new nature trails, it's linking up different beaches and you're off the sand dune. It's amazing and you can see everything that's going on around you it's it's great when the tide is in and you've got all the boards around you and flamingos there. We're very much going to push out a lot. And you know, we're it's it's a lot a lot of things now is about packages, I think people like decisions to be made for more at least to be guided into, I'll take care of it. What do you want to do? You know, if you're coming, you're going to travel for the first time. You want clean living open spaces. What kind of foods do you like? What kind of exercise do you like? Right down to we will label the shelves on your fridge that there starts shelf, that's mom's shelf. This is the baby shelf of what you've told us and what feedback you've given us and pack it and plan out your entire week if you want to de stress and relax or you want a fusion and lots of activity. And already, we're getting lots of great feedback on that. So I think we're going to continue to expand on that. We will look at d more real estate. We're just looking at plans on that at the moment. But we're looking forward to getting people back here.

Matt Morley 26:09

You got plenty going on. It's impressive stuff. So thank you very much for your time.

sean 26:13

It's been great. Thank you, Matt.

Healthy Building Certification FITWEL

A Healthy building consultant guide to FITWEL certification

What is a healthy building or healthy community?

Primarily here we are dealing with factors such as indoor air quality (IAQ), visual comfort, light quality, acoustic performance, active design, thermal comfort and cleaning protocols but it can extend as far as mental wellbeing, biophilic design, physical activity opportunities and even an element of signage.

The ‘healthy building’ and ‘wellness real estate’ movement can be distinguished from its close cousin sustainable buildings and the green building movement that, as the name suggests, adopts more of a planet-oriented perspective.

Their ultimate aim is to create real estate and communities that promote mental and physical wellbeing for regular occupants. Concern for the environment is not their raison d’etre but should still be considered as in practice. many of the same concepts apply to healthy buildings and green buildings.

Why do we need healthy building certifications?

Healthy building certifications, like green building certifications, provide structure, rigour and accountability, as well as the opportunity to benchmark within the industry, measure progress and ultimately advance the cause not just through the award of certifications but also through the network of Accredited Professionals (APs) and Ambassadors and other consultants spreading the message within the industry.

We are great believers in the role healthy building certifications such as WELL and FITWEL have to play as neutral bodies promoting accountability, education and a sense of collective progress towards generally agreed healthy building goals.

What does a healthy building consultant for FITWEL do?

A FITWEL accredited professional is in fact known as a FITWEL Ambassador and can typically advise both on healthy building concepts in general as well as FITWEL certification specifically.

The key insight we wish to offer here, as healthy building consultants and a FITWEL Ambassador, is that there is a considerable amount of work to put in at the front end of any healthy building project to align the work of architects, interior designers, signage consultants, and even MEP consultants and especially Facilities Management with the requirements of the FITWEL standard.

That needs to happen first, with an eye to healthy building certification with FITWEL, only subsequently should the certification process be undertaken, as that is more about providing evidence, data and hard proof that certain decisions have already been taken and measures implemented in the building.

We recommend this way of working rather than attempting the two simultaneously, effectively a healthy building consultant role as well as a FITWEL Ambassador role managing the assessment application online. The timescales for the former are far large than for the latter.

For example, implementing active design strategies in office stairwells requires an understanding not just of the concept of active design but also a series of work phases, from budget allocation to creative concepts (possibly having undergone an RFP process with design agencies), detailed design, sign-off, implementation and snagging. This could realistically be three months from start to finish and it is just one small piece of a far wider project so plan ahead, get your consultants lined up early on and you will end up saving money in the long-run!

What does the FITWEL Standard cover?

The 55+ design and operations strategies in this particular healthy building standard are intended to improve occupant health and productivity.

Its scope is arguably more limited than the WELL standard that takes a far wider view of a similar brief but for this same reason FITWEL can be an easier pill to swallow, requiring less CAPEX. It is considerably less demanding than the WELL standard overall as it has a more limited scope, albeit with many of its components align with the WELL standard.

If we take a workplace as our example in this instance, include: Location, Building Access, Outdoor Spaces, Entrances & the Ground Floor experience, Stairwells, Indoor Environments, Workspaces, Shared Spaces, Water Supply, Food Services, Vending machines / snack bars, and Emergency Procedures.

What else do you need to know about FITWEL?

There are three scores on offer, 1-star, 2-stars and 3-stars with categories covering multi-family residential real estate, retail, commercial interior, single tenant building, multi-tenant base building, senior housing and community.

The seven FITWEL health impact categories are as follows:

• Impacts Surrounding Community Health

• Reduces Morbidity and Absenteeism

• Supports Social Equity for Vulnerable Populations

• Instills Feelings of Well-Being

• Enhances Access to Healthy Foods

• Promotes Occupant Safety

• Increases Physical Activity

Contact us to discuss your FITWEL Ambassador or healthy building consultant project requirements, we are here to help!

well building movement V02 ergonomic workstation design

a consultant’s insight into ergonomic workstation design for the WELL building certification Movement V02

What is the WELL Building Standard?

The WELL Certification process for WELL V2 is now widely established as the leading healthy building and wellness real estate standard in the world today. It is essentially a series of guidelines backed by rigorous scientific research, that when taken together, will guide a real estate project, whether new build construction or refurbishment and fit-out, towards a final product that is aligned with human health and wellness.

Sections of the V2 standard are dedicated to Air, Water, Nourishment, Light, Movement, Thermal Comfort, Sound, Materials, Mind, Community & Innovation.

What is WELL consulting?

A WELL AP or WELL consultant is there to assist a project team through the certification process, ensuring maximum points are scored along the way by offering expert advice not just on how to lock-in points but also the principles that lie behind them. As a result, the project has every chance of becoming a model of health and wellness in the built environment.

Additionally, a WELL consultant’s skill set might include wellness interior design, biophilic design, knowledge in healthy buildings and consideration for sustainability / green buildings, a WELL building’s close cousin, as well as expertise in health and fitness, or as WELL like to call it ‘Physical Activity’, ‘Movement’ and ‘Nourishment’.

What feature of a healthy building does Precondition V02 focus on?

Projects here need to show that they have provided ergonomic workstation furniture to all users of the building as well as practical guidance to ensure the furniture is used to maximum effect. Why does this matter? Get this one wrong and a workplace will likely suffer increases in absenteeism and a reduction in worker productivity.

In blue collar jobs especially there are physical risks at play whenever there is a manual component, such as lifting or loading whilst in white collar workplaces extended periods spent hunched over a screen and a keyboard can, if not positioned correctly, equally lead to pain and injury.

There is no one size fits all response to this but in general ergonomics in the workplace are designed to encourage movement during the day while avoiding awkward, uncomfortable positions. Adjustable furniture plays a large part in resolving the issue but education and knowledge sharing has also been deemed crucial by the WELL Certification.

For details on ROI to show to the ever vigilant company CFO, see here.

For a separate article we have written about ergonomic furniture in workplaces designed for worker wellbeing see here.

part 1: Visual ergonomics in WELL standard V02

WELL are looking for adjustable desktop monitors that avoid neck pain, you’ll need monitors arms or specific adjustable stands for this one. Laptops should also have an external keyboard and mouse to allow for more of an upright stance, additionally a stand for the laptop will prevent the head tilting down at an awkward angle and shoulders hunching forward. We want office workers to sit straight and or stand tall whenever possible to save their backs!

part 2: height adjustable work surfaces in well standard V02

A quarter of all workstations need to be height adjustable so that workers can sit or stand at will, whether it be manual or electric adjustment. Additionally, desk extensions can be included if a dedicated sit-stand desk is not an option, for example due to budget restrictions. We have written in more detail about this subject here in relation to WELL feature V07 Active Furnishings. For example, the photo above shows the standing desk set-up in Casa Biofilico, using a standard home office desk with an adjustable extension placed on top of it.

part 3: adjustable office chairs for WELL standard V02

Most new office chairs will come equipped with some form of adjustment options, in our experience providing office furniture for a luxury coworking office interiors project, spending a little extra brings additional ergonomic benefits from a workplace wellness perspective, and the office workers in question will thank you for it eventually!

WELL have some specific criteria here that your WELL Consultant would need to check with the office furniture supplier prior to making an order. If you are looking for options, we recommend ACTIU, a Spanish brand that specialises in workplace wellness furniture solutions.

part 4: provide support at standing stations for well standard v02

For anyone who is a regular user of a standing desk, it soon becomes clear that some additional support is needed to make this a comfortable experience after the first hour or two standing. WELL specify anti-fatigue mats, recessed toe space, a footrest and or a leaning chair. Only once you have spent a day working like this will you truly understand how important these small details are to the whole active furnishings debate! We usually work with a brand like FULLY for these smaller details.

part 5: provide workspace orientation for well standard v02

This one is an easy win, simply ask your WELL consultant or HR department to arrange in-person training or a video education session on the importance of ergonomics, demonstrating how to get the best out of the chosen office furniture and other resources for further reading on the subject.

To discuss how we can help you create a healthy workplace or healthy building project with WELL certification, contact us here.

well building standard movement V01 active buildings & communities

a consultants response to the well building standard’s movement V01 Active buildings & communities

What is the WELL Building Standard?

The WELL Certification process for WELL V2 is now widely established as the leading healthy building and wellness real estate standard in the world today. It is essentially a series of guidelines backed by rigorous scientific research, that when taken together, will guide a real estate project, whether new build construction or refurbishment and fit-out, towards a final product that is aligned with human health and wellness.

Sections of the V2 standard are dedicated to Air, Water, Nourishment, Light, Movement, Thermal Comfort, Sound, Materials, Mind, Community & Innovation.

What is WELL consulting?

A WELL AP or WELL consultant is there to assist a project team through the certification process, ensuring maximum points are scored along the way by offering expert advice not just on how to lock-in points but also the principles that lie behind them. As a result, the project has every chance of becoming a model of health and wellness in the built environment.

Additionally, a WELL consultant’s skill set might include wellness interior design, biophilic design, knowledge in healthy buildings and consideration for sustainability / green buildings, a WELL building’s close cousin, as well as expertise in health and fitness, or as WELL like to call it ‘Physical Activity’, ‘Movement’ and ‘Nourishment’.

What is the intent of WELL Precondition / Feature V01 / Active Buildings & Communities?

Fundamentally this is about promoting movement and physical activity in all its guises within the context of the built environment, specifically as a way to reduce sedentary behavior in the workplace thanks to targeted design interventions, a.k.a ‘active design’.

inactivity is a health problem because it can lead to chronic diseases and premature mortality, that may sound like hyperbole but many people spend 8hrs or more in their office five days a week and will have a career that spans decades. That’s potentially a lot of inactivity!

The answer to this lies in promoting active design in our healthy buildings, this may be by encouraging greater use of stairwells rather than an elevator, cycling into work rather than driving, engaging in a group physical activity class during the working week with office colleagues, using a standing desk to reduce lower back pain, and so on.

How to design active buildings & communities for this WELL feature

In this Precondition WELL are looking for projects to achieve at least one point from V03: Circulation Network, V04: Facilities for Active Occupants. V05: Site Planning and Selection and V08: Physical Activity Spaces and Equipment.

This makes the Precondition highly achievable in our opinion but remember that the aim with WELL is never just to scrape through with the minimal investment of time and energy possible but rather to look for synergies between features and, where possible, creative solutions to their requirements that have a positive impact on occupant health.

V03: See here for our WELL AP expert opinion on the active design / stairwell strategies in Movement Feature V03

V04: We have written here on Facilities for Active Occupants, effectively these are bike storage, showers and changing facilities on site in adequate numbers to accommodate building users.

V05: See here for our insights into Site Planning & Selection feature in the WELL healthy building standard.

V08: We have previously written (here) in some detail about this WELL feature on Physical Activity Spaces and Gym Equipment as specialists in this particular field of gym design and gym equipment procurement.

To enquire about our services as WELL consultants, wellness real estate and healthy building experts, email us here.

healthy materials & plant-based leather

healthy materials such as plant-based leather are ideal for wellness interiors and better for the planet too

We advise HR departments and project teams on healthy materials for real estate development and workplace interiors. One recent discovery is Deserttex made of cactus plants..

Healthy materials for healthy interiors

A number of innovative products and materials now exist in the marketplace that promise to contribute to a wellness interior, be it in a home, office or hotel bedroom. This is an evolution of a previous shift towards sustainable, natural materials - now we have a human-centric component as well as the material being planet-friendly.

The Covid crisis has only served to bring all of this into the public's attention as there is now a far greater appreciation of hygiene and the concept of Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) nowadays, especially with the rise of the Well Building Standard and other healthy building certification systems.

Healthy materials - an alternative to leather in cactus plants

Desserto positions itself as a plant-based alternative to leather, leveraging its positive environmental impact and comparing that with the damage done to the planet both directly and indirectly by the leather tanning industry. So how does the end product, cactus leather, stand up to scrutiny?

Soft to the touch yet durable and hard-wearing, this cruelty-free fabric has no toxic chemicals, phthalates or PVC, it is semi biodegradable and well suited to the fashion, luxury goods and - of most interest for our wellness interior projects - furniture sectors.

wellness interiors and plant-based materials

The primary issue with the leather industry is chromium-tanning, the dominant form of leather tanning that sadly makes use of a nasty mix of chromium salts.

Cactus on the other hand is known for its CO2 sequestering capacity, it absorbs CO2 whilst in the ground and Desserto only harvest mature leaves every 6-8 months, meaning multiple harvests from the same USDA certified organic plants grown in Mexico.

Interestingly, half of their harvest is for food production while the other half is destined to become plant-based leather.

material durability for application in furniture

Where a leather alternative is required, such as when a client has a particular vegan / cruelty-free philosophy for example, many interior designers might reach for the synthetic PU leather sample pack but in doing so they are immediately introducing the risk of off-gases and toxins, whilst also guaranteeing a product that will regrade steadily over time.

The Desserto cactus leather has no formaldehyde or toxins yet remains hard-wearing and durable, low maintenance and easy to clean with a damp cloth. Even in high-use commercial spaces such as a hotel lobby or workplace lounge area, the cactus leather remains suitable for furniture applications whilst boosting a project’s environmental credentials and doing no harm to the planet.

Sustainable luxury material Deserttex

Deserttex is the group’s high-end sustainable luxury furnishing material that has already been applied with success to the automotive industry. Here we see scope for integrating it into luxury workplace interiors as well as green yacht interiors for example. Again, the same fundamental principles apply, the cactus plant requires almost no irrigation and no herbicides or pesticides are used while it is growing in the fields in Mexico

To enquire about out advisory services contact us here

Active Stairs: Well Building Standard Movement V03 — Biofilico Wellness Interiors

A consultant's response to the WELL Building Standard Feature: Movement V03 / Circulation Network and Active Design Principles

What is the WELL Building Standard?

The WELL Certification process for WELL V2 is now widely established as the leading healthy building and wellness real estate standard in the world today. It is essentially a series of guidelines backed by rigorous scientific research, including active design principles and active design strategies, that when taken together, will guide a real estate project, whether new build construction or refurbishment and fit-out, towards a final product that is aligned with human health and wellness.

Sections of the V2 standard are dedicated to Air, Water, Nourishment, Light, Movement, Thermal Comfort, Sound, Materials, Mind, Community & Innovation.

What is WELL consulting?

A WELL AP or WELL consultant is there to assist a project team through the certification process, ensuring maximum points are scored along the way by offering expert advice not just on how to lock-in points but also the principles that lie behind them. Building owners play a crucial role in promoting physical activity through active design strategies. As a result, the project has every chance of becoming a model of health and wellness in the built environment.

Additionally, a WELL consultant’s skill set might include wellness interior design, knowledge in healthy buildings and consideration for sustainability / green buildings, a WELL building’s close cousin, as well as expertise in health and fitness, or as WELL like to call it ‘Physical Activity‘, ‘Movement‘ and ‘Nourishment’.

What healthy building issue is WELL Feature Movement V03 addressing to encourage physical activity?

In this feature of the WELL building certification we are dealing with, wait for it… staircases! As consultants specialising in the field of wellness real estate, we admit to getting quite excited about stairwells as they represent an often neglected corner of an office or residential building that in a sense has physical activity built into it, however far too often they are not decorated with anything beyond whitewash and basic directional signage.

A healthy building needs to switch its priorities to make the stairwells a feature that regular occupants want to use, even enjoy using. To do that, WELL encourages projects to think about aesthetics, visibility and signage prompts.

The underlying problem is, once again, physical inactivity and sedentary lifestyles. The solution is more movement during the work day and that means, amongst other things such as physical activity spaces and physical activity opportunities), climbing stairs more often and designing spaces that encourage physical activity.

Where did this WELL movement feature draw its inspiration?

The researchers went looking for ‘active design’ case studies from airports, healthcare facilities, universities and offices, all leading them to the conclusion that an enhanced stairwell experience combined with subtle but effective prompts nearby in the form of permanent signage, all have a tangible impact on overall movement and activity levels in the workplace. The concept of 'active living' and 'promoting physical activity' through architectural principles and urban design also served as inspiration for these strategies.

What do we mean by ‘enhanced aesthetics' in this WELL healthy building feature?

For us, this is about being creative with a minimal budget. The reality is that projects are unlikely to apply huge budget per floor, imagine a 10 story building for example, even at a 3,000 euro budget per floor that still adds up to 30,000 euro in total just for active design stairwells. So how do we recommend using what minimal budget is on offer?

Options include flooring, wall decor, lighting, plats or biophilia in general, music speakers even artworks or motivation vinyls on the walls. It’s about making the stairwells bright, visually pleasant and dynamic areas rather than cold, heartless corners of the building. Incorporating visually appealing stairs and feature stairs can significantly enhance the aesthetic appeal and promote physical activity.

Artworks need not be originals, prints will do here. Wall decor can be blocks of brightly coloured organic / low-VOC paint, or large format vinyls. Flooring needs to be extremely hard wearing for obvious reasons but it could be brightly coloured, or have a biophilia, nature-inspired pattern such as the one in our concept design above for a corporate headquarters with a healthy building objective in Switzerland. Bright and or coloured LED lighting can also bring life to a dark stairwell with no natural light.

If the option is available, a WELL AP should lobby the master-planners and architects on a new build construction project to position stairwells in a location that makes them visible and easily accessible to all regular building occupants. It’s all about an active design approach, placing stairs not as a Plan B but as a preferred option, or Plan A,… within reason!

WELL / movement V03 / Part 1: Design Visually Appealing Stairs (1 point)

There is no limit to how far this creativity can be pushed clearly but in terms of securing a point for this WELL healthy building feature, the certification standard is looking for at****least one staircase with a minimum of two****features from the list below on each floor. Central stairs and those in educational and auditorium spaces are prime examples of where these design elements can be applied:

1. Music

2. Artwork

3. Light levels of at least 215 lux when in use

4. Windows or skylights that provide access to daylight

5. Natural design elements (e.g., plants, water features, images of nature)

6. Gamification

WELL / movement V03 / part 2: signage prompts (1 point)

This is where a WELL AP and consultant team need to align with the signage consultants, or indeed take ownership of this element of the overall signage plan whilst integrating the design and production with the rest of the project's signage style.

At least on staircase servicing all floors needs point-of-decision signage near the main entrance or reception desk , at the elevator or escalators, and at the base / entry points of the stairs. The objective here is to grab the attention of building users just before they commit to taking the elevator or escalator instead of taking the stairs.

We want to nudge them in the direction of the stairs, this could be done in a very simple, neutral tone or indeed with something more playful that challenges the users to ‘burn some extra calories while you work', or ‘hit those quads and hams', as long the messaging is positive, not negative.

Finally, additional wayfinding signage may be required if the stairs are not visible from the location of the signage prompts, to ensure users do not get lost and change their mind!

WELL / movement V03 / part 3: promote visible stairs for improved employee health (1 point)

As a WELL consultant, we find this to can be a challenging point to win, as it requires at least one staircase servicing all floors that is open to regular occupants of the healthy building and located before elevators or escalators.

Why is this a challenge? Quite simply because we are rubbing up against the requirements or the building engineers and architects, so ‘active design’ requirements often have to take a back seat. Additionally, considerations such as building codes and mental health must be factored into the design of visible stairs. That said, the point is there for the taking if the project’s stairs happens to fit within these requirements.

If you are interested in our services helping you create active design stairwells on your real estate project for WELL Movement V03,contact us here.

wellness flooring & paints in interior design

Examples of healthy materials for flooring, wall paint and curtains to create a wellness interior concept

What role does flooring play in a healthy interior?

Flooring is one of the key product categories in this healthy interior trend, for obvious reasons. Western cultures, unlike say Russia or Japan, typically have less strict social rules around wearing outdoor shoes indoors, meaning dirt and bacteria from the streets have an easier time making their way into a residential carpet for example.

For more on this subject see our dedicated page here.

Air-purifying carpets?

The Desso Airmaster carpet tile by US giant Tarkett is a perfect example of what is happening in the commercial office market today in terms of air-purifying flooring. Why office interiors and not say gym flooring, hotel flooring or yacht interiors you may well ask?

Offices are primarily places of work, staff are first and foremost there to be productive and staffing costs are invariably a business's largest overhead, therefore anything that can move the needle of productivity, even if by just 3-5% for example, represents a tangible value-add for corporations, well worth a corporate HQ carpet upgrade in other words!

Sustainability first, health benefits second

Importantly, the Airmaster is first and foremost a sustainably made product with a highly respectable Cradle to Cradle certification and an EcoBase backing as standard. In terms of its functional benefits to users, it captures and retains fine dust particles, in some tests proving to be up to 20 times more effective than smooth flooring solutions. This makes it especially relevant for allergy sufferers.

Finally, it has low Volatile Organic Compound (VOC) emission properties with minimal PM10 particles - despite the name 'organic', VOCs are the bad guys as they are mildly toxic. Taken together, this makes the Desso Airmaster a viable contender for a yacht refit carpet option.

Toxin-free flooring

Milliken's Breathe range of flooring is GreenGuard certified for its low chemical emissions, made of natural or recycled fibres from plastic bottles and has a plant-based water repellency component that is fluorine-free.

Milliken have ensured that the carpet is completely VOC-free. We'd love to see the Breathe range deployed in a yacht interior for just these reasons.

Anti-bacterial & eco-friendly floors or walls

Active Surfaces by the Iris Ceramica Group in Italy go perhaps one step further with their ceramic porcelain wall or flooring tiles that come packed with anti-bacterial, anti-viral, anti-pollution and anti-odour properties.

To achieve this, natural or artificial (e.g. LED) light and humidity present in the air contribute to eliminating 99.99% of bacteria and contagious viruses that settle on the tiles.

What's more, these ceramic tiles are 100% recyclable and most are produced with more than 40% recycled content in zero emission factories. The tiles are certified by ISO 10678, ISO 27447 and ISO 27448.

Indoor paints with air-purifying qualities

Healthy wall paints are another high-growth sector we have our eye on, with brands such as Gush from Singapore bringing out a product called Cair that actively attacks airborne pollutants with catalytic reactions that break down VOCs such as formaldehyde and odours into harmless by-products such as H20 and O2.

It is anti-moulding, making it suitable for bathrooms or spa rooms, as well as anti-bacterial - in other words it eliminates 99.9% of infection-causing bacteria such as E. Coli, according to Gair.

Gush focus on a purely residential market with an at present limited product range while, closer to home here in Europe, Airlite from Italy have more products on the market already and offer indoor, outdoor and primer solutions, giving them more of an in-road into the architectural and industrial paint sectors.

Again here, the paint claims anti-bacterial, anti-mould and anti-odour properties. Airlite products are also non-toxin, VOC-free, some have air cleaning properties and are produced using 100% renewable energy.

Healthy materials for curtains

Swiss company HeiQ has produced a curtain fabric that IKEA has bought for wide-spread distribution throughout its network under the product name 'Gunrid'.  The HeiQ Fresh AIR is a mineral-based technology uses transmitted ultraviolet (UVA) light from the sun to convert VOCs into harmless CO2 and O2, just like the Gush Cair mentioned above.

contact us to discuss your interior consultancy requirements 

Healthy materials in sustainable interiors

What are healthy materials vs sustainable materials? How can buildings and interiors integrate circular materials to reduce environmental impact?

We advise teams on the selection of materials for real estate development and interiors projects, typically as part of a wider sustainability plan or ESG strategy for example. Contact us to find out more.

What are healthy materials?

A number of innovative products and materials now exist in the marketplace that promise added wellness benefits, be it in a home, office or hotel. This is in a sense an evolution of a previous shift towards sustainable, natural materials.

The Covid crisis has only served to bring all of this into the mainstream public's attention as there is now a far greater appreciation of hygiene and the concept of Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) nowadays, especially with the rise of the Well Building Standard.

sustainable interior flooring Zandur

The ‘Green & Healthy Places’ podcast series takes a deep-dive into the role of sustainability, wellbeing and community in real estate and hospitality.

Here we discuss sustainable interior flooring with Robert McKee of Zandur in the USA.

This episode we're with Robert McKee, the dynamic founder of Zandur sustainable flooring based in Virginia, USA that supplies hospitals, offices, gyms and residential spaces around the world. Flooring plays a fundamental part in creating a healthy indoor environment, particularly indoor air quality, now more than ever designers and architects need to be thinking about cleaning and hygiene, which is where Zandur comes in...

Sustainable interiors & healthy flooring material

Welcome to episode 15 of the Green & Healthy Places podcast in which we discuss sustainability and wellness in real estate and hospitality. This episode we’re with Robert McKee, the dynamic founder of Zandur sustainable flooring based in Virginia, USA that supplies hospitals, offices, gyms and residential spaces around the world.

Designing a healthy indoor environment

Flooring plays a fundamental part in creating a healthy indoor environment, particularly indoor air quality, now more than ever designers and architects need to be thinking about cleaning and hygiene, which is where Zandur comes in…

Robert talks us through the world of healthy product certifications, the many benefits of using cork as a raw material, why you do NOT want natural rubber in your floor covering but rather vulcanized rubber, the life cycle of flooring and the role of maintenance over a possible 30 years, as well as Zandur’s innovative approach to design that draws inspiration from craftsmen of the early 1900’s.

If you like this type of content please consider subscribing and you can of course find Zandur USA or a local distributor at zandur.com

GUEST: ROBERT MCKEE / Founder, Zandur / www.zandur.com

HOST: MATT MORLEY / www.biofilico. com / www.biofit.io / www.bioblu.org

——————————-

A full transcription follows, courtesy of Otter.ai:

Matt Morley

Welcome to Episode 15 of the Green and Healthy Places podcast, in which we discuss sustainability and wellness in real estate and hospitality. I'm your host, Matt Morley, founder of BioBlu sustainability, Biofilico wellness interiors and Biofit nature gyms.

This episode, we're with Robert McKee, the dynamic founder of Zandur sustainable flooring based in Virginia, USA, supplying hospitals, offices, gyms, and residential spaces around the world. Flooring plays a fundamental part in creating a healthy indoor environment, particularly as it relates to indoor air quality. Now more than ever, designers and architects are thinking about cleaning and hygiene, which is right in Sandur's ballpark.

Robert talks us through the world of healthy product certifications, the many benefits of using cork as a raw material, why you do not want natural rubber in your floor covering but rather vulcanised rubber, the lifecycle of flooring and the role of maintenance over what can be 30 years, as well as Zandur's really innovative approach to design that draws on inspiration often from craftsmen in the early 1900s. If you like this type of content, please consider subscribing. And you can of course find Zandur and the local distributors listed on their website zandur.com

—————————-

Robert, thank you so much for joining us today. You founded the company back in 2004. Could you give us quick introduction to what Zandur flooring looks like today as a business, your products and, so on?

Robert McKee

Well, sure, and I appreciate it, thank you for taking the time to speak with me. A little bit about the company, we did start in 2004. The objective from the beginning has always been to focus on sustainable commercial products, the floor covering portion of construction and really with a focus of not selling something sustainable products that really perform or outperformed other products in the industry that weren't necessarily sustainable, and also meeting those same price points.

Our interest has never been to profit off of sustainability. It's always just to be sustainable. Because it's the right thing to do. And my family history goes back into the cork industry - cork flooring in fact. Sustainability was not something that people even talked about, you know, back in my grandfather's era. But it's always been something that we have had in our product line. And everything we've sold has had that sustainability story before it became popular. So it's something we just continue with.

Matt Morley

I think that really comes through in your current communications online that it is a fundamental piece of what you do rather than an afterthought that you've sort of tacked on at the end. It looks like you've built the business around that philosophy or that it's just it's just part of how you see the world, I think that there is a clear difference now in companies that really have a deep value system behind them like yours and that was very much the initial insight that led me to contacting you. I came across you primarily from the sport and fitness flooring and cork flooring, but you do others you do commercial flooring as well. Right?

Robert McKee

Correct. So basically just getting back real quick to what what you've mentioned and kind of where we come from, there's a lot of temptation always for companies to go out and sell products just to sell products, for instance, you know, we have plenty of opportunities to go and sell vinyl based products, things of that nature. And it's something from the beginning we've always made the point of focusing on sustainability. We're not going to enter into having non-sustainable products, competing with the big guys, yes they do have their sustainable lines but also their non sustainable lines. And to me it kind of defeats the whole purpose, either we're all in on sustainability or we're not.

But getting back to the products that we have. The first flagship product is something that we introduced way back when, it's a product made of cork and rubber combined. We've just recently made some significant improvements to that, it has great cleanability, which is obviously really important these days, chemical resistance, slip resistance, all those sorts of things. Then we have our solid rubber product, which is kind of the go-to heavy duty type of floor covering product for hospitals, airports, things of that nature. And then we have our solid cork flooring product, which has certain applications in commercial use, as well as a lot of residential use as well.

Matt Morley

So then, from an architect or an interior designer or design and build team perspective, how do they select one of these different materials and what that sort of pros and cons do they each have? I know you big on healthy product declaration certifications, right? The idea of a Declare label, from the the International Living future Institute and the Red List.

Robert McKee

So we've always been completely transparent about our products. Again, it goes back to the history of my family being involved in this business. It's just kind of how we're wired. And you can see that we participate in is these transparency programmes. The challenge is the cost for a small company, which can be a certain barrier to entry, whether intentional or not, so we try to pick and choose what's going to be most important, what's really going to tell the story about our product to the clients because ultimately, that's what we're trying to do - easily convey the sustainability story of our product in a completely honest way. That's what everyone else is looking for too. It gets pretty challenging, I think both on the supply side, and the specifications side, for people to really understand even what they're looking at. And I find that with designers or architects that have been doing this for a long time, even they get confused sometimes.

Matt Morley

Yeah, I think we end up we were looking for a quick and reliable route through in terms of digesting that information. And often Yeah, I can declare label or a cradle to cradle certificate, it's just but you know, once that's there, because of the integrity behind those systems, when a when a product comes out with that you can just rely on it. 100% I think that's they're going to be increasingly important. I think as, as the green building systems above start to require those individual product, green building products to align with their systems, because then you sort of you need everything to join up quite a bit like a Tetris puzzle. One of the things I wanted to ask you about was, and it's a big theme right now, for obvious reasons - indoor air quality.

Robert McKee

In a basic sense, floor covering can have a negative effect on air quality. What you're looking for, in the floor covering itself as a material would be something that has a neutral effect - that has no negative effect on air quality. However, if you look at certain types of floor covering, if you look at soft surfaces, how cleanable are they because that's when you can start to obviously have a negative effect on air quality. So it's not necessarily the material itself. But it is what can get into the material. You know, dirt, dust, all those sorts of things that you know allergens, things of that nature, which can can be contained in the floor covering itself. Then as I said specifically in soft surfaces. Now if you get into products, PVC products, things of that nature, certainly off gassing is something that is is important to pay attention to. And, again, it's something that, you know, in the formulation of our products, we make sure that there is nothing that is going to cause any unsafe off gassing of any chemicals, allergens. And it's always been one of those things that I've liked about pork in general, as a raw material is that it has a completely neutral effect on environments as far as there's no off gassing with cork, there's no negative implications whatsoever. On the residential side, it's something that oftentimes has been used in the past for people that have certain allergies, and then we can talk about the cleanability of a product. If you look at a solid surface of rubber flooring versus let's say, recycled rubber flooring or something like that, the cleanability level of a solid balkanized surface is extremely important to indoor air quality and just health in general - it is a very cleanable surface.

Matt Morley

That's an interesting one, because that comes up a lot with with my gym designs, where I'll often I'll see these terms banded around quite loosely like eco rubber flooring tiles, and vulcanised rubber tiles. What's the difference there? Is all rubber sustainable? Or is eco rubber more sustainable than recycled rubber? Can you help us unpick those?

Robert McKee

So yeah, this is one of the challenges that a company like ours fights against. Because there's been so much marketing that's not necessarily straightforward. All rubber is vulcanised as vulcanization is the process of curing the rubber through heat and pressure but then you have what a lot of people refer to as recycled rubber flooring, or crumb rubber flooring. And then there is vulcanised rubber flooring. The reason we call it vulcanised is that it is a completely sealed. The vulcanization is the last process in the manufacturing of our material. So it leaves a completely sealed impenetrable surface. If you look at recycled rubber flooring, the rubber chips are vulcanised. But the last process in fact, is actually they grind up those chips, then they put typically a urethane glue with them, and then they cure them. So it's not the final process of recycled rubber flooring, or crumb rubber is not vulcanization, it's actually just glueing those chips back together. And that's why as a result, you end up with a surface that has a lot of pores in it and holes in it, you have to put finishes on top of that. You have off gassing because you have you know some of those components being the recycled rubber sometimes or not. Not great. You don't know what the contents are.

Matt Morley

Then one of your big innovations was combining rubber with cork in flooring. So how does that how does that process work? How do you blend or combine the two into one solid substance for your floors.

Robert McKee

So I can't claim to be the the ultimate inventor of that product that was actually invented way back in the early 1900s. It's a product that I discovered probably 15 or so years ago. It was not being produced. It was not being used. And I thought it was a phenomenal idea to take basically all the great properties of cork - sustainability, great acoustical properties, great comfort properties, and mix those properties with the those of rubber - phenomenal durability, a lot of options for colour too. And as a result, we've Over time develop this product, which takes the best of both worlds.

Matt Morley

When I think of cork, I guess, I think of Spain, Portugal. What about rubber? Where are you sourcing that element from?

Robert McKee

So floor covering in general, is not made from natural rubber. In fact, you really don't want natural rubber in your floorcovering for a variety of reasons. And this is one of the misconceptions that we don't go out and sell that are products made with natural rubber, because it's not. The reason you don't want natural rubber in your product is because you have a very strong odour from natural rubber, which most people have smelled from erasers or whatever the case may be. That odour is from a protein that is active in natural rubber, and can also cause allergies as well. Latex allergies - that's from natural rubber. So you certainly don't want that in the healthcare situation. natural rubber has very inconsistent colouring. So colour consistency is difficult, which is obviously important for design. It also has very poor ageing characteristics. If you've seen a dry, rotted tire in the past on a bike, or something like that, that's from natural rubber. So long and short of it is natural rubber is one of the coolest raw materials out there. But it's not great for using in floorcovering. So what we use, we'll use a small amount of natural rubber, which will add some slip resistance characteristics, things of that nature, but the bulk of rubber is a byproduct of the petroleum industry. Basically, it's a waste that's generated, which we can thankfully use to generate, you know, this resin that has these great properties. And the nice thing about rubber is that it's easily recyclable into a variety of different things after its use. And, you know, it's does not have bad chemical properties, anything of that nature.

Matt Morley

We're seeing more and more attention paid to this concept of circularity, right. So where does your flooring go in 10 years time, or however long a lifecycle of your flooring might be? And then is it safely recycled after that?

Robert McKee

So with lifecycle there's two things that I always look at which is, how long is the product going to last and how much energy has to be put into that product while it is in service meaning what is your maintenance regime going to be. If you have to be constantly painting a finish to keep it looking clean... And you know, we talked about the recycled rubber flooring and that's one of those things maybe the life cycle life time of the floor is similar but the amount of energy that has to be put into maintain that with all the finishes which have to be manufactured which have off gassing as they're applied you know your labour cost there is far more than the material ever will be. As we continue to develop our products and in general with with solid vulcanised rubber flooring, it's a fairly low maintenance product and you know it's it's, it's great for for that you know not having to use finishes not having to use waxes, things of that nature. But getting back to the actual life span of the product. It's it will last for decades. You know if you if you want rubber to last for 30 years, as long as you maintain it properly. It's gonna last that long now the colours will probably fall out of fashion in that period of time. So what can you do with it? Well, you can do a couple things. Number one, you can instal floor on top of it. And the nice thing about rubber, particularly our cork rubber is it has phenomenal acoustical properties. So if you instal something on top of it, you're going to get the benefit of the existing floor covering for the acoustical reasons. Or it can be removed and it can be recycled in the recycling process for that is basically grinding it back up into chips, and we use chips or rubber in our product, to make different different patterns and designs, things of that nature. In fact, all of our factory waste, we use that same process, we grind up the waste, and then we use that as colour chips in our top layer or the back end.

Matt Morley

You mentioned how there's obviously to a degree, certain colours or or looks that might be popular for a number of years, are there any constraints that you come across in terms of balancing aesthetics with your sustainable values?

Robert McKee

Well, so by by nature, I guess I would say I'm more of the designer slash Innovator of products, and I really enjoy the challenges of coming up with different things with new things 90% of which never get out of my lab. But that's kind of the fun of it. And with cork there are huge challenges. There are challenges and how the raw material reacts once it's installed, if people have used style cork flooring in the past, for instance, a lot of people have had issues with it, for dimensional stability reasons, things of that nature, which we've overcome through a variety of different innovations, but also with colours. You know, people want colours, and with cork, you've got brown, brown, and brown, those are your those are your colours. So how do you take those and make changes and you know, through the baking process, we get different tones of brown from basically a light tan to a black, and then go back and start to mix those things used to you know, traditional woodworking techniques to to laminate things together, do cross cuts, re laminate them and really come up with some pretty neat patterns. And you know, a lot of a lot of my development and innovation comes from looking at what was done in the past and going through archives of factories and looking at the materials they made back in the early 1900s and finding some really cool things and kind of bringing things back out. And that's what we did with work flooring was was literally going through, you know, the basements of a factory that we worked with and finding some things that they did in the past and, and bringing those those patterns back out with a modern twist.

Matt Morley

It's it's, it's funny, isn't it, but in so many different aspects of our lives Now it can feel like in a way, rediscovering how things were done, not prior to the Industrial Revolution, but certainly plus or minus 100 years ago or more. There was just a simplicity to how certain things were done back then. And I think there's this appreciation now for for that slightly more natural touch, and I wasn't expecting it to come from you, but I get totally on it, which is just great to see.

Robert McKee

I've always thought we tend to as a society overcomplicate so many things when a lot of times you just stop look back and see what was done in the past and you know you can put put technology apply technology to something that was done but uh you know, you can really really learn some pretty cool things from from past history, which is maybe you've been buried but not not gone forever.

Matt Morley

Okay, so let's let's look at gym design because it's one of my favourite subjects. You've got three sustainable gym flooring ranges - sustain sport, flexsport, and praxis cork, what are the sort of pros and cons or how would would someone go about deciding which might be more applicable? If it's a big bodybuilding gym, you might suggest one material versus if it's a group class Fitness Studio, you might suggest a different material?

Robert McKee

There's two very distinct groups of products, I would say. One would be the Praxis solid cork. And then the other would be the sustain cork rubber or the flex solid rubber. The solid cork product is a great material for light fitness areas where you're doing a lot of floor exercises, yoga studios, things of that nature, that that product has been very well received. You know, anytime you're on the floor doing those exercises, having a product like cork, which is a very good insulator, it's going to feel warm to the touch versus if you put have a vinyl type of a product things that something like that. There's no insulation, so you're going to get the cool temperature of the typically the concrete slab that's underneath of that so cork is really nice for that obviously has great resilience to it, great acoustical properties, cork is not something that you're going to want to put in a place where you're using heavy free weights, it it is not going to resist that type of abuse. So it certainly has its place. And as I said, I would say like fitness areas where gym users are not going to be dropping heavy loads on them, that works. Then you get into the rubber products, the sustain is kind of my go to product for fitness flooring Because it has the 65% cork in it, it has tremendous acoustical properties, it has tremendous sustainability properties, great slip resistance. It has phenomenal durability, the list goes on and on, exciting about these the sustain, and also the flex product is we now have all of our products. In those two lines, all colours are available in two different thicknesses for the sports range being six millimetre or nine millimetre thickness. And what we do is we actually laminate the top layer to a recycled rubber backing, which now we're bringing in more recycled content. The nice thing about the recycled rubber backing is this on the backside so we don't have to worry about the content of that recycled rubber, which is a concern what's on the top side. And it produces a once again a great acoustical and product that's that's, you know it's going to protect yourself for when you're dropping weights, things of that nature. Navigating to heavy, heavy free weights, you can actually instal underlayment underneath of our products, so you can build up to told me 12 millimetres thick, even thicker than that 15 millimetres people have done. But it's also a good idea if you're if you're gonna be dropping heavy things to put a good drop off mat on Because ultimately, the biggest concern with heavy weights is damage to the sub floor not necessarily to the flooring material. So that's something you have to pay attention to. Yeah, I

Matt Morley

often certainly in the sort of my plans run laying out a gym floor, for example, go with the cork underneath, but then or the cork rubber underneath. And then in the strength area, especially now with sort of the trend for sort of CrossFit type stuff where Yeah, they tend to pick up a barbell and not necessarily put it down too delicately having a nice big thick, sort of extra layer, if you like to sitting on top of the of the base layer around that strength, that strength zone within the gym seems that seems to take care of it. So what have you got what's coming up? What's in the pipeline, it sounds like you're you're moving at 100 miles an hour and you've got your full of ideas. I'm guessing you've got more innovations coming what's what's in the future, if you can give us a sense of that? Well, we

Robert McKee

do it we've got a really a product that I'm really excited about coming out at some point in time this year. COVID has not helped us or anyone else as far as advancing innovation particularly. But it's a it's a it's a product made out of solid rubber. It's a roll product, which will be that will be available in titles and roles has more of a terrazzo type of look to it. Much more subtle colour, tone on tone type of a situation with the design of it and a bunch of new colours. A lot more exciting things about it as well, which will be coming out with some point time.

Matt Morley

Very cool. Well listen, I'm a huge fan. It's been it's been great to get some pick up on some of your energy and ideas that I saw I appreciate that zando.com will will link in the in the show notes in terms of someone contacting you, is it better to go via their headquarters in the US? I know you then have sort of local distributors or representatives in each country.

Robert McKee

Yeah, if you look at our website, you can you can email us directly through that and someone will get back to you with their local salesperson or we also list our different international sales people as well.

WELL Building Standard Movement V05 Site Planning & Selection

A WELL consultant responds to WELL Building Standard feature: Movement V05 Site Planning & Selection

What is the WELL Building Standard?

The WELL Certification process for WELL V2 is now widely established as the leading healthy building and wellness real estate standard in the world today. It is essentially a series of guidelines backed by rigorous scientific research, that when taken together, will guide a real estate project, whether new build construction or refurbishment and fit-out, towards a final product that is aligned with human health and wellness.

Sections of the V2 standard are dedicated to Air, Water, Nourishment, Light, Movement, Thermal Comfort, Sound, Materials, Mind, Community & Innovation.

What is WELL consulting?

A WELL AP or WELL consultant is there to assist a project team through the certification process, ensuring maximum points are scored along the way by offering expert advice not just on how to lock-in points but also the principles that lie behind them. As a result, the project has every chance of becoming a model of health and wellness in the built environment.

Additionally, a WELL consultant’s skill set might include wellness interior design, biophilic design, knowledge in healthy buildings and consideration for sustainability / green buildings, a WELL building’s close cousin, as well as expertise in health and fitness, or as WELL like to call it ‘Physical Activity’, ‘Movement’ and ‘Nourishment’.

What is the main focus of this WELL healthy building feature?

This feature is very similar to some of the features in green building standards such as BREEAM and the USGBC LEED that consider site selection as one of the very earliest decisions for any project to ensure that the result is a piece of real estate in tune with people and planet.

Specifically then, WELL are looking for evidence that the area around the project promotes walkability and has access to public transportation. Read on to discover what that means in practice… there are no fewer than four points on offer here within the WELL certified process after all!

What problem is this healthy building feature addressing?

The WELL Standard make the point that contemporary real estate has a tendency to make our lives easier, more comfortable, less strenuous physically - unlike healthy buildings. This contributes to the worrying dominance of largely sedentary lifestyles in the developed world today.

To combat that this WELL feature looks to raise awareness around active design strategies in interiors but also, just as importantly, to a project’s location and its relationship with physical activity opportunities.

How does site planning connect with physical activity?

Their basic premise here is that thoughtful site planning can improve community health; walkable neighborhoods tend to align proximity, with connectivity, density, safety and aesthetics. They take into account a wide variety of different user profiles, promoting mobility for all.

Even tall buildings cna have a genuine impact on the community through its ground-level architectural choices, by adding public walkways, landscaping and so on that encourage walkability and nature interaction.

Prioritising pedestrians for a healthy community (2 points)

Part 1: STREETS: Projects need to provide at least one building entrance that links to a pedestrian walkway as well as one of a variety of technical considerations such as its WalkScore, vehicle traffic restrictions and the presence of continuous sidewalks. In other words, pedestrians need to be treated with respect, indeed encouraged in the streets surrounding the project. We can imagine this being especially problematic in some US cities where the car tends to dominate the streets still.

Part 2: ENVIRONMENT: Exterior building walls need to include some combination of transparent glazing, overhangs, murals, biophilic design and mixed design features to give the overall impression of a building designed to be aesthetically pleasing for pedestrians in the area.

Access to mass transport (2 points)

For an extra two points, this WELL feature requires that all spaces are located within an area with a specific Transit Score, in vicinity to a bus network and in walking distance to a bus rapid transit stop, rail station or ferry service.

This is to ensure that public transport can be the primary way for regular building occupants to travel to and from the site, if they are not cycling or jogging in.

This is to reduce car usage, which in turn lowers greenhouse gas emissions and lowers our collective impact on the environment, whilst also requiring less car park spaces in urban hubs.

To discuss our consultancy services as WELL Healthy Building experts, contact us here

esg real estate consultancy in london, UK

we have an ongoing real estate ESG advisory role with Black Mountain Partners in London, UK

boutique real estate ESG consultants in London, UK

we create strategic sustainability plans for a business and help deliver those objectives on an ongoing basis.

Examples of our real estate ESG consultancy deliverables for Black Mountain Partners in London, UK

Alignment with the UN Sustainable Development Goals

Evidence of aligning the business with UN Sustainable Development goals, specifically three were elected as targets where most impact can be made:

3/ Good Health & Wellbeing

11/ Sustainable Cities & Communities

13/ Climate Action

An ESG-led development strategy

Evidence of the company having adopted the systems thinking strategies of the Circular Economy and Cradle to Cradle in the initial selection of its Developments and subsequently in their design, delivery and ongoing operation, right through to re-purposing or demolition later in the building’s life.

Employee Satisfaction Survey

We carried out an employee satisfaction survey in July 2020, using these outputs to identified a number of key themes to target for employee engagement over the coming year, then attached an action to each of them and scheduled follow-up 1-on-1 sessions with the CEO for a later date. Key themes included office acoustics, indoor air quality, biophilia and plants, nutrition in the office kitchen and active ergonomics.

Creation of a Company-wide Environmental Policy

We wrote an overview of the company’s approach to systems thinking, demolition works, materials selection, in-built flexibility, lifecycle strategy, sustainable site selection as well as location & transportation objectives as they relate to green building.

Social Enterprise Partnerships & Community Outreach Plan

We implemented a comprehensive series of social enterprise partnerships as part of a community outreach program, many of these changes also have a positive impact on creating a healthy office too. From office soap supplies by The Soap Co, to fairtrade organic coffee by Cafedirect an award-winning B Corp business, carbon neutral BELU mineral water, fruit delivered in biodegradable boxes by Fruitful in Croydon and ethical stationery supplies via fully carbon neutral EthStat.

Net Zero Carbon Building Commitment

We helped the business commit to following the World Green Building Council Net Zero Carbon Buildings Commitment that states all buildings within the portfolio should be Net Zero Carbon by 2030 at the latest.

Staff Training & Professional Development Plan

We arranged for a number of additional staff training sessions including mental health first aider training and LEED Green Associate study.

GRESB Assessment submission

We planned and delivered the company’s first annual GRESB real estate ESG assessment submission. This is both a considerable amount of project administration on the one hand and tactical implementation of multiple smaller components of a wider ESG strategy for the business as a whole (see example above).

Mental Health Awareness

We aligned the company with the Lord Mayor's Appeal Healthy City campaign around promoting greater mental health awareness in the workplace by assigning a mental health officer who took specific training to become a Mental Health First Aider with Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) England, a social enterprise offering specialist workplace training.

Waste Management Strategy

We created a waste strategy covering design, construction and operational phases of the building process.

Created a Governance Policy

Created an anti-corruption and anti-bribery company policy

Created a Whistleblower Policy

Created an IT & Communications Systems Policy

Created a disciplinary procedure policy

Created a Privacy Standard

Contact us here to discuss your corporate social responsibility or ESG strategy requirements

coworking interiors for porto montenegro - arsenal business club

Coworking office interior design by biofilico with a restorative green space outdoors

Coworking interiors for workplace wellness

We designed the communal areas of the Arsenal Business Club, Montenegro (2020) with a view to creating a restorative, calming space that fostered social interaction and connections amongst the rapidly expanding number of entrepreneurs based in Tivat, Montenegro, largely focused around Porto Montenegro the mixe-use real estate development and masterplanned community.

Interior design process for coworking space

Our role included initial layouts and creative direction with moodboards and styling for approval by the CEO.

The project team consisted of the Director of Operations & Facilities Management as well as a Civil Engineer / Estate Manager playing a Project Manager role and finally the in-house Landscaping team.

Coworking office Furniture Procurement

Furniture procurement was a combination of imported pieces from a regional distributor and items found locally, this was intended to keep the CAPEX budget down.

Coworking design project team

We collaborated with the landscaping team on the outdoor plants as well as indoor office plants, pots and ongoing maintenance plan. Marketing helped to produce the direction signage and arrival / entrance signage.

Outdoor restorative space

The outdoor space was arguably the highlight as it provides shelter from the elements, a space for deep work surrounded by nature in a quiet corner of the community village, and of course an area for coffee or lunch with colleagues.

Multi-sensory interior design

How to design multi-sensory interiors for health & wellness benefits

Our multi-sensory bedroom, Casa Biofilico, Barcelona, Spain

All you need to know about Indoor Air Quality (IAQ)

Our guide to the role of indoor air quality (IAQ) in creating healthy buildings and wellness real estate

Dyson indoor air purifier in the bedroom of Casa Biofilico, our residential project in Barcelona, Spain

What indoor pollutants affect indoor air quality (IAQ)?

Indoor pollutants such as CO2 have a negative impact on cognitive function and performance. the best solution is source control - nipping the problem in the bud, by not bringing harmful materials into the space that carry chemicals, VOCs or off-gases.

For that, we need building materials and fit-out materials that disclose their chemical ingredients, ideally with a healthy product accreditation to back up their claims.

One of the main culprits in this sense are Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) or chemicals that off-gas at ambient temperature from building materials such as particle board, glues, paints and carpet backing 

Particulate Matter PM2.5 and PM10 are made up of dust and synthetic materials decomposing around us from furniture, fabrics and so on.

How do green healthy buildings improve indoor air quality?

Green healthy buildings have been shown to have a positive impact on cognitive scores, even a 10% increase in productivity in an office or workplace can pay potentially for or greatly offset a business’s rental costs.

What’s more, health & safety are often the main criteria in building satisfaction for occupants. Deliver a healthy building with high quality indoor air and you add value to the property in other words.

Primarily this is done through a combination of adequate ventilation adapted to the specific location of each project and consideration for the building materials used during construction and materials used in the fit-out.

how to positive impact indoor air quality?

Natural ventilation and high-grade HVAC filters on one side combined with a green procurement policy that specifies healthy, non-toxic materials that do not give off harmful VOCs on the other is the key.

We also advocate for an abundance of air-purifying indoor plants and sufficient numbers of air quality monitors wall-mounted at around head height to ensure we can control and monitor the situation in real time post-occupancy.

We then layer in various facilities management strategies such as enhanced cleaning protocols, green cleaning policies, walk-off mats and so on to ensure the indoor air quality is maintained over time,.

What standards exist for indoor air quality?

RESET AIR focuses specifically on this one theme, whereas other standards such as WELL have a dedicated chapter to indoor air quality. Broadly their content is aligned, combining information about the risks of getting it wrong with strategies for getting indoor air quality right.

WELL Building Feature V11: Ergonomics Programming

A consultants response to the WELL Building Standard’s Movement Feature V11: Ergonomics Programming

What is the WELL Building Standard?

The WELL Certification process for WELL V2 is now widely established as the leading healthy building and wellness real estate standard in the world today.

It is essentially a series of guidelines backed by rigorous scientific research, that when taken together, will guide a real estate project, whether new build construction or refurbishment and fit-out, towards a final product that is aligned with human health and wellness.

Sections of the V2 standard are dedicated to Air, Water, Nourishment, Light, Movement, Thermal Comfort, Sound, Materials, Mind, Community & Innovation.

What is WELL consulting?

A WELL AP or WELL consultant is there to assist a project team through the certification process, ensuring maximum points are scored along the way by offering expert advice not just on how to lock-in points but also the principles that lie behind them. As a result, the project has every chance of becoming a model of health and wellness in the built environment.

Additionally, a WELL consultant’s skill set might include wellness interior design, biophilic design, knowledge in healthy buildings and consideration for sustainability / green buildings, a WELL building’s close cousin, as well as expertise in health and fitness, or as WELL like to call it ‘Physical Activity’, ‘Movement’ and ‘Nourishment’.

What is required from projects pursuing WELL Feature / Movement V11 Ergonomics Programming?

Real estate and healthy building projects pursuing WELL Certification are, for feature V11, required to engage with a certified ergonomist to assist in creating comfortable workstations for all staff in order to avoid the most common issues such as lower back pain, wrist pain or a sore neck.

This specialist should also be brought in for regular visits to make ongoing improvements. Given the shift to working from home of late, he/she is also to assist with remote workers’ ergonomics arrangements.

Why is ergonomics important for a healthy building or healthy workplace?

In short, we’re confronting musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) here, one of the primary health risks in the modern workplace that has a direct correlation with absenteeism / sick days and low productivity due to anxiety, discomfort and low level stress.

What does the WELL standard aim to do about it?

An ergonomics specialist will look at the physical environment, for example sit-stand desks or active workstations, as well as internal organizational culture / behavior and, especially in blue collar circumstances, the type of movements and processes involved in the work itself.

• For a separate blog article on ergonomic furniture in a healthy office design see our blog post here

• See our 9-point guide to healthy buildings here.

Implementing an ergonomics program for WELL Feature V11 (1 point)

Firstly, in terms of human resources, a project must either engage with a certified ergonomist / consultant for help with this feature or have an employee with a similar certification and iis formally responsible for delivering the program.

In other words, this needs to be handled by someone who knows what they are doing and WELL want to see proof of a company taking it seriously!

Additionally, a program needs to include stakeholder consultations, a task analysis by a certified ergonomist, individual ergonomic assessments either virtually or in-person on an annual basis after initial employee on-boarding.

This program also needs to be backed up by an engagement plan with workshops or annual training delivered by the certified ergonomist.

Ergonomic improvements for a healthy workplace (1 point)

A project pursuing WELL certification Feature V11 needs to either describe how this feature informed their decisions in Feature V02 Ergonomics Workstation Design and V07 Active Furnishings.

Alternatively, the project team show that they have heard individual ergonomic needs of employees and have actioned a plan to respond to them, with a timeline communicated to those individuals.

Supporting remote work ergonomics (1 point)

Finally, a project team ought to show they have taken into consideration working from home ergonomics too, tailoring parts of the plan above to those spending time at home on a regular basis for remote work, this includes making ergonomic furnishings available to remote workers, whether via a subsidy or reimbursement.

We hope this article has proven useful! Contact us here to discuss how we can help you with workplace wellness and the WELL Building Certification process.

The Biofilico Guide to Workplace Wellbeing

Workplace wellness covers both office interior design concepts, such as biophilic design and active design, as well as programming for physical activity and mindfulness for example.

Biofilico offers office interior design services, whether as wellness design consultants for large scale projects or by delivering specific concepts ourselves such as a coworking, recharge room or gyms, as well as health & wellness programming.