4 Healthy Home Design

The entire Healthy Home Design^SM system is predicated on having a building construction contractor, subcontractors and material providers that agree to the program and adhere to its requirements.

Green Designers Specify Healthy Home Design Components

Products, Materials and Methods of Assembly for Your House Are Part of the Project

(This Architect began this Healthy Home Design (HHD) program, and his company will certify other entities seeking this label, after satisfying Rand Soellner Architect’s HHD program registration requirements. The intent is for all design and material providers to eventually make only healthy houses.)

Home Architects ® is one of the few architectural firms on the planet that created a Healthy Home Design Building Specification that is included in their construction documents. This specification details Dos and Don’ts to insure that you receive the healthiest project possible from your builder. This Architect was the Green Architect of record on multiple “sick” buildings for large governmental agencies (which he did not create in the first place) and he was commissioned to solve the problems and heal the buildings.

This large-scale commercial expertise is now brought to bear on luxury residential design. You want your house to be a healthy place in which to raise your children, enjoy your life and rest easy, knowing that your have the healthiest materials, systems and configurations possible for your family’s well-being.

Healthy Home Design techniques:

• Proper pressurization of your house’s atmosphere.
• Radon Reduction System option.
• Clean ductwork.
• Air Conditioning equipment that keeps your air clean
• Construction techniques that keep your home clean, sealed and controlled.
• Specification of materials and components that are safer.
• Materials that have minimal to no off-gassing of chemicals inconsistent with living organic things (like people and pets).
• Materials that do not harbor mold, mildew or fungus.
• Vapor Barrier proper location/materials
• Proper insulation materials and design techniques.

• External site feature design to minimize intrusion of unwanted moisture into your home.
• Window and doors choices that minimize infiltration.
• Commissioning your house towards the end of construction to insure clean conditions in its systems.
• Interior treatments that are safer for babies and young children.
• Improved (higher) levels of insulation and types in critical locations.
• Finish selections that are safer.

You do not have to ask for this from us; it is automatically included as one of the many reasons to engage Rand Soellner to design your house (some items are options).

Due to the complex interactions required to achieve a healthy house design, Rand Soellner cannot and does not make any guarantees, express or implied that your house, building or project will be completely in compliance with the indicated HHD program. The reason for this is simple; the Architect does not build your facility. Your builder constructs the built project. The design company only provides a service, not a product.  Your architects do not guarantee the contractor’s performance.  Because even if the designer provided intermittent on-site visits, unless they are on-site full-time observing everything that is going into your house (in the role of a Clerk of the Works) and how it is being done, the designer does not have direct knowledge 100% of that contractor’s means, methods, materials and procedures.

Healthy home design and construction.

If Soellner is engaged by you to provide Construction Administration visits for our healthy house design system, we should have general knowledge of what the contractor is doing and if, in general, he is in compliance with our final Construction Documents and we will issue reports indicating our observations should you wish us to provide that service. What the HHD  procedures and our specifications accomplish is that if your builder complies with those specifications, your house, building and facilities are much more likely to be healthy.

Many of our HHD procedures come from major entities like the U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Environmental Agency and our own experience over the past 40+ years.

Green home architects interested in this healthy house design philosophy will need to implement the policies indicated on this webpage.  Please ask Rand Soellner about getting started.

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GREEN HOME DESIGN UNIVERSITY QUESTIONS, for those of you taking Home Architect’s course of green instruction:  about the above subject:

1.  Which of the following techniques is NOT a Healthy Home Design method?
a.  proper pressurization of your house’s atmosphere.
b. clean ductwork.
c. allowing exterior water from gutters and downspouts to dump water directly next to your house.

2.  Healthy Home Design principles can guide you to do what with your HVAC equipment?
a.  Select air-conditioning equipment that helps keep your air clean.
b.  Use the cheapest air-handler possible to save on capital cost and allow dust into your ductwork.
c.  Ignore mold and mildew in your crawlspace.

3.  With respect to the finish materials and construction materials, HHD philosophies would lead you to select which one of the following?
a.  Materials that have minimal to no off-gassing of chemicals that harm humans.
b.  Cheap carpet for all spaces in the house.
c.  Cheap drywall from foreign countries that may have corrosive chemicals in the panels.

If you are continuing in your Green Home Design University course to the next level,
Favorite this page now, by clicking on your “Favorites” menu choice in the upper left of your Windows Internet Explorer window,
then click here:  Energy Efficient Home Architects to go to the next level 5.
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answers:
1. a., 2. a., 3. a.

related article: https://www.homearchitects.com/healthy-home-architecture

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