Building a home is like baking a cake & much like baking a cake:
- A house requires a recipe (building code)
- A house requires ingredients (building materials)
- A house requires step by step instructions (a design)
Anyone that has tried to bake a cake, knows all too well that there are nuances with the quantities of ingredients, the order you mix them, the baking time and temperature … there are many variables. It’s not uncommon to bake a cake, and it comes out of the oven looking normal – but upon a taste test, its evident something has gone seriously wrong. Much like building a house, the taste test is comparable to the performance of the home: Its energy efficiency, its comfort and air quality, its durability and longevity. Often times a house is built, and it looks good when you walk in the door – but once you live in it for a year or two, you experience all of the problems that exist from a poor recipe. Cold basements, stuffy bedrooms, cold surfaces near windows and doors, high energy bills, failing windows, structural issues, poor air quality… All of these issues can (and often do) occur with a normal custom home built to building code standards. The standard issue checks and balances are not in place to ensure the above issues don’t happen.
An integrated design process, and a building science approach aims to design a new home in a much more intentional and detailed fashion. It takes more time, more engineers, more modelling, and specifies more robust building materials – but when the cake comes out of the oven, it tastes delicious!
While taking a integrated building science based approach, we dive deep into facets such as:
- Energy modelling, thermal bridging, air circulation
- Solar heat gain, shading & landscape influences
- Eliminating structural and mechanical conflicts
- Air tightness, fresh air exchange and filtration
- Mindful mechanical design
- Occupant comfort
- Mindful material sources
- Long term durability and maintenance
- Long term value of project expenses, and return on investment
Just because a home is big, expensive and luxurious does not mean it has been designed with building science in mind – protect your investment with a thorough design process. Your home is likely the biggest investment you will make in your lifetime – make it count. Prioritise a quiet, comfortable, healthy, durable & mindful home design. Frontiers Design Build specializes in high performance custom homes – reach out to us today for more info on this unique approach.
Contact us today to get started on your next project.
