Episode 4 | Design Efficiency and Sustainability with Amanda Weglinski

In this episode, we dive into key design elements that make a home truly energy-efficient and sustainable. Mark and Alison are joined by guest Amanda Weglinski, Design Project Manager with the Bensonwood Design Group and key contributor to the recent launch of Bensonwood's OpenHome product offerings. Together they explore smart siting for natural solar gain, efficient layouts, and multi-use spaces that reduce the home’s footprint. You'll also learn how material choices, shorter MEP runs, and native landscaping make a lasting impact on the resiliency of a design. To learn more about OpenHome and the Bensonwood Design Group, visit: https://bensonwood.com/build-with-us/our-homes/open-home/

Learn more about Bensonwood by visiting our website: bensonwood.com

Transcript

Alison Keay: 0:00

Al, welcome to a new era of home building, where we explore sustainable home building, high performance design, innovative off site construction and groundbreaking practices that are transforming the home building industry. This podcast is produced by Unity homes, a brand of Benson wood. Welcome back. I'm your host. Allison Kay, Sales Lead at Unity homes,

Mark Hertzler: 0:25

and I'm your co host. Mark Hertzler, Director of unity homes. Today we're speaking with Amanda weglenz, a design project manager with the benzoyl Design Group. Amanda has over 20 years in the design field, and she has recently worked with a team to develop the open home offerings. If you're more interested in finding out about open home, you can check out Open home on bensonwood.com So Amanda, welcome and why don't you tell us a little bit about what is it you do? Well,

Amanda Weglinski: 0:53

thank you, Mark and Allison for having me. I think it's a really exciting time to be at bensonwood in this specific season, so I feel very blessed to be here. I've been in the field of architecture, as you mentioned, for 20 years, and it's a great joy to interact with clients on what often is the sort of biggest purchase of their life, and be able to help shepherd and lead that project towards construction on the Benson wood Design Group. We're a group of architects and designers. We have a wonderful team here that helps support that effort on the build side as well. And so it's it's just exciting to be part of a greater team, and we work on both open homes and custom projects. Open home is a product home that we have designed in collaboration with Karen Timberlake of Pennsylvania and Lake Flato of Texas. They're both world renowned architecture firms in their own right, and together, we have a collection of product homes that represent the collective intelligence of the design teams and the legacy of the firms that we're all part of.

Alison Keay: 2:02

With that nice overview, let's jump into our topic for today on design efficiency and sustainability. So we want to focus on what are the design elements, the design conversations that can happen to improve in energy efficiency and sustainability within a home design.

Mark Hertzler: 2:21

So what kind of design decisions are you thinking through in regards to energy efficiency, aside from the building science, where we're talking about the insulations and the air tightness that the building science part of it, what's the design aspect to energy efficiency?

Amanda Weglinski: 2:40

Yeah, I think generally, when we are starting to work with clients in designing their home, we're always trying to right size the house and so making sure that we're not inflating the square footage unnecessarily, we're focused on really how each individual family uses their space. And so I can think back on past projects where clients really enjoyed just having the bedrooms be a place for sleeping and not for activities. So we were able to, for instance, really cut the square footage down of the house because the bedrooms were all much smaller. They just had a, you know, a bed in it. And other clients have have needs that we try to think about that maybe are more flexible so that we can share spaces. Sometimes sharing spaces is an opportunity to cut down square footage as well using them for multiple purposes. Yeah,

Mark Hertzler: 3:31

and that's great, because I think I've recently read that for many, many years, the average size of a home in the US have been increasing, and now recently, it's actually starting to decrease a little bit, and people are getting away from that sort of McMansion attitude of, I need a bigger house to now there. I need the right size house. Not only cuts costs up front, but it also cuts your operating costs going forward. Sure,

Amanda Weglinski: 3:56

yeah, I think the average home in the United States is around 2000 square feet, and other countries in Scandinavia are closer to 1200 to 1400 so there's areas to improve.

Alison Keay: 4:06

I tend to be really drawn to the spaces that are multi use too. We have a lot of projects that will do a room off the living room that can be kind of included in that living room space or or closed off. So it often is playing a multi purpose use of a library or office as well as a guest room or again, that extended living space and the ability to close rooms off and include them and when you need them. And there's just a lot to be said for not wasting space, especially when it comes to your heating and cooling. Yeah, I would

Amanda Weglinski: 4:40

agree with that. In fact, when we're speaking with our clients initially, clients, initially, we try to think of the life cycle of the house and even a season that they might be in now with young children, we might think of that flexible space to serve one purpose, like a homeschooling room. But in the future, does it become a guest bedroom, or even beyond that, does it become the first floor primary suite when it's coupled with. Other areas on the first floor. So I think thinking about the longevity of the house and how it could be flexible over many years is a helpful consideration.

Mark Hertzler: 5:09

Good and how about the design itself, sort of the shape. Any thoughts there on how that affects energy efficiency? So

Amanda Weglinski: 5:17

we know in the Northeast that the most efficient design is a compact plan, and part of the reason for that is because we're cutting down on the amount of wall area. Of course, when we have walls, we want to put windows in those, and those are the less efficient part of the wall, so just makes the overall envelope less efficient.

Mark Hertzler: 5:36

Yeah, and you bring up windows, which is was something else I wanted to touch on. There's a double edged sword to Windows. Everybody wants more glazing. Everybody wants more natural light. But as you pointed out, there is a sort of a negative impact of Windows, and so how do you balance that out? When it comes to design and energy efficiency, we

Amanda Weglinski: 5:55

often are inspired by the site, and especially views from the home out to the site. That's our starting place. Oftentimes we're thinking about the solar orientation and where we might locate windows. So we're getting the good warmth of the sun in the wintertime when we want it, but also being concerned about shading in the summertime, when we wouldn't want to overheat the house. So those views and passive solar orientation or two things we focus on. I would also say, in general, we try to under glaze the north side of the building, where you're often just losing heat in the winter time because there's no solar gain. We try to have that help and compensate a little bit for maybe how we might be over glazing the south side of the building or the east side of the building. Yeah,

Mark Hertzler: 6:42

so good balancing of that, glazing and the siting definitely important. How about the mechanicals? How do you work those into the design and get those as efficient as possible? Generally,

Amanda Weglinski: 6:56

we try to have the mechanical room centrally located and we we bury it within the plan, but it usually does need to have access to an exterior wall, so we try to be thoughtful about that. So I think, in general, shortening any of the runs, whether it be for water or duct work, you know, to where it's delivering out to the perimeter, is is a way to be more efficient. And again, if you're doing a more compact plan, then that's one way you can achieve that. Have

Mark Hertzler: 7:21

you ever been involved in the design? It was gonna be kind of an odd question, but a design where you worked in something with energy efficiency, and in retrospect, you know, realized maybe that wasn't the greatest approach, or maybe that didn't work. And one thing I'm thinking of is kind of off the wall there, but we had a client who was really interested in a wastewater heat recovery system, which basically the the incoming water wraps around the waste pipe that we have, like hot water from your shower going out, so you're recovering some of that water. Sounds great, but I think, in reality, maybe probably didn't provide that much efficiency. So you have any other examples you could think of, like great idea, but it just never really worked out well.

Amanda Weglinski: 8:09

I think one thing that clients are often bringing to us are the ideas of exterior blinds, and so the purpose with those would be to block the sun from coming into the building so that the mechanical system is not expending energy to cool the house down, especially in the summertime. And I have concerns about how well those operate year round. I know that we have some clients that use them in the winter, and I worry that they're just more delicate and with our snow and ice, that it just could be a long term maintenance problem, trying to fix a solar glare problem, or the solar heating issue, overheating issue in the summer. Yeah.

Mark Hertzler: 8:46

So I think sometimes we try to outsmart ourselves, and it really comes back to the basics, as you had mentioned, that the tight design, you know, really thinking through the glazing and the windows and right sizing the house, so that those are things that make the biggest impact, as opposed to some of these sort of neat sounding ideas, but, you know, more complicated than the worst, sure. So moving on from energy efficiency. What about water efficiency? Now, you know, I know a lot of the focus on water efficiency is on the actual fixtures and low flow. And, you know, toilets that are low flush, or, you know, well water when they flush, things like that. But beyond that, from a design perspective, what are some other things that can be done to improve water efficiency? Yeah, there's a

Amanda Weglinski: 9:31

couple of things that you can do. There can be water collection. Sometimes we're harvesting water off of roofs and collecting them into barrels. And really, at a basic level, like some some of our clients are extremely sophisticated gardeners, and just having that free water to be able to water their garden makes a big difference. To not fire up the hose. There's more sophisticated water collection systems, but I'd say additionally, generally, we're trying to promote natural landscapes. So we're doing. Less grass and more native plantings, and they can take the summer heat and also the drought of the summer and don't need to be watered all the time.

Alison Keay: 10:09

There's also the aspect of siting the home on the site.

Amanda Weglinski: 10:13

Yes, when we start, we usually start with a site visit, and it gives us a really good understanding of the topography of the site, and we try to be very sensitive about where the house ultimately will be located, so that we're minimally disturbing the site and retaining its natural features. So for instance, if you have a site that has a very steep incline on it, to make a spot really a flatter spot for the House to land, you would have to cut and fill a lot of that site, trucking and fill. There's a cost to that, but there's also, you know, a cost to the planet for that as well, in terms of the exhaust from the trucking of material and and reshaping the landscape. Obviously has effects too. We have to be cognizant about how water flows and where does that water go, you know, making sure that we're not impacting other properties. So I think in general, our goal is to be as minimally invasive as possible, which is also really good for nature and the flora and fauna that are inhabiting our sites.

Mark Hertzler: 11:16

And tying the site design back with landscape design. I think there's some strategic things you can do with planting the right kind of trees to give you shading in the summer and, you know, wind breaks and things like that. So you can kind of tie that site design into the landscape design along with the home design to create a really cohesive, efficient, sustainable, say, ecosystem. But like I said, it really is an ecosystem in that sense.

Amanda Weglinski: 11:47

Absolutely. We often will work with a landscape architect and use strategic trees to help with the wind break, as you mentioned. So we might put an evergreen tree that is going to stay kind of green and heavily leaved throughout all seasons, and pepper that in with some deciduous trees that are losing their leaves but will allow more sunlight to come through in this in the winter time. Yeah, that's

Mark Hertzler: 12:09

definitely interesting. How about the the materials that are being specified for a house?

Amanda Weglinski: 12:16

We try to focus on natural materials that are sustainable. They can be harvested. You know what's a great example. And there's just some really great products out there that are thermally modified. Koya is one of them that we've been using a lot of recently. There's also Kevin E and thermary, a couple other companies, the companies impregnate the wood fibers and then bake out the material that they've impregnated to make the wood be more robust. It's more resistant to water and and bugs, and just the product itself will last much longer than a regular piece of wood siding. And

Mark Hertzler: 12:55

what a great way to take a natural product and make it even better.

Amanda Weglinski: 12:59

We do have clients that are interested depending on their location in fire resistant construction, even on their residents. And so we have solutions for siding options and roofing options that are not non combustible and lean into those, those needs in

Alison Keay: 13:16

terms of timbers and things like that, any exterior woods. We like to have be tropical woods because they do much better in the outside environment and moisture and rain. But we have a very big effort to always have those be FSC certified. And so there's a whole department too that works with those woods and maintains those certifications. And it's, it's a pretty important thing when you're working with tropical woods, because of the potential for rainforest deforestation and things like that, for these really well sought after woods that do so well outside, but to make sure that you know, they're sourced sustainably. Yeah, I would agree.

Mark Hertzler: 13:58

And you touched on this a little bit, on the resilience and durability. So I think that's a pretty common concern of people now with weather events, whether it's hurricanes or tornadoes or wildfires or even here in the northeast, recently, we've had the smoke from wildfires. We haven't had the actual wildfires, but they've blown in from Canada, things like that. So what kind of design things are happening to improve the resiliency and the durability of a house? Yeah,

Amanda Weglinski: 14:26

on the Benson wood side, we have had clients that have been particularly concerned about that, and one of the ways that we've solved that problem is by designing a timber frame system inside of our shell so we have the redundancy of our walls are self supporting, unto themselves. They don't necessarily need a timber frame. But in in a few of these homes that we've designed recently, we did do the timber frame plus the walls, and so we feel like that redundant system is more robust to withstand. You know, potential future natural disasters. The timber frame in general is great because it is a. Resistant to fire, in the sense that when it does catch on fire, it chars and it creates a protective layer around the timber frame, and so it makes it more challenging for there to be full burn through of the structure. So we think those are, you know, good properties and very helpful for the long term.

Mark Hertzler: 15:16

And I think that's kind of an interesting fact that it seems counterintuitive, but a wood, timber frame, in many instances, will do better in a fire than steel. Well, because steel gets to a certain temperature and it just fails right where, as you said, the wood will char and kind of protect itself from from burning all the way through. So that seems counterintuitive, but I think that's a very interesting fact.

Alison Keay: 15:39

The Open built systems that used by bensa wood in Unity also are kind of disentangling the different systems within a home that allows it to be used for a longer period of time. So it's the thought of separating systems that we know have a shorter lifespan or going to change and need updating in a shorter amount of time than the structural systems, the air barrier, the insulation, things like that that we want to maintain for the life of the home. Is there any other ways that we can think about that the disentanglement of the systems in design as well?

Amanda Weglinski: 16:17

Yeah. Allison, I agree with that 100% especially as we think about technologies with audio, video equipment and speaker systems, they're all just rapidly changing. And it's really much more helpful if those things can be exposed. I'm actually working on a project right now where, of course, since COVID, you know, home offices have become just the norm as part of the program, and so clients are particularly interested about how they, you know, get their printer and, you know, there's, they almost have, like, a server closet between their offices. And how do they get just those basic connections to their computer, you know, electrical and internet and otherwise. So I think, you know, keeping the system separate and accessible is really helpful. And our OB plus wall is a, you know, a great solution for that, but we also try to be thoughtful about that too in the design. And so there could be some areas in the home where we drop the ceilings, and actually even have, you know, something that's more like a commercial product, where there would be a drop ceiling that you can access cabling and wiring above the ceiling, but it's kept out of your view. So it's not disturbing to look at when we're in the early phase of design, we like to talk to our clients about thinking about the longevity of their house, even for generations beyond their ownership. You know, maybe it's a legacy home that their children would inherit or, you know, just a completely different homeowner. And so we try to think about even disentangling the structure so that we minimize the amount of bearing walls or on the interior of the house, so that there's opportunity for flexibility in the future to reconfigure the home in a different way. You know, over many generations, we're we're learning to live differently, you know, than our grandparents generation even. So that's something we can relate with. And so who knows how people might be living here in the future, yeah,

Mark Hertzler: 18:02

and regardless of you know what happens in the future, the House still has that really solid envelope, which is as a house mentioned, the air barrier and insulation layer layer, which doesn't change, but the infill inside can change over time. I think one of the biggest examples that we talk about is kitchen so you're starting out, you know, you put a kitchen in that you can afford, like, you know, in my case, I know Allison's case, with young kids, you know that that kitchen is going to take some wear and tear, and eventually, at some point, you can take it out and you can replace it without having to, you Know, redo a significant portion of your house. So

Alison Keay: 18:42

another aspect of sustainability is waste, right? Eliminating waste. What are some things for waste reduction and maybe even recycling that can be part of the design.

Amanda Weglinski: 18:53

During the design phase, we try to design with a two foot grid in mind, and that gives us the opportunity to be less wasteful when cutting materials. If you think of a four by eight sheet of plywood that's divisible by two feet, and we can actually reuse the off cuts if we're cutting the sheet down in other areas of the home, that's where

Alison Keay: 19:13

product homes, I think, really shine in their efficiency and sustainability, as well as the ability to think through down to that level of detail. And of course, thinking about waste reduction, our off site fabrication is definitely aiding in that our ability to design for the specific lumber and shipping capacities really paired with the CNC cutting really allows us to reduce the waste that we create to begin with, and then on site, we have minimal waste. There's almost no waste at all on site, or even utilizing the packaging for our bundling, which is a recycled material, and we're collecting that, bringing it back from the site, making sure that it gets shipped back to the manufacturer. Over and turned into the very same plastic that we're using for that next round of projects. So off site fabrication is a huge waste reduction element,

Mark Hertzler: 20:09

and it does go into the insulation. There's many reasons why we like this dense, packed cellulose, but one of them is that it's a recycled product.

Amanda Weglinski: 20:18

Even our 24 inch on center framing reduces the amount of studs that are in a wall. You know, a typical wall has 16 inch on center. Well, this has

Alison Keay: 20:27

been really great. Amanda, thank you so much for joining us today and giving us some insight into the Benson wood design group and efficiency and sustainability.

Mark Hertzler: 20:37

Enjoyed the conversation. Yes.

Amanda Weglinski: 20:39

Thank you and Dan,

Alison Keay: 20:43

thanks for listening to a new era of home building. If you're passionate about high performance homes like we are, be sure to subscribe to our podcast and stay tuned for our next episode on the pretty good house book with builder and co author Dan Colbert from Colbert building in Portland Maine. You can also visit unity homes.com to learn more about our upcoming events, subscribe to our newsletter. Check out our home plans and get in touch. Thanks to George Peavey, Jason reamer and Josh Riemer of our company's very own plum dable band for the music you hear on this podcast, and thanks to Damaris Graham for the production and editing of the podcast. We hope you enjoyed this episode. Until next time. I'm Allison Kang and I'm Mark Hertzler, and here's to better building you.