With sustainability at the forefront of design and production these days, companies are introducing a new standard for furniture and buildings – WELL certification
aims to measure their ability to improve our comfort, reduce stress and enhance health and wellbeingThe worth of the made object relies on a number of factors: the craftsmanship, the attention to detail, the quality of the materials used… and, particularly as the issue of sustainability begins to take hold in the mainstream, these all add up to a strong narrative that can add value to the final piece. But there are other, less tangible qualities that makers can also contribute to, such as the wellness of the workplace and the home – thanks to air quality, the use of light, the encouragement of movement versus sedentary lifestyles and mental health.

This is something that we do a lot of research around,’ says Zoe Laughlin, director of the Institute of Making at University College London. ‘It’s what we describe as the “senso-aesthetics” of an object. It’s not just the visual qualities of something; there is a full palette of senses in play. So we have done a lot of work trying to push the sensorial aesthetic of stuff .’

Housing its own Materials Library within their workshop space, the Institute of Making encourages experimentation and research to discover properties that might never previously have been considered about specific materials – and that includes how their sensorial aspects can affect our sense of wellbeing.
‘It’s something that’s not easy even to have a language about, let alone specify on a data sheet,’ Laughlin explains. ‘You can’t say, “I just want it to be more friendly” because there’s no matrix for friendliness on the engineer’s data sheet. You could call it the “pleasure agenda” – but actually that’s a really serious thing… for us there’s nothing frivolous about it. And when you think about it, we’re all experts on the sensory side of materials because we’ve all been holding things, putting things in our mouths, bending stuff , stamping on stuff our entire lives – and actually we all have a lot of knowledge that comes from our experience of that.’

One organisation that is attempting to produce such a certifiable matrix is the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI), which aims to transform our buildings and communities through their WELL Building Standard certification ‘the first to be focused on the ways that
buildings, and everything in them, can improve our comfort, drive better choices and generally enhance, not compromise, our health and wellness.’

‘We’ve always looked at the sustainability side of things,’ says Paul de Zwart, founder and MD of furniture and homeware brand Another Country, which has adopted the WELL Standard. ‘That’s the ethos of the brand and that will always be the case. It’s something you have to keep working on, and some things are outside of your control – because you have your supply chain and every new supplier will have different ways of working. But while the two may go hand in hand, WELL Standard isn’t about sustainability – of course, indirectly, solid timber that is sustainably sourced is part of the WELL proposition. But they focus on the other side of things.’

And, as Laughlin has already made clear, the ‘other side of things’ is often hard to define. ‘Totally,’ agrees de Zwart. ‘The biggest opportunity will come from the commercial sector: if you want to certify your building and tell your staff it’s WELL certified, obviously you’re looking after them and hopefully you’ll get more out of your workforce. From my perspective, if we are to sell the WELL concept to our retail clients, my angle is much more about the natural or healthy home concept. And with things like mental health, it’s about minimising stress, with items that are easy to use, easy to assemble…’

The first fruits of this can be seen in Another Country’s Ori collection, created in association with building design company Ekkist, which includes a mirror with hinge so it can be turned according to the position of the sun during the day, enhancing the natural light in your home. Other items include the multifunctional Ori guest bed; planters to encourage you to introduce nature to the home or office; even a set of skittles to emphasise the importance of physical wellbeing – ‘which also stimulates mental wellbeing,’ de Zwart points out.
‘The idea that you have objects in your home or office that you interact with physically is important: these things have very specific resonances.’

Like Loughlin, de Zwart emphasises how our all senses come into play, adding reassurance – for instance by introducing materials such as antimicrobial copper on the handles and tactile surfaces, ‘where you run your hand over the surfaces to feel the ridge or the grain – that sense of touch is also important to wellbeing.’

Sean Sutcliffe, co-founder of Benchmark furniture, is another convert. ‘The WELL Standard is emerging as the leading standard globally on health and wellbeing in the built environment,’ he says, ‘because it looks at several aspects of wellness within buildings.’ Like Another Country, it too has launched a range – the Sage collection in association with the NY-based architecture and design fi rm Rockwell Group – which was specifically created to be WELL certifiable. ‘We thought we understood wood as material, but Sean had an incredible amount of knowledge and experience to share with us,’ says founder David Rockwell. ‘In return, I think we showed them how important user experience and perception is. The best projects are the ones where you learn from each other. ’

The collection includes a sit-stand desk, which can be set at various heights to discourage inactivity, alongside tables, sofas and chairs that all utilise Benchmark’s expertise in the properties of wood. For instance, explains Sutcliffe, ‘We focus on using paler timbers because you get a higher level of reflective light. You don’t want a lot of light reflecting off a glossy surface, but you do want it reflecting off a matt surface, making the most of natural daylight.’

Mental wellbeing and air quality are affected by the choice of wood, too. ‘The way we can influence that is by transparency of materials,’ continues Sutcliffe. ‘Everyone’s going to trust this [thumbs a solid oak table] – because that’s one single piece of a solid natural material.
“It’s not a solution to
simply advocate that
we stop consuming.
It’s our duty to develop
solutions that tackle
the side effects of
consumption’But the moment you start getting into MDF – that’s a classic example; whether it is or it isn’t toxic as a material, it has become toxic by reputation and association. MDF is just an undesirable thing. And then you’ve got the VOC (Volatile Organic Compound) emissions in lacquers and paints. Not all VOCs are bad – some are positively beneficial: pine, for example: when you walk through a forest and get that lovely pine smell, that’s pinetum, which is a beneficial VOC. But there are lot that you don’t necessarily smell but are toxic and noxious. So we focus on things like that, which we think we can influence.’

‘There’s lots of things like that,’ says de Zwart. ‘Paints, oils, particularly laminates, where you have chipboard in a table that’s all glued, then you slap on more glue to put the veneers on it – some houses you walk in and you need a mask with all the veneers and the carpets that stink of bonding… the whole thing could make you ill.’

Another Country is also engaged in sourcing eco plyboard. ‘It’s ply but it’s ecologically sound,’ he says. ‘If you think about ply it’s just a vat of glue between bits of wood. They’ve passed laws to regulate it some years ago actually, but with eco-ply, you have to find another glue that’s strong enough for veneering – particularly with engineered pieces. You don’t want to sniff glue, but that’s what’s been happening.’

A further aspect where Another Country and Benchmark align is the issue of upholstery and the material used for filling, which has traditionally been toxic in every sense. ‘If you use manmade materials that are fire retardant, that creates all kinds of invisible but toxic fumes and VOCs in the air,’ says de Zwart.

This is an area that Sutcliff e admits he has been playing catch-up on. ‘Our stance had pretty much been like everyone else’s – to use foams and synthetic materials in upholstery,’ he says. Now, like Another Country, it is using a combination of pure natural materials, including coconut fibre sprayed with natural latex (which replicates the traditional feel of rubberised horsehair); wool (both carded or felted); and recycled denim in place of manmade Dacron. ‘We’re trying to leave behind synthetic materials in upholstery and move forward into natural, traditional materials. As you often find, the future looks awfully like the past!’
Having introduced new upholstery in the Sage collection, Benchmark is now looking to retrospectively add all-natural materials to its archive range, in line with brands such as The Natural Mattress Company, Sheridan Coakley’s Coakley & Cox and, of course, Another Country.

Another company that has this transparent ethos of wellness and a responsibility in its DNA is Mater, founded in Denmark in 2006. ‘Our philosophy is simple; we want to inspire consumers, architects and corporations that ethics, sustainability, waste and aesthetics goes hand in hand,’ says Mater founder Henrik Marstrand.

Mater has been a pioneer in encouraging people to think about the ethical results of design choices – for instance, working with one of the only companies in the world who can clean and process discarded fishing nets and recycle them through injection moulding to produce a range of plastic products including a collection of tables and chairs. Each chair contains 960 grams of ocean waste, ‘So, by buying one chair, you remove 960 grams of plastic from the ocean,’ he says. ‘The story is very simple, the chair has the Scandinavian aesthetics and on top of that, it is extremely comfortable to sit on. Because the design would not survive on the story alone – the furniture must last, both in terms of aesthetics and function.’

One of the key factors in all this is the issue of ‘consumer inertia’ – where we all appreciate there is a problem but feel powerless to affect change. ‘There is a wonderful saying these days: “the change is in your wallet”. Which means that we all have the power to make changes for more sustainable and ethical living if we take a good look at our consumer behaviour,’ he explains. ‘However, it is up to us manufacturers to inspire and develop products that consumers can relate to and find attractive – in choice of material and design. It is not a solution to our economy simply to advocate that we stop consuming. That will have a negative impact on jobs etc: it’s our duty to develop solutions that
tackle the side effects of consumption – ocean waste, plastic waste, wood waste, metal waste, food waste – and use those materials in the next cycle of production such as furniture or lighting.’

It still seems that there is an educational job to be done so that such attitudes filter down to the mainstream consumer rather than being viewed as an indulgence that 
only the top end of the market can afford. In reality, given that we are talking about the health of our families both at home and in the workplace – it’s an issue we can’t afford to ignore…

‘We can influence workplaces more perhaps because they can be influenced by the architects and designers,’ admits Sutcliffe. ‘Homes have to be influenced by the media – and people’s will to change their own homes.’

‘I think it’s up to the companies to provide good alternatives for consumers,’ adds Marstrand. ‘If the ethical choice is unavailable or too difficult to understand, it is hard to motivate the consumer to change their behaviour. We need to see transparent and sustainable solutions in many businesses in the future… and maybe someday won’t feel the need to be bragging about it anymore!’

De Zwart also believes the best route is to keep things as simple as possible for the customer. ‘If we were to sell this as a brand, we would be talking about “natural” rather than WELL. But we’re keen on it in general – the plan is to make that part of what we want to be conveying as a brand: come to us, buy goods for the home with furniture at its core, but that will speak of wellness and what’s good for the home.’

There are encouraging signs that the public are now setting the agenda in this area rather than having to be convinced – particularly from the younger ‘woke’ generation of climate activists. ‘I hope it’s a sea change in attitude, says Sutcliffe.’ The Greta Thunberg world – the world of the young – those are the ones who are inheriting this and are highly motivated. 
They won’t fall for that office culture – the free beers and all that. They’ll want to know that it’s a healthy environment to work in. That’s going to be a big focus. Employers and property owners and developers are really pushing to start talking about – can our building be ‘Well’? What’s the WELL Standard of our building?’

Naturally, Marstrand is enthused by how Scandinavian and Nordic youth in particular are leading the field in this regard. ‘I’m extremely proud of the effort they make to get through to politicians and people with the message of taking more care,’ he says. ‘I think the new generations are smart and they will figure out how to minimise our footprint on the environment even more. I can only hope that the work we do at Mater inspires sustainable thinking. I am definitely inspired by the green revolution we experience in Scandinavia. It feels like we are all part of it. It encourages me to proceed and to come up with more solutions to our common problem…’

While all acknowledge that it will take time for more radical thinking to filter into the mainstream – and for people to appreciate that the cost to our health comes above the fractional cost increase of investing in better materials, there is enough evidence that a fundamental shift in consumer thinking is taking place.

And now is the time to be bold, insists Marstrand. ‘There is a saying in sports that I like: “You miss 100 per cent of the shots you don’t take”. We have a culture of taking risks here – because we want to be at the forefront in the years to come.’
materdesign.dk; anothercountry. com; instituteofmaking.org.uk;
benchmarkfurniture.com; wellcertified.com
WORDS MARK HOOPER