interior-finishing / Green Building & Sustainable Home Renovation Information & Advice

Interior solid pine door
Doors and trim

Interior finishing

Adhesives and sealants: Modern homes have a lot more caulking and adhesives than older homes. Adhesives are liberally applied to many surfaces for ease and speed of job completion, as well as to prevent squeaking between flooring and joists, for example. Functionally speaking, caulking is used to prevent moisture and a...

wood ceiling in Reclaimed sunken lumber
Walls and ceilings - interior surfaces

Wood Ceilings or drywall - how to choose your ceiling material & what's the difference in cost?

Wood ceilings - what's the the skinny? Ahhh, the charm of a wood ceiling, seriously, what's not to like? The intent of this page is less about talking you out of installing gypsum board (drywall), and more about giving you a little encouragement if you are hesitantly considering a wood ceiling. It’s a natural product t...

Alternative wall coverings to drywall
Walls and Roofs

The best alternatives to drywall for finishing interior walls

Walls in residential homes are almost exclusively finished using gypsum board (either recycled or synthetic) because it is cheap and easy. It is however, not the only option for interior walls, and it has some other competition - especially in areas that may get humidity. We will start with drywall, but also list off a...

How to Fasten Cement Board Facing to slab on grade insulation
Slab on Grade

Finishing the exterior of an insulated slab-on-grade floor

WATCH MORE sustainable building VIDEOS Once a decision has been made to choose between a crawlspace or a slab foundation , you need to know how to finish the edge off durably. Typically the exterior edge of a slab on grade is made of EPS foam and can be parged. Having used rigid Rockwool panels meant we needed an addi...

Healthy Home Offices - Natural Biophilic Design Ideas
Interior design and furnishing

How do you create a healthy home office? With Biophilic Interior Design

If you’re anything like me, you’ll have daydreamed on more than one occasion of having the luxury of being able to work from home. Oh, the thought of not having to deal with the daily commute, of being able to put your laundry on before the weekend rolls around and being able to spend your lunch break in the luxury of ...

Under bed storage
Interior design and furnishing

Storage ideas for small spaces

From underneath a bed, under a subfloor or the underside of the staircase, there are many underutilized areas in a home that can make life in a small home a lot less cluttered. Here are some ideas on how to transform dead space into storage space. Use the bottom of the bed as a storage with drawers on wheels. There...

Fire retardants in furniture are intended to slow flames
Interior design and furnishing

Flame retardants in furnishings - an unnecessary and serious health risk

With the intention of reducing the speed at which flames can spread, fire-retardant compounds are added to almost all the materials we furnish our homes with: children's toys, curtains, carpets, mattresses, sofas, electronics, plastic, etc. How flame retardants work: The chemicals generally used as flame retardants are...

Laneway house by Lanefab Design/Build
Interior design and furnishing

Interior furnishings & decor

  Protecting your indoor air quality: Any renovation or building project is exciting, but it can also be exhausting and emotionally taxing. Right at the end when it's time to furnish your new space can be one of the hardest times to stick to your environmental convictions. When you are finally ready to move in, the tem...

Repainting and refinishing brick facades
Exterior cladding

All about painting brick, is it a good idea and what paint to use?

Is painting brick a good idea? Bricks will absorb moisture from the interior of a home and they need to be able to expel that moisture; applying paint to the exterior can cause the paint and masonry to lift, peel or crack as it can become susceptible to freeze thaw cycles in cold climates. Beyond just aesthetics, moist...

Installing recycled drywall in the Edelweiss House
Walls and ceilings - interior surfaces

Choosing the best drywall - video

How to Choose Eco-Friendly Drywall: There is a lot more to choosing drywall than one might think, and as it finds its way into pretty much every building made, a lot of resources are used in the process and noses irritated. In the LEED Platinum certified Edelweiss House, we used CGC Sheetrock® Brand Ultralight gypsum ...

MDF Formaldehyde Free Alternatives - Made from Rice Stalks
Healthy indoor air quality

The formaldehyde-free MDF non-toxic alternative made of natural rice-stalks

Formaldehyde-free MDF made from rice - available at distributors in USA & Canada There is a natural and Formaldehyde-Free alternative to MDF (Medium Density Fiberboard) made of rice straw hitting the green building market soon! That’s a reason to breath a sigh of relief (literally and figuratively) since a lot of p...