Canadian Living online article by author Kristy Wright featured an interview with Dayle Laing for her eco-chic tips on sustainable interior design.

Dayle Laing, Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Accredited Professional and Principal Designer of Dayle Laing Interior Designs in Brampton, Ont.

"Choose simple, local and high-quality products that bring you joy and make you smile every time you see and use them. Cherish your family heirlooms. Avoid any products that have odours and lists of ingredients difficult to pronounce. Finally, select products that draw the least amount of power and have logos such as Energy Star, EnerGuide, Green Seal, Greenguard, Green Label, EcoLogo, Cradle to Cradle and Forest Stewardship Council – these show they've been independently tested and certified."

Dayle's eco-tips

"When planning a kitchen don't forget about kitchen waste. Use containers that make it simple and convenient to sort recycling and compostable items, such as this kitchen's stainless-steel compost pail that was built into the counter. Select high-quality LED systems for kitchen lighting (the under-cabinet lighting in this kitchen is LED) and use dimmer controls for task and mood lighting. When I began this kitchen, LED pendant lights weren't available so I used dimmable halogens that have an infrared coating – this provides the same light at 35 watts as a regular bulb of 50 watts. The good news is that now LED pendant lights are available."

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How would you feel if ¼ of your household electricity consumption walked out the door in the form of one appliance?

Hooray! That’s what I felt. Men from the “Great Refrigerator Roundup” program in my municipality picked up my old still-operating chest freezer and took it away for recycling.

It is time for us to identify the major energy culprits. A colleague of mine takes issue with our focus on tiny culprits like cell phone charger phantom loads, while we ignore the big energy-draw items!

I bake my own bread and purchase organic flour in bulk, which I stored in this 30 year old freezer. Lately, I noticed that the freezer compressor was running all the time!

Dayle Laing, LEED AP, provided practical advice for selecting sustainable residential and commercial interior fabrics that will meet clients’ needs for health and the environment.

Fabrics 101, an IDCEC accredited seminar, encompasses the most current research on textile certification and scientific research on toxicity.

Sun screens are used extensively in projects with large windows requiring the comfort of light control and preventing solar heat gain.

Attendees made the following comments:

Dayle, I gained an immense amount of knowledge during your presentation Fabrics 101. Thank you for the references to so many worthwhile websites to assist us as designers / decorators. I feel I can offer my clients & family better information going forward.”

Jane Campbell, Woodbridge, ON

Excellent! I learned a great deal.”

Helen Moffett, Toronto, ON

One flush - 3 litres - waste gone! There is scepticism about how such a low volume toilet can possibly work with one flush. Personal experience shows it does work!

Proficiency toilets were installed in the Chapelview LEED Platinum affordable housing project in Brampton, Canada. At the Construct Canada trade show, I met Tom Lazarou of Water_Matrix distributor for Canadian designed Hennessy & Hinchcliffe’s Proficiency.

Handling kitchen waste is easy when it is set up right to achieve sustainable interior design.

Making it work and making it into a habit is all about having a convenient efficient system.

For many years, I deposited vegetable peelings into a hand-thrown pottery jar obtained on a trip to Crathes Castle in Scotland.  That worked until one winter day when I slipped on ice on the way to the backyard composter, and down crashed the jar. The glue gun repaired it somewhat.

Shortly after, the city created a municipal composting program and supplied a plastic lidded pail for use on the counter or stowed under the sink.  Under the sink was inconveniently low and on the counter was not particularly elegant. One of my clients keeps their plastic pail in a drawer beside the sink.

The renovation of my kitchen last year was the chance to make a truly wonderful waste system that is one of my favourite features in the kitchen!

Dayle Laing presented “Greening Healthcare Fabrics” to an enthusiastic group of green team members and physicians at the EcoCare 2010 conference on October 19, 2010 in London, Ontario.

EcoCare 2010 - Understanding Our Impact...Creating Positive Change, is “the only conference in Canada to speak directly to the link between healthcare and the environment, and presents both practical and innovative ways to encourage and inspire ecological stewardship within the Canadian healthcare sector”.

Her main point was avoid chemical finishes where possible, to minimize toxic exposure to chemicals for immunocompromised patients and staff. She described her selection criteria based on the principles of LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), and explained the relevant third party certifications for textiles. Fabrics to avoid and more importantly, suggestions for what fabrics to use instead were made.

Dayle had the opportunity to travel to London the prior evening to join the conference and hear the keynote speech from the leader of the Green Party, Elizabeth May, who affirmed the importance of this conference and this direction for healthcare professionals.

Do you use fabric softener or dryer sheets and want to avoid 'greenwashing'?

If so, have you considered what value they are providing to the textiles or to you? Laundering our personal and interior fabrics is a repetitive task that most of us perform without thinking what products we are using and why we are using them.

I recently presented a seminar at a healthcare medical conference, EcoCare 2010 in London, Ontario. In my topic “Greening of Healthcare Fabrics”, we discussed the toxicity of fabric softener use for hospital fabrics for patients, staff and hospital visitors, and what alternatives to consider instead.

Fabrics should not always require fabric softeners, and should be especially avoided for polyester or ‘microfibre’ fabrics because they interfere with the natural wicking abilities of the fibre which draws moisture away from the body and makes us comfortable.[1] Fabric softeners work as surfactants by reducing the surface tension and allow the spreading of their antibacterial and antifungal properties by leaving a residue on fabrics that does not easily wash off. [2] Fabric softeners are added either to the final rinse cycle of machine washing or in the form of softener-impregnated dryer sheets.

When does green building and designing stop being about merely saving energy, reducing our carbon footprint and start being about how comfortable we are and how few colds we catch?

The keynote speaker at the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) annual conference in Vancouver addressed these issues in her presentation, “Green Design for a Sustainable & Shared Quality of Life”. Vivian Loftness, FAIA, LEED AP, USGBC Board of Directors, Carnegie Mellon University Center for Building Performance & Diagnostics, is an internationally renowned researcher, author and educator with over 30 years experience in environmental design and sustainability.

As a LEED AP and member of the CaGBC, I had the pleasure of hearing Vivian speak about her research and have prepared this, my 4th article on the 2010 Vancouver conference. (If you missed the earlier articles, all are posted on my blog.) I found her research most valuable as I prepare and deliver interior design sustainability seminars.

We are not using energy for its highest and best purpose,

After explaining precisely what is toxic about our home and commercial textiles,

Dayle Laing proceeded to suggest positive alternatives for making safe and more environmentally friendly fabric choices to a group of Interior Designers. Her Fabrics 101 seminar was hosted in the showroom of Suzanne Brown & Associates, in the heart of Toronto's Designers Walk. Dayle based her textiles selection criteria on her extensive studying of the latest research in this area, her LEED AP, and her 2 decades of teaching and practice in this field.

Here are some comments from the designers who attended the event:

Very informative for a topic that has very little reliable information available.”

Jeffrey Douglas, Toronto, ON

This should be required information for anyone working in this industry. Great seminar.”

Brenda Lukacsy, Toronto, ON

Dayle's obvious passion for her research on environmentally improved products and how we as designers/decorators can help educate our own clients to make wise "Green" choices, shone through again.  The session was jam packed with extremely current and useful information about the industry that I previously was not aware of, despite my recent formal education in the field of interiors and my university degree in textile science. I think everyone in the field of design would really benefit from attending one or all of Dayle's seminars!" 

Janelle Withers, Toronto, ON

Your knowledge is fantastic and I really learnt so much. I can’t thank you enough for sharing your wisdom with us.”

Tamara Topornicki-Holdip, Toronto, ON

How to build or renovate homes to be green, save energy and money and reduce our carbon footprint. This is my 3rd article on information presented at the annual conference of the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) in Vancouver, in June, 2010.

(Check this blog, if you missed the 1st two articles and want to catch up.)

Derek Hikson from Minto_Homes and Allan Dobie from Canada Mortgage and Housing, presented “Incorporating LEED for Homes in Sustainable Communities”.  CMHC is currently assisting 13 housing projects across Canada with their EQuilbrium™ Housing Initiative, which “offers builders and developers across the country a unique opportunity to stand out as market leaders by building healthier homes and sustainable communities”.

Derek said that Minto believes it has a corporate responsibility, that there is a market for green building and that they can make a profit. They offer homes at different levels of certification with different price points. Most interesting is their calculation that shows mortgage + utility costs per month with expected pay back time for each option. (This is one area consumers and designers often overlook, in my opinion: the total lifecycle operating cost for a purchase decision.)

In the Minto projects, they claim the largest effect is achieved with a tight building envelope. They are orienting the homes and using overhanging roofs for solar gain, constructing double-studded walls with cellulose blown insulation totaling R-60, and using triple paned windows with low-E and argon fill. They focus on