"Beyond Biophilia: Advanced Wellness in Healthcare Design" explores how healthcare spaces can evolve into restorative, intuitive, human-centered environments. Through case studies, participants learn how narrative design, universal private rooms, daylighting, and anticipatory inclusive planning reduce stress and support better outcomes. The session also shows how IPD, prefabrication, and modular methods improve quality, speed, and sustainability. Attendees move from core wellness principles to practical, measurable strategies adaptable across healthcare and commercial settings.

This presentation will advocate for ways to get us off the dime regarding the dilemmas many companies are grappling with, like hybrid, RTO mandates, worker empowerment, and new metrics. I'll cover what's not working, what we should be doing instead, and what new perspectives we must embrace to enable more meaningful and effective workplaces.

Most workplaces, educational buildings, healthcare facilities, etc. are investing in creating an outdoor space for the occupants of their buildings. Why? As school districts and pediatricians recognize the risk factors associated with sitting in desks all day long, as well as those added on by lack of access to sunlight and fresh air, designers in the education space have investigated alternative learning spaces that allow students to get out of their desks and into the great outdoors. Meeting and learning outdoors creates a people/student first environment. Creating intentional spaces for collaboration and learning has been shown to improve mental, physical, and emotional health. In this course, we will discuss the importance of including outdoor learning environments in educational facilities, risks of excluding these types of spaces, and the relationship to physical health, mental wellbeing, and academic performance.

The Earth's atmosphere now contains more carbon than at any point in the last three million years, making climate-responsive design and material selection more urgent than ever. This course examines carbon analysis, circularity, and the critical role of the building sector in addressing environmental impact. It outlines best practices, clarifies commonly used sustainability and carbon-related terms to strengthen carbon literacy, and explores how understanding embodied carbon can enable our industry to positively influence the built environment. The course also identifies actionable pathways for designers and manufacturers to achieve best-practice outcomes and support a more regenerative future.

Lighting plays a critical role in patient healing, staff performance, and the long-term success of healthcare facilities. This presentation explores how intentional, patient and staff centered lighting strategies can enhance experience while improving sustainability and operational performance. Attendees will learn how early lighting decisions can reduce first costs, energy use, maintenance, and carbon impact without compromising safety, visual comfort, or clinical function. Evidence based wellness strategies including biophilic and circadian lighting principles and the use of melanopic lighting strategies will be discussed for 24/7 healthcare environments. The session also highlights how targeted lighting investments support intuitive wayfinding, reduce stress, and improve staff efficiency. Participants will leave with practical insights for leveraging lighting as a high value design tool that supports healing, performance, and long term facility goals.

Business as usual is no longer acceptable. Clients want healthier buildings, and cities are raising the bar on performance. How can architects meet these increasing expectations? This session will share lessons from a recent innovative campus: one of the first projects in America to achieve both LEED and WELL Platinum certification. This office building illustrates success in healthy workplace and resource conservation, and through specific tips and lessons from both LEED and WELL programs, you will learn where to focus energy, time, and attention in the pursuit of higher performance. The session will tell the full design story, from the original client brief-asking for a healthy and remarkable environment through successfully achieving certifications at the highest level of both LEED and WELL. Additional insights will be shared on the deep collaboration from all members of the project team that was necessary for success.

We will explore how the built environment can actively support the people who provide healthcare services every day. As staffing shortages, burnout, and retention challenges continue to impact health systems, workplace design has emerged as a critical- yet often underutilized tool for change. This seminar reframes healthcare interiors not only as places of care delivery, but as environments that influence staff well-being, performance, and resilience. Using research insights, design strategies, and real-world examples, the presentation examines how factors such as daylight access, acoustic control, spatial equity, intuitive circulation, and restorative spaces can reduce cognitive load and emotional fatigue for staff. We will focus on often-overlooked back-of-house environments, highlighting how thoughtful planning of work zones, respite areas, and team spaces can foster connection, dignity, and psychological safety. Projects with Cedars-Sinai, UCSF and Scripps will be referenced.

Life is full of inevitability. As the cost of technology, services, and healthcare continues to rise, designers are increasingly asked to fill a widening gap. How can spaces reduce reliance on costly interventions? How can design act as a silent support system, allowing people to age, adapt, and thrive in place? And how do designers prepare themselves and their clients to engage in essential, sometimes uncomfortable conversations about change, ability, and future needs? ASID's National Universal Design Committee presents the Principles of Healthy Living: practical, human-centered strategies. These principles were put to the test in a case study using a classic American housing type: the single-story bungalow. Participants will walk through the lifecycle of a bungalow and see how Universal Design strategies reduce dependency on costly technologies and healthcare interventions while supporting dignity, independence, and long-term usability.

Sound transmission between walls is becoming a major challenge for building owners, residents, and tenants. Poor sound transmission mitigation results in lost revenue, poor health, decreased property values and litigation. This presentation will focus on: the impact of sound transmission; why it is becoming an increasingly important issue; the nature of sound, how it travels between walls; comprehensive methods of wall; ceiling and floor construction and how they impact sound transmission; and methods for post-construction sound mitigation that will allow a tenant to address sound transmission within typical lease agreements. It will include a comprehensive review of available materials and construction methods available to mitigate sound transmission.

Furniture has a funny way of showing up late and asking very expensive questions. By the time FF&E enters the conversation, the space is planned, the budget is spoken for, and everyone is hoping the furniture will somehow make it all work. Sometimes it does. When it doesn't, the fallout looks like rushed decisions, compromised design intent, and frustration. This masterclass is about prioritizing furniture planning early while there are still meaningful choices to make. We'll explore how early furniture decisions shape budget, schedule, and scope, and why better outcomes depend on having the right conversations sooner. Drawing from project examples and 25+ years of experience, we'll look at how good furniture planning holds everything together. When it's addressed early and with intention, it supports the full arc of a project, from strategy through activation. The result is fewer surprises, stronger outcomes, and projects that deliver as intended.