WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The International WELL Building Institute™ (IWBI™) today marks a new milestone in the development, growth and expansion of the WELL Certification program as the first project in the world achieves WELL Certification under v1 of the WELL Building Standard™ (WELL).
The project, located at TD Bank Group’s (TD) office in Toronto, has been awarded WELL Certification at the Gold level, which also makes it the first project in North America to achieve WELL Certification. This prestigious distinction was awarded through IWBI’s WELL Building Standard, which is the first building standard to focus on enhancing people’s health and well-being through the built environment.
“A growing body of research demonstrates the environments where we live and work have a direct impact on our well-being and it is becoming increasingly important to place people at the heart of design and construction, operations and development decisions,” said IWBI Founder Paul Scialla. “We are tremendously proud to announce the world’s first WELL Certified™ project under WELL v1 and many newly registered projects. The first WELL v1 certification marks an important step forward in the advancement of human health and wellness through the built environment in Canada and globally, and demonstrates TD’s vested interest in the health and well-being of its employees.”
Created through seven years of rigorous research and development working with leading physicians, scientists, and industry professionals, the WELL Building Standard is a performance-based certification system that marries best practices in design and construction with evidence-based medical and scientific research. TD’s renovation earned the distinction based on seven categories of building performance—air, water, light, nourishment, fitness, comfort and mind—and achieved a Gold level rating.
“People are our most important asset,” said Martha MacInnis, Design Director, Enterprise Real Estate, TD Bank Group. “We’re committed to being an extraordinary place to work, so it made perfect sense to look at our existing design standards and figure out a way to elevate them to the next level.”
TD renovated 25,000 square feet of corporate office space located at TD Centre in downtown Toronto, Canada. Marrying their existing corporate design standards and WELL’s New and Existing Interiors typology, the space incorporates health and wellness features throughout. This renovation was part of a larger optimization project at TD that involved the renovation or refresh of 50 floors throughout their headquarters.
Today’s announcement follows a formal commitment from June 2015 to bring WELL to market across Canada by Green Business Certification Inc. (GBCI) and the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC). The GBCI-CaGBC agreement aims to bolster the adoption of WELL in Canada by aligning the business and administrative processes with the demands of the Canadian market.
To date, WELL has enrolled 154 building projects in 17 countries. Currently, an additional nine projects are registered to pursue WELL Certification in Canada including CBRE Vancouver, Oxford’s MNP Tower in Vancouver, BC and Bay Park Centre in Toronto, ON.
About the International WELL Building Institute™
The International WELL Building Institute™ (IWBI™) is a public benefit corporation whose mission is to improve human health and well-being through the built environment. Public benefit corporations like IWBI are an emerging U.S. structure for corporations committed to balancing public benefits with profitability – harnessing the power of private capital for greater good. IWBI administers the WELL Building Standard™ (WELL) – a performance-based system for measuring, certifying, and monitoring features of buildings that impact the health and well-being of the people who live, work, and learn in them. Fulfilling the vision of IWBI Founder Paul Scialla, IWBI has a pioneering altruistic capitalism model that will address social responsibility and demonstrate a sustainable model for philanthropy. IWBI has committed to direct 51 percent of net profits, after taxes, generated by registration fees, certification fees and recertification fees received from real estate projects applying for WELL Certification toward charitable contributions and impact investment focused on health, wellness and the built environment. IWBI was established by Delos in 2013 pursuant to a Clinton Global Initiative commitment to improve the way people live by developing spaces that enhance occupant health and quality of life by sharing the WELL Building Standard globally. www.wellcertified.com
About the WELL Building Standard™
The WELL Building Standard™ (WELL) is a performance-based system for measuring, certifying, and monitoring features of the built environment that impact the health and well-being of the people who live, work, and learn in the buildings. WELL focuses on seven categories of building performance: air, water, nourishment, light, fitness, comfort, and mind. Pioneered by Delos, the WELL Building Standard is grounded in evidence-based medical research that demonstrates the connection between the buildings where we spend more than 90 percent of our time and health and wellness impacts on us as occupants. The WELL Building Standard is administered by the International WELL Building Institute™ and third-party certified by Green Business Certification Inc. (GBCI). www.wellcertified.com
