December 12, 2024 • 39 mins
This week on Chatter that Matters, we explore the profound impact of our surroundings on our health, emotions, and overall well-being. World-renowned architect and thought leader Tye Farrow joins me to discuss how our spaces can elevate our lives, offering more than shelter.
Tye shares insights from his groundbreaking book, Constructing Health, in which he integrates neuroscience with architecture to advocate for salutogenic design—a transformative approach that fosters well-being. From the inspiration of his architect father to his work on major global projects, like a revolutionary cancer centre in Israel, Tye takes us on a journey through his career, highlighting how thoughtful design can be more than a place to be; it can be a place to be healthy, creative and connected.
Tye shares how we can construct health through specific, measurable design qualities and characteristics to enhance human performance in our cities, homes, and places of learning and healing. This includes intergenerational housing that fosters community.
Leah Robinson from RBC joins the show to talk about how financial institutions must, too, march towards a future to provide innovative solutions to homeowners.
To purchase Tye Farrow's best-selling book Constructing Health: https://www.amazon.ca/Constructing-Health-Built-Environment-Enhances/dp/1487557221
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Have you ever thought about the expression state of mind? This
mental and emotional condition you have for certain
moments. Call encompassing your thoughts, your feelings,
your attitudes, triggers emotions like happiness
and anger or cognitive states like focus,
confusion, or creativity. What's fascinating
(00:22):
is that a state of mind is dynamic. It can change based on
your circumstances. It's like the switch
where you're suddenly optimistic or pessimistic,
certain or uncertain, secure or insecure.
In other words, how we interpret these situations, impact how
we make decisions, how we respond to our environment. In fact,
(00:46):
it encompasses our entire well-being. Today's show, I wanna
modify the well known idiom you are what you eat. 1 that expresses the
idea that food we consume directly influences our moods.
2, you are where you are, that your physical surroundings
could determine your state of mind. Spaces that we occupy,
any place that we move into, we have cognitive and
(01:09):
precognitive reactions, and those reactions have
physiological and psychological reactions of
our body. My guest today is Tai Ferro.
He's an architect redefining what it means to create not only beautiful
spaces, but places in which you can thrive. His work just
isn't about aesthetics. It's about designing environments that
(01:32):
actively promote our well-being. And when I talk about well-being, it's our
body, our soul, our mind, and our health. Positive
stimulating environments do a whole range of things to our
bodies, reduce stress, decrease blood pressure,
enhance memory and learning. And as we've heard, they strengthen
our neural networks. He's just released his groundbreaking and best
(01:54):
selling book, Constructing Health, and tied Del's into
the science behind how spaces are physicality can
influence not just how we live, but how we feel, and more
importantly, how we feel better. We need to begin to think of the
spaces we create as noninvasive
therapeutic treatments. He dances across this intersection of
(02:17):
neuroscience and architecture. He'll explain the concept of
salutogenic design, design that actively insights
health and how you can apply it to urban spaces at homes and
schools and hospitals. Imagine from the places we live to the
hospitals where we heal. These physical spaces have
the ability to make us feel better, feel better in the way
(02:38):
we think, feel, and do.
Hi. It's Tony Chapman. Thank you for listening to Chatter That Matters presented
by RBC. If you can, please subscribe to the podcast.
And ratings reviews, well, they're always welcome and they're always appreciated.
Ty Ferrell, welcome to Chatter That Matters. Great to be here, Tony. Lovely to see
(03:02):
you as always. Hey, you know, it was wonderful to originally cross paths with you
at Bishop Strahan and some of the amazing work you did in
that school. And to me, I never imagined that when you were
designing, you're also thinking about sort of the
health and mental well-being of the students. And that's why I'm so fascinated to
unpack your new book and talk a little bit more about what you're doing in
(03:23):
terms of this sort of state of place and state of mind. Bishop Strong,
that that was in the early days, and I think
I knew a variety of these ideas in your gut. You had that gut feeling,
but I didn't have the material to support it. So let's talk about
this journey of learning you're on. Where's the concept of just becoming an
architect? Where did that come from? You've talked about this idea, you are,
(03:47):
where you are. You are as a result of where you are. I grew
up in Oakville. I was born in Oakville just outside of Toronto, and
I came from home from the hospital, and I arrived into
a brand new designed house. My father is a retired
architect. So he designs this house in sort of a
suburban street and it has a big wall of, you know,
(04:10):
handcrafted brick. And all the neighbors thought, well, these guys must not
be social because there's no window. But you walk through
a courtyard and the courtyard has birch trees, it
has time growing, and you can sense, you can
smell it. You then pass into a dining room
that's all Scandinavian furniture, wood, curved, And
(04:32):
then you continue into the stairs go down, the roof
slopes up into this living room that
looks out over these huge big trees. And all I remember
is lying on the floor in the sunlight staring up at
these these trees. But the important thing about this house,
my father was inspired by this guy called Richard Neutra.
(04:54):
Richard Neutra grew up in Austria in and around the 19
thirties, and his best friend was Sigmund
Freud's son. So he was immersed in that
whole frothy period of inside space and outside
space, but Neutra then goes on.
He because of the war, he moves to the United States. He moves to
(05:16):
Chicago, and he gets hired by this
psychologist. And he designs the level house,
which is known as the health house, on the cover of Time
Magazine because it's incorporating all of these
ideas that sort of came through Freud. And
and he then writes this very important book called Survival Through
(05:38):
Design, which is certainly my book is obviously
an an inspiration on where he was.
Another place that seemed to inspire you was that as a young kid
walking into Ontario Place for the first time. And I remember you talking
(06:00):
about it, in an interview with Stacy Shoemaker. So tell me a little bit more
about that. You come in under these pavilions that are floating
everywhere, you know, over the water. The light is reflecting on the
underside. You can go up top, and there's the big views. You can go
walk along those wood walkways, you know, with all the cafes that didn't
exist in Toronto at the time. And then the landscape, you
(06:22):
know, those paths that go up to The Forum, sitting on the
grass and and watching music? That place
as a really inspirational space that's
invigorating and restorative designed by Ebb Seidler,
the great Toronto architect. Curiously, Ebb Seidler, I
ended up meeting, but he was a
(06:45):
thesis adviser when I did my thesis at U of T. And he
I ended up doing my thesis with him, and he was a real humanist.
Ended up working for him and then went and opened an office with him in
in London. But this idea, like I talked with with Stacy,
this idea of beginning to link together these ideas of health
(07:05):
and well-being in both an invigorating and in a
restorative way. U of T, and a lot of people would say that's a pretty
good degree, but it seems to be you're on this educational journey.
Next, you go to Harvard for urban design. While you're at that
place, let's keep using the word place, what influences did you gain there that
you felt gonna be part of my knapsack as I went I've been going through
(07:26):
life? Harvard was amazing, and the degree was, for me, interesting
because the first degree was in architecture, and the second one was about architecture
and urban design. And so urban design isn't just
about buildings. It's the edge of the buildings, the spaces, or as you
say, the places and the landscapes in behind
in between. But what when I'm there, I come across,
(07:50):
as we all know, Frederick Law Olmsted. Who's Frederick Law
Olmsted? Well, he's known as the great father
of landscape architecture. And what did he design? Well,
that place we'd love to go to when we go to New York, which is
Central Park. And so we know him as this
fantastic landscape architecture. But you know what?
(08:12):
He wasn't a landscape architect. But in fact,
he was a public health activist. He was the
founder of the US Sanitary Commission, which
is the forerunner for the Red Cross, and he
used design to cause ecological,
physical, societal, and mind health. And I started to
(08:35):
think, am I actually an architect? Am I
a designer? Or in fact, should I be thinking of myself
as a public health activist? Do you think in some ways
you're this silver ball in this pinball game bouncing off these
extraordinary people because your next part of this sort of who am I
gonna be takes you to Venice. And while you're there
(08:57):
studying in Venice, you also, in your spare time, decide
that you you have a strategy for saving Venice. So talk to me a little
bit about what happens there. You know, I had this gut feeling that
the environments influence and change us, And I came
across a book, this was just before the pandemic, probably 2 years.
This amazing lady called Sarah Goldhagen, writer
(09:19):
for New York Times, great teacher, and she writes this
amazing book called Welcome to Your World, which effectively
lays out the neuroscience architecture connection, how
the mind is influenced by the environment. I then
decide to go to I submit a paper for something called the
Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture at the Salk Institute.
(09:42):
I get accepted to talk, and I meet this lady and, in
fact, realize she sees the connection.
She's using pictures of my work in the lectures that
she's giving. And then I hear there about this program, a
master of neuroscience applied to architecture and design in
the 1st year at Venice, and it's the first program in the
(10:04):
world that's looking at at the subject you're taught
by the world's arguably the best neuroscientist, cognitive
scientist, sociologist, and psychiatrist. So I
think I'm gonna go and meet the director of this and lay out
what my thinking is. I do. He's very excited about
it. And he says, you know, you can come as a fly in student,
(10:26):
be in Venice a week a month. And I say, this is amazing. You know,
there's 11,000,000 bits of information that are coming
at us right now, But only, in fact,
50 of those bits per second are registering
consciously, but the rest are still registering
subconsciously, preconsciously, and they
(10:48):
change us. How can we create human
performance buildings? Buildings that enhance memory,
stimulate, social interaction. And so while I'm
at Venice, what I begin to discover, I was there,
in fact, when there was that big, Aqualto
flood in 2019 in November, and
(11:10):
walking through the streets, and literally the water is up to
your waist. But the stores are still open and people are
staying in chairs and cafes, sipping their coffee, but it's
like, how does the city continue? The other curious
thing is, when you walk home at night from your studies in November,
all of the shop lights are on, but all the buildings
(11:33):
up above, the lights are off. And the reason is
that Venice is going through something, which we've
coined the the 2 floods. And it's the floods
as a result of, rising, sea
levels because of, environmental issues. But
the second flood is the flood of mass tourism. Venice in
(11:56):
the 19 sixties had a population of 275,000.
Right now, it's less than 50,000. That's a 70%
decline, and that's because everybody has moved out
because the only jobs you can get or if you wanna serve,
coffees in a in in in a in a restaurant. And so what
(12:16):
we decided was we need to change Venice because Venice,
for your children and definitely your grandchildren, it won't exist.
At 1.5 degree, the city,
about a third of it, will be underwater, which we're around right now.
And so what the plan is was to
continue doing what Venice has done since the beginning of time,
(12:39):
which is build islands and create, a
necklace, an archipelago of new and existing islands.
And by doing that, you can lower the water in the middle
down to historic levels. The important thing is it
creates a 30 2 kilometer new park, which
is very good for people to go out and have their allotment
(13:01):
gardens. It's also bringing agritech industry
in, meaning that suddenly the universities, 4 great
universities, you don't stay there. Like at U of T,
you get a degree, you start a business up here. There, you don't. You
go because there is an opportunities. So suddenly, the sophistication
of food production, food security, food export, which
(13:24):
Venice has already done. But it's looking
at economic health, societal
health, physical health, and ecological health as a
fundamental of city making. Amazing. I
wanna now move to this incredible book, Constructing Health. I
know the reaction from the public. I know Indigo's raving about it. They
(13:46):
consider it the book for the holiday season. How's your fellow
architects reacted? Because very often when someone steps
outside of what I would call the silo or the barriers or
or the conditions that we're supposed to operate on and takes a practice in a
new level, it it comes with both celebration and criticism. There's
this amazing young architect, in the
(14:08):
States who, was interviewing me on on,
on the book. And she said to me or I was saying, well, how's this
embraced in your office? And she said to me, well, I can't
talk to the partners about it. They don't believe the environment
impacts your health. So there is a real mindset
of of people that that really don't believe it.
(14:30):
And in fact, I think you see that in in some of the education, but
in fact, there's a whole movement about a
humanist movement about architecture and humanity
that, went to sleep for about a 100 years or so,
and now it's definitely emerging. And this this book is being
taught, in the United States, as as
(14:53):
we speak. You know, you talk about salutogenic design.
For us that aren't architects, break that down what it
means, not only for us to understand it, but if you could wave
a magic wand and see the world starting to embrace it, how our life
would change? Salutogenesis is exactly
what your show is about. In fact, I think you need to re
(15:16):
rename your show, the Saluda Salutogenic
Soul podcast because your podcast, as I
understand it, is discussing with people that have
gone through extraordinary circumstances often very
negative and have come out of it in a transformed
way. And Salutogenesis is exactly about
(15:39):
that. Let me step back a little bit. It was coined by
a guy called Antonovsky, who was a Israeli
American doctor, and he studied people that went
through terrible, terrible situations. And in fact,
a number of them that went through the holocaust. And he couldn't
understand why some of these people came
(16:01):
through such an experience, but
were really able to frame a way forward. So
he coined this word called slutogenesis. Very
few of us know that word, but do you know the word pathogens,
pathogenic? Of course, we do. And
pathogenic comes from the root words that land in the Greek words of
(16:24):
pathogenesis, which is meaning disease and the
origins. Our whole medical system is a pathogenic
system, stopping bad things from happening. Salutogenesis
comes from the Latin and the root words of solace and
genesis. Solace, the goddess of of health
and well-being. So instead of stopping bad
(16:46):
things from happening, Salutogenesis is about
health creation, this idea of a sense of coherence
and meaning a sense of purpose. So, Tony, if you don't have a sense of
purpose, you're probably not gonna get up in the morning. And he sort
of supported that concept around 3 ideas, which
was about comprehensibility, manageability,
(17:10):
and meaningfulness. Meaning, do you see a path
forward? Do you think you have the resources to to
get you through it? But more importantly, that you have
meaning and purpose. But think of the buildings you come
into. Do you know where the front door is? How do I get into
this building? So the sense of coherence doesn't
(17:31):
exist. The manageability when you get in, do you know how to move
through it? The comprehensibility, but most importantly,
the buildings communicate meaning and purpose to
us, which gives us that extra spring in our step. The
statistic that I discovered, which shows exactly where we
are, we are in a period that's only about a 150
(17:55):
years old Western evidence based medicine that is a
pathogenic view. For 3000 years of human history,
which I trace in the book, we had a salutogenic view,
but we shifted away. And the evidence is there
are 8,000 known causes or
symptoms of disease, but there's only
(18:17):
80 known causes or symptoms of health
and well-being. My purpose with the book is to
begin to change our mindset towards a fluidogenic
view. What's it like for you walking into places
now where I would imagine most architects
view it, try to understand the motivations behind it, but now you're
(18:39):
looking at it from sort of the body and mind and soul of the individual.
I think myself as well as the team I collaborate,
we're just a lot more intentional about what we do and, in fact,
the way we see, being able to really
connect the dots of what enhances human performance.
How receptive are clients to this? Because
(19:02):
ultimately, the end the end game is someone that's gonna work
in that building, someone who's gonna find their spirits elevated.
In fact, the the clients have been extraordinarily,
responsible, and and we work primarily with purpose based
organizations, lots in in in the health and and the knowledge
sectors edge education. It's shifting away a little
(19:26):
bit from the analogy I like to use is a lot of the buildings we
create are like hamburgers. Well, a hamburger is very functional, isn't
it? You don't need a knife and a fork and a plate. You can hold
it in your hands and and consume it. It does what it asks you to
do, doesn't it? Gives you protein and calories,
but it leaves you feeling empty after about an hour
(19:48):
you had it, and it does more damage to you because the
sodium content and all the over
processed nature of it. A lot of our buildings are like that. They're
transactional. They only do what they're asked for. With
our clients though, Tony, if you spend, say,
$1 on a building, how much do you spend over the life of that
(20:10):
building on the heating and the cooling of it? $5. Well, that's a
lot of money, so you better focus on the mechanical, the
electrical systems, the envelope so it's functional from that
standpoint. But how much do you spend on the people inside
the building through the life of that? $10?
50? 100? It's $200.
(20:33):
If you if there's 1 penny 1 cent of that
dollar that has an impact on the
performance, memory, social interaction, creativity,
empathy, learning, as a result of the design
decisions, it has massive impact on on
an organization. And so when we get into those discussions, the
(20:55):
clients say, you're absolutely right. And we can see it as a
result of the performance of of the buildings we create.
What is that cost benefit analysis? Because some of these
investments might take a little bit more upfront, but there is a
payback period. Whether it's putting in a heat pump, additional
insulation, those are all decisions that you should be thinking about
(21:18):
as you go through that process, and they will pay you back over time.
What you heard was words of wisdom from Leah Robinson, who's gonna join me later
in the show and talk about greener homes. But when we
return, Kai and I continue to talk about homes and buildings
being more than just a place to be, but a place to be healthier. And
of course, my 3 takeaways. Hi. It's Tony
(21:40):
Chapman from Shatter That Matters. RBC is offering more
financing options to support Canadian homeowners looking
to maximize their property's potential. Whether you want to provide
supportive housing for a family member or supplement your income with a
rental, RBC's Construction Mortgage Multi Units Program has
you covered. You can finance additions like laneway homes,
(22:02):
garden suites, modular units, or even redevelop your home
into duplexes or triplexes. Speak to an RBC mortgage specialist
today to see how this program can work for you. Maximizing the potential of
your home? Well, that matters to you, to me, and to RBC.
My guest today is Tai Farrow. I'm proud to call him a Canadian
(22:22):
architect, but he's world renowned for integrating neuroscience
in architectural design. When he does so, it promotes
our health and well-being. Not only does he design buildings that
are a place to be, but also wants to be healthy.
Do you see a time when a Faroe
(22:44):
building, people that are leasing it, people that are involved with
filling it with people can say to them, this has the
same or even greater benefit than the building that might be 2
blocks over that's on a subway station. In other words, if there's real
value in terms of how they market the building because to
me, capitalism also has to inherit this philosophy saying
(23:06):
this is good business for you to be located here. Well, let me give you
an example of that. So we have just opened about a year
ago the largest, most important
cancer center in the ancient city of Jerusalem, 5000 years
old. It's a building on a very big important, medical
campus. So what are the metrics that that would be something
(23:28):
that you could measure this thing, that the chair of the board would be significant?
Well, let's look at 2 stats. Right now, in
Canadian hospitals globally around the world, we
have a shortage of somewhere between 15 to 35
percent of doctors and nurse nurses and medical staff.
We just can't get staff. Those positions are open, and we can't fill
(23:51):
them. In Jerusalem, even relatively new
hospitals have exactly the same problem. They can't get staff
to fill the building. What about ours? There
is a lineup of the leading medical
people that wanna go and work there. There are no
empty positions. It's remarkable in the phenomenon
(24:12):
that's happening. But what about the other side of the equation?
Right now, people that have either gone through cancer
or, in fact, they have lost family members, they're
asking the staff if they can come and inhabit
the public areas of our cancer center. They wanna come back
and embrace it effectively like a community center, which
(24:35):
doesn't happen. And, importantly, since
the hospital has been keeping patient satisfaction
records, this patient satisfaction records for
this billing are the highest ever
that the hospital has recorded. So if you were the
CEO or the chair of the board of that organization,
(24:58):
are these stats meaningful to you? Is there anything that
we should be thinking about even within our own homes
to understand, you know, as I used in the opening
instead of you are what you, we, you are where you are.
What we need to step back and understand the way that the mind
works is the way that we build, person
(25:21):
to place relationships is exactly our mind.
It's the same way that we build person to person relationships.
So what are characters and qualities of environments that offer
that? In the book, I talk about one thing, and we use it a lot,
is the material wood. Wood's very interesting
because you can see the grain. You can imagine it growing, over
(25:44):
time. But the important thing about wood is
that it works to all your senses. When you look at it, you see
the grain. When you touch it, doesn't feel like,
steel. It doesn't take the temperature from you. The other important
thing is, you know, that sound on walking on wood,
think of the deck up north, that relates to
(26:07):
your theta And beta waves, which is both the
positive and the negative wood works perfectly in the
positive side of sound, which is lowering blood pressure,
heart rate, but also the scent of what think of a sauna,
you know, that smell of cedar. That in fact does the same thing.
It changes your physiology. So if we can use these
(26:29):
tools, in our environments, they have an
impact as well as I write about that you wanna linger in
these spaces, you wanna spend more time with people, it changes
your physiology and your biology as as a result of
it. Just remember, it's using all of the
tools. We're very sort of visually focused because of
(26:51):
Instagram and TikTok and these things, but your body,
the multimodal sensorial part is the key piece of the
equation. Ty, the the interesting narrative that seems to be
roaring through workplaces, ordering people back to
office. Why are we not creating spaces where people wanna be
there and thrive being there versus feeling they have to be there?
(27:13):
You know, I I think the book is popular because through COVID,
we began to realize that the environment has a
significant effect of us, and we suddenly woke up and said, what
the hell am I doing commuting to this miserable
space, you know, that I feel as if I'm in a little tuna can,
and in fact, the statistics show that the environment
(27:36):
changes your brain, your synapses. If the environment
there's a great study of mice, and if the mice are in
environments that are impoverished, they shrink the synapse connections.
And if they're in enriched environment, in fact, they grow the synapse connections
by about 25%. We voted by our
feet that we don't wanna go back to the office because it's
(27:58):
not authentic, and we found it in places we we call
home. The only way we're gonna get people back
to the office is if we start focusing on
people, human needs, and the ability to create
the conditions of which I can thrive and prosper as opposed
to merely survive. You know, I think if we do
(28:20):
that, the same thing that happened to your Cancer Institute in Jerusalem,
people will be auditioning to work for those companies, and they will have a
competitive advantage because they will have a place that attracts the best of the
best. And equally stimulates them of all the complex
issues that, you know, what we need to do together to solve these
issues is these environments enhance the
(28:43):
creativity, social interaction, memory, and on and
on. We need to start using these spaces
as, like, super, super foods, like little
blueberries that are packed full of minerals and vitamins. You can do
it the same to space. We have to do it
intentionally. What about elderly care? Because I look at
(29:04):
you know, I'm doing a lot of work on longevity right now. And the thing
that everybody comes back to me that are 50 plus, I don't
wanna ever go there. I wanna stay in my home.
Is there a lesson to be learned for for the people that are creating these
spaces for people when they get to the point where they need to have some
kind of assisted living that we can be doing a lot to extend
(29:27):
the quality of their life, their cognitive ability, their their physic physical
ability? We just opened a, a facility,
towards London, Ontario. The whole building is semicircular,
all the public spaces. You can start in one space, and as
you move through it, your view is continuously changing.
You can look out to the front, you can look out at the side. And
(29:49):
what we know is that we have to exercise our
muscles or apathy, they begin to shrink away. We're creating
these environments for people that are mind numbing.
And it's not only for the people, the the older people that are
staying there, but in fact, it's, equally for
the the the people that are working there. And we're involved in something that's called
(30:12):
the Treehouse right now, which is, for adult
living in the in the city. We're designing whole
living intergenerational housing. It's good for stimulating
building relationships with the older people, but equally important
with, younger people. And these things we have to
do intentionally. There's a lot of affordable housing that's being built,
(30:34):
and it's all about modular housing, you know, construction. That's great,
so we can roll it out quickly. But a lot of them are like
19 fifties, you know, motels. And the whole thing
about these things is they have to offer dignity, that
when you're living there, you feel special. It doesn't mean a lot of
money, but it means creating something that you
(30:56):
feel you have dignity and you can flourish and thrive.
That needs to be the number one piece. It has to be
affordable on time and easy to construct, but let's create
conditions of which we can thrive and prosper. Clyde, where do you go from
here? You strike me as you're here for a reason. The
people you've met along the way, the Yodas that have embraced you, the the the
(31:19):
learning. What are you gonna do in the next 10 years with it? Because you
could certainly turn it into just continuing to build your practice. But
to me, I sense with this book and just talking with you today, there's a
higher calling. What can we do through the act of place
making that can bring people together to share?
And these ideas, a big theme of environmental enrichment
(31:40):
is around generosity. I mean, just think of generosity
as as a common theme. You know, what's a generosity
and affordances? Affordances, you know, when you walk up to a
door and you don't know if you should push or pull the door,
and you feel sort of like an idiot or it says push or pull, that's
not generous, and it doesn't afford you to know
(32:03):
how to move through it. How many barriers are we creating
where in fact we need to do the opposite, and we have to shift
to a salutogenic, a health causing view
in all aspects. And I would say, salutogenesis,
you meet people that are very salutogenic, health giving,
and in fact, we know environments that are similar to that.
(32:26):
That is the mission is to bring this forward
and disseminate it widely. And so this book,
it's written for students in architecture and cognitive scientists.
It's written as a resource for professionals in both those
areas. Got lots of data, lots of information. But
most importantly, as you know, it's 11 inches square. It's got
(32:48):
450 images. We designed the whole book. It's
very immersive. There's headings, so you you don't have to start at
the beginning. You can jump into the middle. It can be a coffee
table because it needs to be disseminated to the
public. Because once you see it, you can't unsee
it, and you question everything year round. That's the purpose.
(33:11):
I gotta ask you the question again that you avoid it. You, Ty Farrell,
10 years from now, are you even gonna be putting pen to
paper, or are you gonna be much more someone that's you
hope to lead this cause around the world that we
can do a much better job with our spaces and
places. As you correct, I mean, instead of about preventing health, you can be
(33:33):
embracing and lifting how we feel, how we think, and how we
do. I'm a practitioner, Tony. I I think
through through making. By the act of making, I can have
significant impact, big or small. The journey so
far for me has been interesting because something's come up
in front of me, and I've said, well, why don't I try that or why
(33:55):
don't I why don't I move down that path? And in
fact, it's it's led to to amazing things, which
is really the realization that we need to think of
architecture not about what it is, but what
it does and its ability to cause
health. Architecture as a noninvasive
(34:16):
therapeutic treatment, that has the
ability to be transformative, generous,
offering affordances, and specifically dignity,
but its ability to cause hell. So, Ty, I
always end my interviews, my 3 takeaways, and
I love your book. I continue to pick it up, and I continue to go
(34:38):
to those headlines and everything you said. It certainly has that impact on me, and
I know it'll have on others. I just think what's interesting about you is
these Yodas you have met along the way. You know, you end up meeting,
and next thing you know, you're going a week a a month in Venice to
study, and, you know, this person was connected to Freud and all of this
wonderful tapestry of people that have influenced you. And it's
(35:00):
almost like the torch has been passed to you. You know, the second thing
that you brought out is this sort of almost from transactional
to transformative and using data and empirical
evidence to let people open their minds to what could be easily
dismissed as an intangible. Of course, I want my employees to feel better,
but actually starting to put empirical evidence that says, you know, for every dollar that
(35:22):
building costs, $200 goes into people. Let's impact that. And
I think that's just a really good advice for people that even what
seems like the most ethereal or intangible or
really locked into the minds of great thinkers, if you can break it
down sometimes into the simplest of math, you can impact change. And I think
you do that extraordinary well. And then the final thing that you came
(35:45):
back to me and said, I love the art of
making. Sometimes we get promoted beyond what we
love to do. Sometimes we chase financial rewards beyond
what we love to do. But if there's something you love and you're passionate
about and can impact others, can transform others' lives,
that is a good life lived. So for all of that and more, Ty
(36:07):
Ferro, I'm I'm just honored you join me on Chatter That Matters. Tony, it's
amazing to be with you because the the people that that you
you have, you tell a story about a journey.
Joining me now is Leah Robinson. She's the vice president of home equity
financing at RBC. Leah, welcome. Tony, thanks
(36:29):
for having me. I'm happy happy to join you today on this important topic.
Let's talk about green homes. There's an there's an incredible
appetite to do more for mother nature. But when I
talk to people, they always talk about how expensive it is. Is there
anything you're doing from your end to help people to kind of
(36:49):
treat our planet better and at the same time be a little kinder to their
pocketbook? You know, I think one of the things that people don't know is is
what large polluters, buildings and homes are, both both
commercial and and residential. And so there's actually a
big opportunity here from a housing perspective to look at
how do we solve that problem. And so when you look at things like retrofitting
(37:11):
homes and building homes, we have a great opportunity in
Canada to really start tackling this problem differently. Where
consumers are looking at some of this is there still is, you know, some
consideration of what that green premium looks like. And so
there's a real factor that needs to come into play in terms of looking at
what is that cost benefit analysis because some of these
(37:33):
investments might take a little bit more upfront, but there is a
payback period, whether it's putting in a heat pump, additional
insulation, windows and doors that are that that
will help keep the heat in your home. Those are all decisions
that you should be thinking about as you go through that process, and they will
pay you back over time. And if I went to RBC with that
(37:55):
idea, is that something you'd also help me to understand is what
is the payback on that green investment? We're building tools and resources,
for customers. One of the the common pieces that people do is get
an energy audit, which is an outside professional, that would do
that evaluation on your home. Our mortgage specialists are great. They know a lot
about about mortgage financing and things like that, but climate,
(38:18):
and and impacts of homes really serve that growing area. So
there's information, there's tools and resources. We're looking at what we can do, but I'd
say one of the best things to start out is is looking at getting that
energy audit, and helping you to better understand what would be
unique and best to do to your home and your given your specific
circumstances. Leah Robinson, as always, a pleasure to have
(38:40):
you on, Chatter That Matters. Thanks, Tony. Thanks for having me. Have a
great day. Once again, a special thanks to RBC
for supporting Chatham That Matters. It's Tony Chapman. Thanks
for listening, and let's chat
soon.
Have you ever thought about the expression state of mind? This
mental and emotional condition you have for certain
moments. Call encompassing your thoughts, your feelings,
your attitudes, triggers emotions like happiness
and anger or cognitive states like focus,
confusion, or creativity. What's fascinating
(00:22):
is that a state of mind is dynamic. It can change based on
your circumstances. It's like the switch
where you're suddenly optimistic or pessimistic,
certain or uncertain, secure or insecure.
In other words, how we interpret these situations, impact how
we make decisions, how we respond to our environment. In fact,
(00:46):
it encompasses our entire well-being. Today's show, I wanna
modify the well known idiom you are what you eat. 1 that expresses the
idea that food we consume directly influences our moods.
2, you are where you are, that your physical surroundings
could determine your state of mind. Spaces that we occupy,
any place that we move into, we have cognitive and
(01:09):
precognitive reactions, and those reactions have
physiological and psychological reactions of
our body. My guest today is Tai Ferro.
He's an architect redefining what it means to create not only beautiful
spaces, but places in which you can thrive. His work just
isn't about aesthetics. It's about designing environments that
(01:32):
actively promote our well-being. And when I talk about well-being, it's our
body, our soul, our mind, and our health. Positive
stimulating environments do a whole range of things to our
bodies, reduce stress, decrease blood pressure,
enhance memory and learning. And as we've heard, they strengthen
our neural networks. He's just released his groundbreaking and best
(01:54):
selling book, Constructing Health, and tied Del's into
the science behind how spaces are physicality can
influence not just how we live, but how we feel, and more
importantly, how we feel better. We need to begin to think of the
spaces we create as noninvasive
therapeutic treatments. He dances across this intersection of
(02:17):
neuroscience and architecture. He'll explain the concept of
salutogenic design, design that actively insights
health and how you can apply it to urban spaces at homes and
schools and hospitals. Imagine from the places we live to the
hospitals where we heal. These physical spaces have
the ability to make us feel better, feel better in the way
(02:38):
we think, feel, and do.
Hi. It's Tony Chapman. Thank you for listening to Chatter That Matters presented
by RBC. If you can, please subscribe to the podcast.
And ratings reviews, well, they're always welcome and they're always appreciated.
Ty Ferrell, welcome to Chatter That Matters. Great to be here, Tony. Lovely to see
(03:02):
you as always. Hey, you know, it was wonderful to originally cross paths with you
at Bishop Strahan and some of the amazing work you did in
that school. And to me, I never imagined that when you were
designing, you're also thinking about sort of the
health and mental well-being of the students. And that's why I'm so fascinated to
unpack your new book and talk a little bit more about what you're doing in
(03:23):
terms of this sort of state of place and state of mind. Bishop Strong,
that that was in the early days, and I think
I knew a variety of these ideas in your gut. You had that gut feeling,
but I didn't have the material to support it. So let's talk about
this journey of learning you're on. Where's the concept of just becoming an
architect? Where did that come from? You've talked about this idea, you are,
(03:47):
where you are. You are as a result of where you are. I grew
up in Oakville. I was born in Oakville just outside of Toronto, and
I came from home from the hospital, and I arrived into
a brand new designed house. My father is a retired
architect. So he designs this house in sort of a
suburban street and it has a big wall of, you know,
(04:10):
handcrafted brick. And all the neighbors thought, well, these guys must not
be social because there's no window. But you walk through
a courtyard and the courtyard has birch trees, it
has time growing, and you can sense, you can
smell it. You then pass into a dining room
that's all Scandinavian furniture, wood, curved, And
(04:32):
then you continue into the stairs go down, the roof
slopes up into this living room that
looks out over these huge big trees. And all I remember
is lying on the floor in the sunlight staring up at
these these trees. But the important thing about this house,
my father was inspired by this guy called Richard Neutra.
(04:54):
Richard Neutra grew up in Austria in and around the 19
thirties, and his best friend was Sigmund
Freud's son. So he was immersed in that
whole frothy period of inside space and outside
space, but Neutra then goes on.
He because of the war, he moves to the United States. He moves to
(05:16):
Chicago, and he gets hired by this
psychologist. And he designs the level house,
which is known as the health house, on the cover of Time
Magazine because it's incorporating all of these
ideas that sort of came through Freud. And
and he then writes this very important book called Survival Through
(05:38):
Design, which is certainly my book is obviously
an an inspiration on where he was.
Another place that seemed to inspire you was that as a young kid
walking into Ontario Place for the first time. And I remember you talking
(06:00):
about it, in an interview with Stacy Shoemaker. So tell me a little bit more
about that. You come in under these pavilions that are floating
everywhere, you know, over the water. The light is reflecting on the
underside. You can go up top, and there's the big views. You can go
walk along those wood walkways, you know, with all the cafes that didn't
exist in Toronto at the time. And then the landscape, you
(06:22):
know, those paths that go up to The Forum, sitting on the
grass and and watching music? That place
as a really inspirational space that's
invigorating and restorative designed by Ebb Seidler,
the great Toronto architect. Curiously, Ebb Seidler, I
ended up meeting, but he was a
(06:45):
thesis adviser when I did my thesis at U of T. And he
I ended up doing my thesis with him, and he was a real humanist.
Ended up working for him and then went and opened an office with him in
in London. But this idea, like I talked with with Stacy,
this idea of beginning to link together these ideas of health
(07:05):
and well-being in both an invigorating and in a
restorative way. U of T, and a lot of people would say that's a pretty
good degree, but it seems to be you're on this educational journey.
Next, you go to Harvard for urban design. While you're at that
place, let's keep using the word place, what influences did you gain there that
you felt gonna be part of my knapsack as I went I've been going through
(07:26):
life? Harvard was amazing, and the degree was, for me, interesting
because the first degree was in architecture, and the second one was about architecture
and urban design. And so urban design isn't just
about buildings. It's the edge of the buildings, the spaces, or as you
say, the places and the landscapes in behind
in between. But what when I'm there, I come across,
(07:50):
as we all know, Frederick Law Olmsted. Who's Frederick Law
Olmsted? Well, he's known as the great father
of landscape architecture. And what did he design? Well,
that place we'd love to go to when we go to New York, which is
Central Park. And so we know him as this
fantastic landscape architecture. But you know what?
(08:12):
He wasn't a landscape architect. But in fact,
he was a public health activist. He was the
founder of the US Sanitary Commission, which
is the forerunner for the Red Cross, and he
used design to cause ecological,
physical, societal, and mind health. And I started to
(08:35):
think, am I actually an architect? Am I
a designer? Or in fact, should I be thinking of myself
as a public health activist? Do you think in some ways
you're this silver ball in this pinball game bouncing off these
extraordinary people because your next part of this sort of who am I
gonna be takes you to Venice. And while you're there
(08:57):
studying in Venice, you also, in your spare time, decide
that you you have a strategy for saving Venice. So talk to me a little
bit about what happens there. You know, I had this gut feeling that
the environments influence and change us, And I came
across a book, this was just before the pandemic, probably 2 years.
This amazing lady called Sarah Goldhagen, writer
(09:19):
for New York Times, great teacher, and she writes this
amazing book called Welcome to Your World, which effectively
lays out the neuroscience architecture connection, how
the mind is influenced by the environment. I then
decide to go to I submit a paper for something called the
Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture at the Salk Institute.
(09:42):
I get accepted to talk, and I meet this lady and, in
fact, realize she sees the connection.
She's using pictures of my work in the lectures that
she's giving. And then I hear there about this program, a
master of neuroscience applied to architecture and design in
the 1st year at Venice, and it's the first program in the
(10:04):
world that's looking at at the subject you're taught
by the world's arguably the best neuroscientist, cognitive
scientist, sociologist, and psychiatrist. So I
think I'm gonna go and meet the director of this and lay out
what my thinking is. I do. He's very excited about
it. And he says, you know, you can come as a fly in student,
(10:26):
be in Venice a week a month. And I say, this is amazing. You know,
there's 11,000,000 bits of information that are coming
at us right now, But only, in fact,
50 of those bits per second are registering
consciously, but the rest are still registering
subconsciously, preconsciously, and they
(10:48):
change us. How can we create human
performance buildings? Buildings that enhance memory,
stimulate, social interaction. And so while I'm
at Venice, what I begin to discover, I was there,
in fact, when there was that big, Aqualto
flood in 2019 in November, and
(11:10):
walking through the streets, and literally the water is up to
your waist. But the stores are still open and people are
staying in chairs and cafes, sipping their coffee, but it's
like, how does the city continue? The other curious
thing is, when you walk home at night from your studies in November,
all of the shop lights are on, but all the buildings
(11:33):
up above, the lights are off. And the reason is
that Venice is going through something, which we've
coined the the 2 floods. And it's the floods
as a result of, rising, sea
levels because of, environmental issues. But
the second flood is the flood of mass tourism. Venice in
(11:56):
the 19 sixties had a population of 275,000.
Right now, it's less than 50,000. That's a 70%
decline, and that's because everybody has moved out
because the only jobs you can get or if you wanna serve,
coffees in a in in in a in a restaurant. And so what
(12:16):
we decided was we need to change Venice because Venice,
for your children and definitely your grandchildren, it won't exist.
At 1.5 degree, the city,
about a third of it, will be underwater, which we're around right now.
And so what the plan is was to
continue doing what Venice has done since the beginning of time,
(12:39):
which is build islands and create, a
necklace, an archipelago of new and existing islands.
And by doing that, you can lower the water in the middle
down to historic levels. The important thing is it
creates a 30 2 kilometer new park, which
is very good for people to go out and have their allotment
(13:01):
gardens. It's also bringing agritech industry
in, meaning that suddenly the universities, 4 great
universities, you don't stay there. Like at U of T,
you get a degree, you start a business up here. There, you don't. You
go because there is an opportunities. So suddenly, the sophistication
of food production, food security, food export, which
(13:24):
Venice has already done. But it's looking
at economic health, societal
health, physical health, and ecological health as a
fundamental of city making. Amazing. I
wanna now move to this incredible book, Constructing Health. I
know the reaction from the public. I know Indigo's raving about it. They
(13:46):
consider it the book for the holiday season. How's your fellow
architects reacted? Because very often when someone steps
outside of what I would call the silo or the barriers or
or the conditions that we're supposed to operate on and takes a practice in a
new level, it it comes with both celebration and criticism. There's
this amazing young architect, in the
(14:08):
States who, was interviewing me on on,
on the book. And she said to me or I was saying, well, how's this
embraced in your office? And she said to me, well, I can't
talk to the partners about it. They don't believe the environment
impacts your health. So there is a real mindset
of of people that that really don't believe it.
(14:30):
And in fact, I think you see that in in some of the education, but
in fact, there's a whole movement about a
humanist movement about architecture and humanity
that, went to sleep for about a 100 years or so,
and now it's definitely emerging. And this this book is being
taught, in the United States, as as
(14:53):
we speak. You know, you talk about salutogenic design.
For us that aren't architects, break that down what it
means, not only for us to understand it, but if you could wave
a magic wand and see the world starting to embrace it, how our life
would change? Salutogenesis is exactly
what your show is about. In fact, I think you need to re
(15:16):
rename your show, the Saluda Salutogenic
Soul podcast because your podcast, as I
understand it, is discussing with people that have
gone through extraordinary circumstances often very
negative and have come out of it in a transformed
way. And Salutogenesis is exactly about
(15:39):
that. Let me step back a little bit. It was coined by
a guy called Antonovsky, who was a Israeli
American doctor, and he studied people that went
through terrible, terrible situations. And in fact,
a number of them that went through the holocaust. And he couldn't
understand why some of these people came
(16:01):
through such an experience, but
were really able to frame a way forward. So
he coined this word called slutogenesis. Very
few of us know that word, but do you know the word pathogens,
pathogenic? Of course, we do. And
pathogenic comes from the root words that land in the Greek words of
(16:24):
pathogenesis, which is meaning disease and the
origins. Our whole medical system is a pathogenic
system, stopping bad things from happening. Salutogenesis
comes from the Latin and the root words of solace and
genesis. Solace, the goddess of of health
and well-being. So instead of stopping bad
(16:46):
things from happening, Salutogenesis is about
health creation, this idea of a sense of coherence
and meaning a sense of purpose. So, Tony, if you don't have a sense of
purpose, you're probably not gonna get up in the morning. And he sort
of supported that concept around 3 ideas, which
was about comprehensibility, manageability,
(17:10):
and meaningfulness. Meaning, do you see a path
forward? Do you think you have the resources to to
get you through it? But more importantly, that you have
meaning and purpose. But think of the buildings you come
into. Do you know where the front door is? How do I get into
this building? So the sense of coherence doesn't
(17:31):
exist. The manageability when you get in, do you know how to move
through it? The comprehensibility, but most importantly,
the buildings communicate meaning and purpose to
us, which gives us that extra spring in our step. The
statistic that I discovered, which shows exactly where we
are, we are in a period that's only about a 150
(17:55):
years old Western evidence based medicine that is a
pathogenic view. For 3000 years of human history,
which I trace in the book, we had a salutogenic view,
but we shifted away. And the evidence is there
are 8,000 known causes or
symptoms of disease, but there's only
(18:17):
80 known causes or symptoms of health
and well-being. My purpose with the book is to
begin to change our mindset towards a fluidogenic
view. What's it like for you walking into places
now where I would imagine most architects
view it, try to understand the motivations behind it, but now you're
(18:39):
looking at it from sort of the body and mind and soul of the individual.
I think myself as well as the team I collaborate,
we're just a lot more intentional about what we do and, in fact,
the way we see, being able to really
connect the dots of what enhances human performance.
How receptive are clients to this? Because
(19:02):
ultimately, the end the end game is someone that's gonna work
in that building, someone who's gonna find their spirits elevated.
In fact, the the clients have been extraordinarily,
responsible, and and we work primarily with purpose based
organizations, lots in in in the health and and the knowledge
sectors edge education. It's shifting away a little
(19:26):
bit from the analogy I like to use is a lot of the buildings we
create are like hamburgers. Well, a hamburger is very functional, isn't
it? You don't need a knife and a fork and a plate. You can hold
it in your hands and and consume it. It does what it asks you to
do, doesn't it? Gives you protein and calories,
but it leaves you feeling empty after about an hour
(19:48):
you had it, and it does more damage to you because the
sodium content and all the over
processed nature of it. A lot of our buildings are like that. They're
transactional. They only do what they're asked for. With
our clients though, Tony, if you spend, say,
$1 on a building, how much do you spend over the life of that
(20:10):
building on the heating and the cooling of it? $5. Well, that's a
lot of money, so you better focus on the mechanical, the
electrical systems, the envelope so it's functional from that
standpoint. But how much do you spend on the people inside
the building through the life of that? $10?
50? 100? It's $200.
(20:33):
If you if there's 1 penny 1 cent of that
dollar that has an impact on the
performance, memory, social interaction, creativity,
empathy, learning, as a result of the design
decisions, it has massive impact on on
an organization. And so when we get into those discussions, the
(20:55):
clients say, you're absolutely right. And we can see it as a
result of the performance of of the buildings we create.
What is that cost benefit analysis? Because some of these
investments might take a little bit more upfront, but there is a
payback period. Whether it's putting in a heat pump, additional
insulation, those are all decisions that you should be thinking about
(21:18):
as you go through that process, and they will pay you back over time.
What you heard was words of wisdom from Leah Robinson, who's gonna join me later
in the show and talk about greener homes. But when we
return, Kai and I continue to talk about homes and buildings
being more than just a place to be, but a place to be healthier. And
of course, my 3 takeaways. Hi. It's Tony
(21:40):
Chapman from Shatter That Matters. RBC is offering more
financing options to support Canadian homeowners looking
to maximize their property's potential. Whether you want to provide
supportive housing for a family member or supplement your income with a
rental, RBC's Construction Mortgage Multi Units Program has
you covered. You can finance additions like laneway homes,
(22:02):
garden suites, modular units, or even redevelop your home
into duplexes or triplexes. Speak to an RBC mortgage specialist
today to see how this program can work for you. Maximizing the potential of
your home? Well, that matters to you, to me, and to RBC.
My guest today is Tai Farrow. I'm proud to call him a Canadian
(22:22):
architect, but he's world renowned for integrating neuroscience
in architectural design. When he does so, it promotes
our health and well-being. Not only does he design buildings that
are a place to be, but also wants to be healthy.
Do you see a time when a Faroe
(22:44):
building, people that are leasing it, people that are involved with
filling it with people can say to them, this has the
same or even greater benefit than the building that might be 2
blocks over that's on a subway station. In other words, if there's real
value in terms of how they market the building because to
me, capitalism also has to inherit this philosophy saying
(23:06):
this is good business for you to be located here. Well, let me give you
an example of that. So we have just opened about a year
ago the largest, most important
cancer center in the ancient city of Jerusalem, 5000 years
old. It's a building on a very big important, medical
campus. So what are the metrics that that would be something
(23:28):
that you could measure this thing, that the chair of the board would be significant?
Well, let's look at 2 stats. Right now, in
Canadian hospitals globally around the world, we
have a shortage of somewhere between 15 to 35
percent of doctors and nurse nurses and medical staff.
We just can't get staff. Those positions are open, and we can't fill
(23:51):
them. In Jerusalem, even relatively new
hospitals have exactly the same problem. They can't get staff
to fill the building. What about ours? There
is a lineup of the leading medical
people that wanna go and work there. There are no
empty positions. It's remarkable in the phenomenon
(24:12):
that's happening. But what about the other side of the equation?
Right now, people that have either gone through cancer
or, in fact, they have lost family members, they're
asking the staff if they can come and inhabit
the public areas of our cancer center. They wanna come back
and embrace it effectively like a community center, which
(24:35):
doesn't happen. And, importantly, since
the hospital has been keeping patient satisfaction
records, this patient satisfaction records for
this billing are the highest ever
that the hospital has recorded. So if you were the
CEO or the chair of the board of that organization,
(24:58):
are these stats meaningful to you? Is there anything that
we should be thinking about even within our own homes
to understand, you know, as I used in the opening
instead of you are what you, we, you are where you are.
What we need to step back and understand the way that the mind
works is the way that we build, person
(25:21):
to place relationships is exactly our mind.
It's the same way that we build person to person relationships.
So what are characters and qualities of environments that offer
that? In the book, I talk about one thing, and we use it a lot,
is the material wood. Wood's very interesting
because you can see the grain. You can imagine it growing, over
(25:44):
time. But the important thing about wood is
that it works to all your senses. When you look at it, you see
the grain. When you touch it, doesn't feel like,
steel. It doesn't take the temperature from you. The other important
thing is, you know, that sound on walking on wood,
think of the deck up north, that relates to
(26:07):
your theta And beta waves, which is both the
positive and the negative wood works perfectly in the
positive side of sound, which is lowering blood pressure,
heart rate, but also the scent of what think of a sauna,
you know, that smell of cedar. That in fact does the same thing.
It changes your physiology. So if we can use these
(26:29):
tools, in our environments, they have an
impact as well as I write about that you wanna linger in
these spaces, you wanna spend more time with people, it changes
your physiology and your biology as as a result of
it. Just remember, it's using all of the
tools. We're very sort of visually focused because of
(26:51):
Instagram and TikTok and these things, but your body,
the multimodal sensorial part is the key piece of the
equation. Ty, the the interesting narrative that seems to be
roaring through workplaces, ordering people back to
office. Why are we not creating spaces where people wanna be
there and thrive being there versus feeling they have to be there?
(27:13):
You know, I I think the book is popular because through COVID,
we began to realize that the environment has a
significant effect of us, and we suddenly woke up and said, what
the hell am I doing commuting to this miserable
space, you know, that I feel as if I'm in a little tuna can,
and in fact, the statistics show that the environment
(27:36):
changes your brain, your synapses. If the environment
there's a great study of mice, and if the mice are in
environments that are impoverished, they shrink the synapse connections.
And if they're in enriched environment, in fact, they grow the synapse connections
by about 25%. We voted by our
feet that we don't wanna go back to the office because it's
(27:58):
not authentic, and we found it in places we we call
home. The only way we're gonna get people back
to the office is if we start focusing on
people, human needs, and the ability to create
the conditions of which I can thrive and prosper as opposed
to merely survive. You know, I think if we do
(28:20):
that, the same thing that happened to your Cancer Institute in Jerusalem,
people will be auditioning to work for those companies, and they will have a
competitive advantage because they will have a place that attracts the best of the
best. And equally stimulates them of all the complex
issues that, you know, what we need to do together to solve these
issues is these environments enhance the
(28:43):
creativity, social interaction, memory, and on and
on. We need to start using these spaces
as, like, super, super foods, like little
blueberries that are packed full of minerals and vitamins. You can do
it the same to space. We have to do it
intentionally. What about elderly care? Because I look at
(29:04):
you know, I'm doing a lot of work on longevity right now. And the thing
that everybody comes back to me that are 50 plus, I don't
wanna ever go there. I wanna stay in my home.
Is there a lesson to be learned for for the people that are creating these
spaces for people when they get to the point where they need to have some
kind of assisted living that we can be doing a lot to extend
(29:27):
the quality of their life, their cognitive ability, their their physic physical
ability? We just opened a, a facility,
towards London, Ontario. The whole building is semicircular,
all the public spaces. You can start in one space, and as
you move through it, your view is continuously changing.
You can look out to the front, you can look out at the side. And
(29:49):
what we know is that we have to exercise our
muscles or apathy, they begin to shrink away. We're creating
these environments for people that are mind numbing.
And it's not only for the people, the the older people that are
staying there, but in fact, it's, equally for
the the the people that are working there. And we're involved in something that's called
(30:12):
the Treehouse right now, which is, for adult
living in the in the city. We're designing whole
living intergenerational housing. It's good for stimulating
building relationships with the older people, but equally important
with, younger people. And these things we have to
do intentionally. There's a lot of affordable housing that's being built,
(30:34):
and it's all about modular housing, you know, construction. That's great,
so we can roll it out quickly. But a lot of them are like
19 fifties, you know, motels. And the whole thing
about these things is they have to offer dignity, that
when you're living there, you feel special. It doesn't mean a lot of
money, but it means creating something that you
(30:56):
feel you have dignity and you can flourish and thrive.
That needs to be the number one piece. It has to be
affordable on time and easy to construct, but let's create
conditions of which we can thrive and prosper. Clyde, where do you go from
here? You strike me as you're here for a reason. The
people you've met along the way, the Yodas that have embraced you, the the the
(31:19):
learning. What are you gonna do in the next 10 years with it? Because you
could certainly turn it into just continuing to build your practice. But
to me, I sense with this book and just talking with you today, there's a
higher calling. What can we do through the act of place
making that can bring people together to share?
And these ideas, a big theme of environmental enrichment
(31:40):
is around generosity. I mean, just think of generosity
as as a common theme. You know, what's a generosity
and affordances? Affordances, you know, when you walk up to a
door and you don't know if you should push or pull the door,
and you feel sort of like an idiot or it says push or pull, that's
not generous, and it doesn't afford you to know
(32:03):
how to move through it. How many barriers are we creating
where in fact we need to do the opposite, and we have to shift
to a salutogenic, a health causing view
in all aspects. And I would say, salutogenesis,
you meet people that are very salutogenic, health giving,
and in fact, we know environments that are similar to that.
(32:26):
That is the mission is to bring this forward
and disseminate it widely. And so this book,
it's written for students in architecture and cognitive scientists.
It's written as a resource for professionals in both those
areas. Got lots of data, lots of information. But
most importantly, as you know, it's 11 inches square. It's got
(32:48):
450 images. We designed the whole book. It's
very immersive. There's headings, so you you don't have to start at
the beginning. You can jump into the middle. It can be a coffee
table because it needs to be disseminated to the
public. Because once you see it, you can't unsee
it, and you question everything year round. That's the purpose.
(33:11):
I gotta ask you the question again that you avoid it. You, Ty Farrell,
10 years from now, are you even gonna be putting pen to
paper, or are you gonna be much more someone that's you
hope to lead this cause around the world that we
can do a much better job with our spaces and
places. As you correct, I mean, instead of about preventing health, you can be
(33:33):
embracing and lifting how we feel, how we think, and how we
do. I'm a practitioner, Tony. I I think
through through making. By the act of making, I can have
significant impact, big or small. The journey so
far for me has been interesting because something's come up
in front of me, and I've said, well, why don't I try that or why
(33:55):
don't I why don't I move down that path? And in
fact, it's it's led to to amazing things, which
is really the realization that we need to think of
architecture not about what it is, but what
it does and its ability to cause
health. Architecture as a noninvasive
(34:16):
therapeutic treatment, that has the
ability to be transformative, generous,
offering affordances, and specifically dignity,
but its ability to cause hell. So, Ty, I
always end my interviews, my 3 takeaways, and
I love your book. I continue to pick it up, and I continue to go
(34:38):
to those headlines and everything you said. It certainly has that impact on me, and
I know it'll have on others. I just think what's interesting about you is
these Yodas you have met along the way. You know, you end up meeting,
and next thing you know, you're going a week a a month in Venice to
study, and, you know, this person was connected to Freud and all of this
wonderful tapestry of people that have influenced you. And it's
(35:00):
almost like the torch has been passed to you. You know, the second thing
that you brought out is this sort of almost from transactional
to transformative and using data and empirical
evidence to let people open their minds to what could be easily
dismissed as an intangible. Of course, I want my employees to feel better,
but actually starting to put empirical evidence that says, you know, for every dollar that
(35:22):
building costs, $200 goes into people. Let's impact that. And
I think that's just a really good advice for people that even what
seems like the most ethereal or intangible or
really locked into the minds of great thinkers, if you can break it
down sometimes into the simplest of math, you can impact change. And I think
you do that extraordinary well. And then the final thing that you came
(35:45):
back to me and said, I love the art of
making. Sometimes we get promoted beyond what we
love to do. Sometimes we chase financial rewards beyond
what we love to do. But if there's something you love and you're passionate
about and can impact others, can transform others' lives,
that is a good life lived. So for all of that and more, Ty
(36:07):
Ferro, I'm I'm just honored you join me on Chatter That Matters. Tony, it's
amazing to be with you because the the people that that you
you have, you tell a story about a journey.
Joining me now is Leah Robinson. She's the vice president of home equity
financing at RBC. Leah, welcome. Tony, thanks
(36:29):
for having me. I'm happy happy to join you today on this important topic.
Let's talk about green homes. There's an there's an incredible
appetite to do more for mother nature. But when I
talk to people, they always talk about how expensive it is. Is there
anything you're doing from your end to help people to kind of
(36:49):
treat our planet better and at the same time be a little kinder to their
pocketbook? You know, I think one of the things that people don't know is is
what large polluters, buildings and homes are, both both
commercial and and residential. And so there's actually a
big opportunity here from a housing perspective to look at
how do we solve that problem. And so when you look at things like retrofitting
(37:11):
homes and building homes, we have a great opportunity in
Canada to really start tackling this problem differently. Where
consumers are looking at some of this is there still is, you know, some
consideration of what that green premium looks like. And so
there's a real factor that needs to come into play in terms of looking at
what is that cost benefit analysis because some of these
(37:33):
investments might take a little bit more upfront, but there is a
payback period, whether it's putting in a heat pump, additional
insulation, windows and doors that are that that
will help keep the heat in your home. Those are all decisions
that you should be thinking about as you go through that process, and they will
pay you back over time. And if I went to RBC with that
(37:55):
idea, is that something you'd also help me to understand is what
is the payback on that green investment? We're building tools and resources,
for customers. One of the the common pieces that people do is get
an energy audit, which is an outside professional, that would do
that evaluation on your home. Our mortgage specialists are great. They know a lot
about about mortgage financing and things like that, but climate,
(38:18):
and and impacts of homes really serve that growing area. So
there's information, there's tools and resources. We're looking at what we can do, but I'd
say one of the best things to start out is is looking at getting that
energy audit, and helping you to better understand what would be
unique and best to do to your home and your given your specific
circumstances. Leah Robinson, as always, a pleasure to have
(38:40):
you on, Chatter That Matters. Thanks, Tony. Thanks for having me. Have a
great day. Once again, a special thanks to RBC
for supporting Chatham That Matters. It's Tony Chapman. Thanks
for listening, and let's chat
soon.
Popular Podcasts
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy And Charlamagne Tha God!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Decisions, Decisions
Welcome to "Decisions, Decisions," the podcast where boundaries are pushed, and conversations get candid! Join your favorite hosts, Mandii B and WeezyWTF, as they dive deep into the world of non-traditional relationships and explore the often-taboo topics surrounding dating, sex, and love. Every Monday, Mandii and Weezy invite you to unlearn the outdated narratives dictated by traditional patriarchal norms. With a blend of humor, vulnerability, and authenticity, they share their personal journeys navigating their 30s, tackling the complexities of modern relationships, and engaging in thought-provoking discussions that challenge societal expectations. From groundbreaking interviews with diverse guests to relatable stories that resonate with your experiences, "Decisions, Decisions" is your go-to source for open dialogue about what it truly means to love and connect in today's world. Get ready to reshape your understanding of relationships and embrace the freedom of authentic connections—tune in and join the conversation!