Supporting More Sustainable Specification
How Mecho helps architecture and design teams navigate evolving sustainability and material health priorities
Sustainable specification used to come with a relatively familiar set of criteria: low-VOC materials, recycled content, responsible sourcing, and requirements tied to programs such as LEED.
Those considerations haven't gone away. But architecture and design teams are now evaluating material health, embodied carbon, ingredient transparency, circularity, supply chain impacts, and other factors alongside performance, aesthetics, durability, budget, and occupant needs.
For firms including LPA Design Studios, BA, and Little, that evolution has changed both how products are evaluated and what designers need from manufacturer partners.
Mecho supports that process with shading solutions designed to meet a range of sustainability and performance goals, accessible product information and documentation, and knowledgeable representatives who can help design teams understand the details behind a specification.
Specification Goals
At LPA Design Studios, Material Impact Manager Jill Pedro has watched specification criteria move beyond requirements such as low-VOC materials, recycled content, and responsible sourcing to address embodied carbon, chemicals of concern, circularity, supply chain transparency, and other material impacts.
BA has experienced a similar evolution. Its internal material evaluation framework considers sustainability alongside durability, maintenance, performance, aesthetics, budget, and client requirements.
Little has also incorporated material transparency into its architectural specifications and corporate materials standards. The firm's approach has moved beyond compliance-based requirements to a broader evaluation of material health within Architectural specifications.
The result is more information for designers to evaluate and more nuance in determining how sustainability attributes apply to the exact product, material, or option being considered.
For BA, that range allows designers to address the needs of different spaces without setting aside the firm's material health priorities.
“The range of shading solutions allows us to easily address different performance and occupant needs based on the space and use type, while also supporting our sustainability and material health goals,” says Heather Park, Senior Associate Interior Designer at BA.
Park points specifically to Mecho's selection of Red List Free shade textiles.
“Having access to a broad selection of Red List Free shade textiles gives our designers confidence that we can meet project-specific shading requirements without having to compromise on our material health priorities.”
Partnership in Practice
That support can also extend to the product itself.
For BA, Mecho's value also comes from the expertise and responsiveness of its team.
“Having knowledgeable representatives who can clearly explain sustainability attributes and quickly provide supporting documentation is invaluable to our specification process,” Park says.
For BA's Seattle office, that partnership was put into practice when one of the firm's larger clients needed a healthier material option for a blackout shade fabric.
Rather than asking the design team to find an alternative that met the requirement, Mecho’s sales and product development team presented a newly reformulated fabric to support the project.
“That level of collaboration and commitment to continuous product improvement is highly valued and makes Mecho a strong partner,” Park says.
As our VP of Engineering noted:
Partnership Results
Pedro has relied on Mecho for window shade systems and fabrics for the past decade and continues to recommend the company in her sustainability-focused role. Breemes works directly with Mecho through mindful MATERIALS working groups focused on advancing material transparency across the industry. For BA, the Red List Free blackout fabric is one example of how feedback from designers and clients can translate into product improvement.
As sustainable specification becomes more nuanced, designers need to understand what documentation applies, how options differ, and which products can meet both sustainability priorities and project requirements.
Mecho's role is to make those decisions easier with shading solutions that give designers options and the product knowledge and support to help them choose the right one.