Latest / RoofersCoffeeShop / The Building Envelope Evolved: Better Design, Lower Risk
Transcript
- Karen Edwards: Welcome to Roofing Road Trips, the podcast that takes you on a thrilling journey across the world of roofing. From fascinating interviews with roofing experts to on-the-road adventures, we'll uncover the stories, innovations, and challenges that shape the rooftops over our heads. So fasten your seat belts and join us as we embark on this exciting roofing road trip. Hello and welcome to Roofing Road Trips from Roofers Coffee Shop. My name is Heidi Ellsworth, and we are live, yes. Live with this podcast from the beautiful Building Envelope Center from Suprema in right outside of Dallas, Texas. I have to tell you, amazing facility, and I am with some amazing guests to really talk about what's going on, not just with Suprema, but overall in the industry, what's happening with the building envelope, what's happening with architects, designers. There is just a lot that we're looking forward to covering all around Building Envelope as we sit in this beautiful center. so I am so proud and so happy to invite or welcome both of our guests here today. We have Matt and Andrew who are both in architectural cells. and I'm gonna let them tell you you a little bit about them. So gentlemen, welcome to the show. It's great to be here. Okay. So let's start with some introductions. So Andrew, why don't we start with you? If you could introduce yourself and tell us what you do with Suprema. Great. my name is Andrew Morrison. Live pretty local to here in Fort Worth. and as in my role as an architectural rep sales representative for Suprema, I cover the state of Texas and am also doing a little bit of work in Oklahoma, focusing on education and assisting design professionals with construction documents, details, and ultimately serving as a resource throughout the process. Awesome. Awesome. Such an important role. It's so important from the very beginning. And Matt, if you could introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about what you're doing. Yeah, thank you. I've been in commercial construction for ten years now, the last six, focusing on the building envelope broadly in a few different capacities. and and like Andrew, my job is to support the AEC community as they specify and design high performance building enclosure. and what that means today is education. Yeah. That's the number one thing that is I don't know if it's lacking, but it's something that's desperately needed right now as so many trained professionals have retired over the last five to ten years and we've been at pains to replace them because you know this is an industry of tribal knowledge, right? Yes. Who's the guy? He knows everything and yeah we're trying to replace that guy and the most important thing that manufacturers can do and it's what we love doing every day is actually sitting down and teaching someone something they didn't know before. So that they can do better on their next job. That's so important too. It's bringing us all together for the professionalism of the industry overall. And what when we're talking about the industry overall, I mean we're on Roofers Coffee Shop, so of course we love the roof, but we have seen how important it is. I mean I've seen definitely through my career that we have to be looking at the building envelope. everything transitions, roof to wall to below grade. And if you don't have the right products and you don't have the right installation, you're going to have problems. So Matt, I'd like to kind of start with you on what is that problem and what are you seeing out there really when we're talking about building envelope and building sciences. So you can look at it on a macro level or you can look at it on a micro level, but in the middle, it's very simple. The building envelope is probably a hundred times more complex to execute now than it ever has been. It's a massive kit of parts, in other words, and it's treated that way, from design all the way through to substantial completion, but it it has to function as a unified whole. In other words, we don't care here's the parapet. Yeah. Right? Roof to wall, number one transition that leaks. We don't actually care why it's leaking at the parapet, if it was the roofers' fault or the waterproofers' fault, if it was the consultant's fault, it we actually don't care. What we care about is that the building is leaking. Right. And the reason that it the this is so challenging is because the detail I just described involves a dozen stakeholders and a lot of and no one wants to do that. But it's the nature of the process that we're all a part of that it's just very hard to get to the bottom of Why is this leaking and who's gonna do something about it? Right? Whose responsibility is it? Yeah. That's the challenge in a nutshell right now. I I I and I just from my experience I have seen that over and over again. but we have seen a lot of contractors, a lot of commercial roofing contractors who are now building envelope contractors. They have taken on the cladding, the waterproofing, really the full scale as we're going through it. And Andrew, you used to work for a contractor. And you have a lot of field experience. What are some of the things you've been seeing as on this progression of contract the design community and contractors really starting to go that click of I need to be thinking about the whole building envelope? That it's not just their fault. so to to Matt's point, I think that traditionally, as we've looked at this as a kind of a kit of individual parts over time, the same issues continue to happen, right? oftentimes. And and so I think from a contractor's standpoint, when there are various trades involved in let's say installing the air barrier, and let's say it's a a roofing contractor that's doing a tear off and a roof replacement, you know, they're overnight tie-ins. How how does that tie in to the air barrier in the the scope, right? You know, the process of of the location of where the air barrier contractor is. Are they disrupting the overnight tie-in in that situation? If water gets inside of the assembly, who's at fault? and and how how how is that issue rectified? So I think it's it's a natural evolution that as you as as these trades have to intersect, that you want to shoulder more of that burden, right, with the right, you know, your your your right the right guys in the field, if you will, the guys that are trained and know. So I think that that's a process of bringing on of taking on a larger scope is obviously training up your folks and and we love doing trainings at Suprema with contractors and design professionals. But yeah, I think it's a natural evolution really to to realize that okay, if we are the one the sole responsible party for this envelope, then we can help schedule it appropriately, phase the the work in the way that makes the most sense. Yeah. Well and when you look back at the history of where we're at with the building envelope. science. we went from RCI, Roofing Roof Consultant Institute, to IBEC, which is now all about the building envelope. And most of the consultants out there and a number of architects, this is their their focus, is the building envelope. So you know, Matt, as you're looking at that and really thinking, watching the history and the trans you know ten even in the last ten years that you've been involved. This has really become a number one issue on the design side. What are some of the things that are driving that? Well, the buildings are getting bigger, they're getting more expensive, the stakes are getting higher, and the leaks keep happening. Yeah. Right? Yeah. I mean in sales, right? What's the number one thing people say when we show them a fix? I wish you had been here six months ago. Because I didn't know that then. I just had that problem and now I right. little by little what we did was take most of the stakeholders in the project delivery process away from the pain of the field. Right. Architect means master builder, right? People who n actually know historically how to do everything that it takes to design and build a building. Right? True. And over time, because of specialization of labor, everyone has gone into very specific job functions as a part of building that building, but no one can see the whole elephant anymore. It's not just architects, it's GCs It's the installers, it's the manufacturers. Yeah. But slowly but surely over the last five, ten, fifteen years, people have been coming and coming back and seeing the pain that's happening in the field because it's affecting their business, it's affecting their daily life. eventually the balloon gets so big that it pops. And a it's I started pushing this because what we're tacitly doing is talking about How can you single source and eliminate this liability? Can you single source it from a d design build contractor, from a manufacturer, from an installer? We're all the whole industry's talking about that. Right. I started pushing that really hard myself about four years ago, and people were like, yeah, it's kind of whatever. Yeah. but that sounds like a big change from what we're doing right now. It is, yeah. Recently though, it's what everyone's looking for, and they're like We really need to change because what we're doing right now is so painful. I can't do this anymore. I need to f I need a solution. I'm willing to actually do something different. Yeah, and this the demand is being pushed, right? From building owners, developers, g G Cs who have seen the problems time over and time again, they're pushing back on the design community, saying, Plus you have codes, the air barriers, there's just a lot has kind of come into place to make these changes happen. over the last ten years. I'll give you a specific example. Airtightness. Yes. Airtightness is the sum total of the performance of all the products that make up the envelope, right? Because you can leak in the wall, you can leak at the roof, you can leak anywhere. So it doesn't actually matter what the air tightness potential of a product is. It doesn't even matter what the airtightness of one system is, it matters what the airtightness of the envelope is. And that's why Increasingly municipalities are starting to enforce things like the blower door test where you depressurize the entire building, measure the air changes per hour through the test chamber, and that tells you how tight your whole building is. And then there are ways to diagnose where the specific leaks are and you know, but but that's a performance verification, right? Whereas before we looked at a number of different pieces of a data sheet and we said if if you hit these numbers, that meets code. Yeah. But codes get tighter and tighter and we're increasingly calling for real wor world performance, demonstrable performance in the codes, rather than data checking. And there's you just you really make me think about this in that there are so many different scenarios too. I mean, we're here in Texas right now and you walk outside and it's very humid. I mean, compared to Oregon, where I'm from, which is just it rains a lot. and so when you talk about controlling leaks, controlling moisture, there's also such a regionality that goes around that too. And Matt, I know that you are now national and looking at this nationally with all these design commu with the design community. How how do you kind of how how do you approach that? Climate and cruise. Those are the two things to look at when you're doing product selection. In my experience, I used to actually started my career in New York, so in a cold climate. Yeah. I was there for three years, four years, and and now I've been here for six years or something. the two things you need to look for are what's the external load, right? What what is the building actually going to have to protect against? We don't live in a static world. The the outside is trying to get in, right? So in a cold climate, what you have is hotter inside, colder outside. Yeah. And what that means is you're going to try to equalize through the building envelope from inner to outer. Right. So we have to think about what temperature and vapor drive are going to do throughout the year and then design according to that. Okay. It's the opposite in the South, right? So that's one thing you have to take into account when it comes to product selection. But the other is what can the actual crews who are actually going to be installing those products actually train to do. In the Northeast, at least historically, it was on the wall peeling stick air barriers. Mm-hmm. Right? You've got a four foot roll with a release liner, you peel it off, and it's a big old sheet across the building. Right. Down here in Texas, that One in fifty jobs will go peel and stake. It's all fluid applied. Right. So if I'm talking to an architect and they want a a consult on what type of air barrier, well, we need to specify for the climate and with the crews. Right. And location. Because why would you there are a lot of benefits to peel and stake, don't get me wrong. But why would you specify something that you're unlikely to get the benefit of because the local crews aren't trained to do it? Right. Right. Yeah. That makes so much sense. So Andrew, I wanna kinda bring that those thoughts 'cause we said product selection, right? So you're visiting architects every single day throughout and then on job sites, following through and all of that. Talk to us a little bit about Suprema. I mean Suprema has been obviously in the waterproofing world for a decade or I mean a century. And fifty years of really looking at that internationally, very I mean, huge presence now in the US. What are some of the things you're talking to your c architects about when it comes to product selection to hit on some of those factors of how Suprema can solve those problems? So, you know, historically I'd say over the last hundred years internationally, we've always been known as as a roofing and or waterproofing co you know company. Yeah. Depending on kind of where you are. The things that I'm kind of driving home with with the design community is one thing that I really appreciate about Suprema is that they have grown organically, I think, in in in terms of what I mean by that is they have continued doing what they've always done well as they've grown. You know, they haven't kind of put the cart before the horse, if you will, and and wanting to to see similar to the contracting contractor conversation that we just had as far as contractors taking on a larger scope. And the ones that are doing it well are doing that kind of organically as they as they're able to. And so I I really appreciate that Suprema has has not taken on more than they can do well. And that the name and the reputation are behind those products. And so I feel like as the in and that's kind of been regard irregardless and not dependent necessarily on the industry per se. You know, I think that maybe ten, fifteen years ago there was certainly there's always a cost pressure on any project, but there was more I I guess I would say in the last five to ten years I've heard much, much more industry wide conversation surrounding the idea of resiliency. that was a that was a term that you know I've been doing this for sixteen years. that was a term that I'd never heard. I I've always been talking high performance my entire career, but resiliency has never been a a kind of a buzzword. And I I would say in the last five years it has certainly become that where I hear about it at industry associations, from architects, from contractors, where the appreciation of of a truly resilient, long-term, high performing building envelope is kind of becoming more of a of a common conversation, I guess. And and I feel like that's That's what Supreme has always been about. That's what we're still about and that's what we're gonna continue to be about. And so let's give him an example. Yeah. I think that I think there's a great example that I know you can do in your sleep, right? Because what he's saying is that we should focus on the lifespan of the roof. Right? If you have a roof that performs for thirty years, whatever materials went into making it, all of the carbon calculations that we do, they're amortized over thirty years. If it only lasts twenty years So if you can get that extra five, the sustainability is the resiliency, right? That's the little secret. So talk about hail. Because the number one thing in Texas that a roof has to do is probably resist hail. Yeah? Yep. And a building professional, and this is where the building professionals are coming, we're hiring them all the time, people with fifteen years of experience like Andrew, right? What they need to be able to do is walk an architect or anyone through how do you make sure that this is going to perform for the hail that you're planning to get. Right. And it's a function of a number of different products. Yeah. So really quickly, how would you do it? How would you select You know, I think it really starts by qualifying the individual project. I think I think we you know, it's similar to we talk about master specs all the time. Master specs are great. That's a good starting point. You know, it it's it doesn't ultimately equate whatever should be selected for that particular project. You know, you talk about a value engineering process. There are projects where value engineering certain aspects of the building envelope are in line with that particular owner, you know, the long term use case of that facility. But then there are others where if you take that exact same process and methodology that you used previously to value engineer in case A that worked out well, but you're now doing it for a particular a completely different client and project type where it it is you're you're yeah, it's not a viable solution. And so I think it starts by by Looking at the individual project exposures, but certainly when it comes to like very severe hail, we are big proponents of multiply roofing, redundancy in the waterproofing layers. And so I think that when you have that as as kind of the belt and suspenders approach already built into your front end documents, to your construction documents as the standard for that project, that that obviously there's a lot of other pieces to to your Earlier point that have to get put together in order to have that be successful. You can't just throw a multiply roof and walk away and assume that it's going to come out well in the end. But by looking at approvals, by by evaluating systems to make sure that they meet those, whether it be wind loads, whether it be very severe hail, whatever the requirements are, I'm a big proponent of that. Whether we're looking at a modified or multiply roof system, or even if we're looking at at a single ply. What I d what can we do to build that Belt and Suspenders methodology or way of thinking into that project from the beginning to ensure long term performance? Because yeah. Well and I I I think w you said it right at the very beginning of this was how the term resiliency has become so important, it just goes back to the hell. It goes back to the fi the extreme fires we're having. It goes back to the hurricanes and the you know, everything Our weather is so much more extreme right now that the design community is having to build to that. And building codes are are requiring it now too. You know, as more and more jurisdictions adopt IBC twenty twenty four, you know, there are there are requirements now as far as calculating your windloads and and and designing around low level tornadoes. Yeah. and so yeah. Because you know we have it's really interesting too, as you really look at that and realize How much the weather, the building codes, and people say this all the time, is the minimum. Yes. And the actual communities, the building owners, the developers, are starting to require more. and then you add in sustainability with that, and you've now, okay, where does this take us on c net carbon, all the different things that are out there? So this relationship between the architect, the design community, and the contractors. is more important than ever. And I we we talked ahead of this podcast a little bit and I found it really interesting. But and I I'm gonna start with you, Andrew, really talking about that relationship and how the contractors are having to actually communicate probably more with architects and roof consultants and the staging because of value engineering, because of some of the things that are going on. But you are that You and you are that person who's trying to make that connection. Talk a little bit about that. So yeah, I think that that's been you know, a a realization that I've had over the last sixteen years, just what degree of influence the contractors really do have on on on sometimes on the education side, frankly, for design professionals. I mean they they are a not only just needed as far as installing putting on a roof or air barrier, what have you, but they are incredibly important stakeholders throughout that whole process. And so that's I think where having a manufacturer that is able to train their crews for the specific system that's being specified or installed, and be along for the ride, so to speak. If you you know that that that as questions come up, because they do on every single project, you know, we talked earlier, designed Yeah. Ideally would stop at the end of design development as you transition into construction documents, but that just doesn't that doesn't happen. That's not the real world. And so yeah, I think that that they are a critical component that yeah, that that we love to partner with and we appreciate their you know their expertise because I think to some of the other points that we made, they they see a lot of what actually happens. They see the constructibility of the systems that are being specified. They see the some of the you get out into the field and you realize this detail is not gonna work the way it's drawn up. And so to to kind of have those discussions early enough in the process and to be able to design around those eliminates a lot of the the the potential change orders down the road, which certainly the the architects, the building owners appreciate, and it helps to ensure that final product is is what you set out for it to be. Yeah. When you see the some of the commercial roofing contractors out there and the relationships they have with their local architects, with their local roof consultants, those are the smart companies. Those are the ones that have that relationship that are talking about what's happening and what products and resiliency and all those things way before it goes to bed. and are right there educating. what do you see, Matt, on a on even on a national level with that those relationships? I I I have to say I remember many years ago it was like a contractor did not want to work with a consultant at all. Now they are very, very close. what are you seeing? I we were talking about the about the CDT, the that certification that CSI provides, which is very valuable. one of the concepts that I learned when I studied for the C D T was IPD, integrated project delivery. And this was eight, nine years ago, I guess. integrated project delivery is like the opposite of design bid build. Right? Someone designs it, a bunch of people bid to build it, and then a bunch of people bid to do all of the sub, right? Right. everybody's got their lane and it's everybody's got their own incentives and profit centers and it contributes to the challenges we've been talking about. IPD is a it's it's a conceptually where all of those people get together, they all agree what they're going to do, and then they're all responsible for their piece of it. But a as if they were one company instead of three companies, right? And I'm seeing people increasingly as they build trust with someone start to partner up in that way because they're realizing that yes, low bid wins but it doesn't win forever because when it doesn't go well, people remember, you know. So so there are there are firms that are taking this in house and they're you know, expanding the definition of design build, you know, beyond where it's ever been before. there are firms that they they just offer extensive pre con or free con services, right? Where the G Cs are basically a part of the design process because they're helping wrinkle out those details, those constructibility issues, those pricing problems as early as Like, you know, fifteen percent D D twenty five percent D D's early early, early early materials. Yeah. Early, early, early. And then they start to partner with trades downstream. And so it's increasingly people are getting further and further up in the project delivery process and they're starting to solve these problems earlier and earlier. And to Andrew's point earlier about V E, w one of the things that manufacturers can do is kind of help kind of grease the skids. Between those companies, right? Because we always get the call if something leaks. It doesn't matter. I could have a piece of paper from everyone on the project team that says Suprema did everything perfectly. Right. In blood, they could sign it. Doesn't matter. I'm still gonna get called in when it leaks, right? Yeah. So we're sort of naturally incentivized to the good of a project. Right. Obviously we want to sell product, but it dealing with a leak takes a lot of time and energy, right? So one thing we can do for architects in the VE process. Is help them understand the nature of the VE that's being proposed to them. Okay, it's very technical. Money is simple, right? I can save you 50 grand. That's very simple. When you go from one product to another, the actual performance you're losing is not always readily apparent. It's actually complex. So one thing we can do is, and I've we've done this on you know multiple projects, an architect gets a VE proposal, they say, I don't really understand this. What's the cost benefit? We can help explain that to them and help them make a good informed decision about whether or not to accept or reject that VE, right? On the other hand, the the contractors are put into a position of VE ing on every single job just to make the schedule and the budget work. It's not like they're they probably wouldn't want to do it if they didn't have to because it's a lot of work, right? we can help them to VE within the system that was specified. as opposed to across multiple manufacturers. Nice. And what I mean is we can be a part of that project team where the guy says, look, here's just the pressure I'm under. I have to find these savings. Okay? They specified you, they specified this grade system. How can you help me get from here to here without losing the critical performance that I need on this scope? Yeah? And if I can help him do that, it's a big improvement over how VE has often gone conventionally, which is I'm gonna call every manufacturer until one gets me the number I need. Which of of course they have to make their budget. So what what what else can they do? But if you have a trusted relationship, mm-hmm, someone that you know that you can go to to help you when you need it, it makes the whole process much better and it makes it much more likely, nothing's certain, but much more likely that the good of the project is being maintained. Right. Right. Because there's that communication from the very beginning. A hundred percent. And and even as it goes through. you just are so perfect because you just came in. That was the question I was gonna ask you before we wrap up this podcast. I was gonna say, what can contractors do? Right? What should they be doing? And you answered it just absolutely perfect. Communication with the manufacturer, looking at the whole building envelope and the pro right products to go into those. I've learned a lot. Thank you. You guys are amazing. Thank you so much. any last thoughts for the our contractors out there? All my competitors would say this, but I w I wanna remind you of it. We want to work with you as closely as you want to work with us. Obviously there are natural limitations to how much support anyone can give a project, yeah, but the reason that we work here is because we want every project to work. We don't want our buildings to ever leak. And we say the same thing to the architects. So there is a a vast suite of services and people That Suprema will bring to bear to keep a building from leaking from design all the way through to being on site with you to fix a problem. Yeah. So take a leap and try to get to know your reps better than you do if you haven't already. You know, that's our goal is to build trust with you and to support your projects. I just can't say it much better than that. I want to say thank you to you both. Well done. Well done. Thank you very much for being here today. Thank you so much. Thank you. And thank you so much. Thank you all for being with us today for this live roofing road trip from the Building Envelope Center from Suprema outside of Dallas. I tell you what, we're going to have more podcasts coming from this location. This is so interesting, so much to learn. Please check out all of our podcasts under the Read, Listen, Watch Navigation. Be sure to subscribe and set those notifications. We'll be seeing you next time on Roofing Road Trips. If you've enjoyed the ride, don't forget to hit that subscribe button and join us on every roofing adventure. Make sure to visit rooferscoffeeshop.com to learn more. Thanks for tuning in and we'll catch you on the next roofing road trip.