Wellness can be luxurious, but luxury is not required for well-being. Introducing Delos WELLness and Luxury.
The latest trend after LEED certification is bound to be WELLness Certification according to twin brothers Paul and Peter Scialla, who make up the real estate development group DELOS. They have dedicated the last five years to the science of WELLness-living and have invested a small fortune to bring their concept to reality. What Wellness means is not quite defined, but it encompasses a broad range of requirements from air, light, and sound quality, sensory input from textural surfaces, to the purest and cleanest of foods and storage thereof. With a price tag starting at $15.5 Million, a condo in their near complete complex in the West Village of Manhattan is pie in the sky for most of us.
Initiatives to green our planet and improve our lives often sprout from the few who can afford to be pioneers, but luxury and wellness, or simply living well, can be achieved in many ways. In past articles, we have written extensively about criteria for well living similar to what Delos incorporates in their buildings, and by following those basic steps to a sustainable and healthy lifestyle, it can also be done on a budget.
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SPACE:
Having enough space is not equal to having a lot of square footage. It is how your space is laid out, and how you function in it, that matters most. We often tackle mega-mansions that are completely impossible to live in, or small houses with additions so out of proportion with the rest of the house that they dwarf the original. But what we mostly find is that these houses are not very livable. I still hear the complaint that rooms are underused and that vital functions don’t quite fit in anywhere. So space is not so much about “how big” but simply “how.”
By organizing the lay-out of your home based on Function Centers™ © and having rooms serve more than one function if necessary, you are more than half way to WELLness living.
LIGHT:
Light is a major part of our physical and mental functioning. It is incorporated in the interior environment of the DELOS apartments to underscore and support the body’s natural Circadian rhythms. 
LED lights shift with the time of the day to give you the right boost at the right time. We know, from having installed lighting systems in as diverse situations as storefronts and private libraries, that cost can range tremendously. But LED is a reality now, and even if you can’t afford the full-fledged programmable system, you can replace light bulbs with LEDs of the right temperatures in bedrooms, kitchens etc. Sometimes a photographic gel can suffice to get the right wave-length for the right time of day.
WATER:
Pure water is essential and figures high on the list of amenities in the DELOS WELLness concept. They alternately take away minerals and add vitamins in places so the water you drink and bathe in is always balanced with its purpose in mind. A whole house water filtration system has been one of our recommendations for some time now. For the sake of cost, we recommend a 2 stage system placed so you can easily change the filters. We use an inexpensive filter to take the larger particles, such as rust and other large minerals.
This filter gets changed at least once a month. The next filter is finer – it filters microbes, chlorine, and other unwanted micro-particles. It is more expensive but, with the pre-filtration, you should be able to extend its life and have clean water through its recommended cycle. If you want to add vitamin C to your shower, there is a showerhead attachment just for that. We also recommend replacing pipes that are more than 25 years old with PEX tubing. You can add different energy to your bath water as well with colored light. Again, simple LED lights in various colors can be placed so they shine through the stream as you fill the tub or take a shower.
Read more about other interior elements in the coming weeks. Next week’s elements are Air, Touch, and Sound.