07/10/2026
Turn over a box of crackers and you get a full ingredient list. Turn over a piece of drywall, insulation, or flooring, and you get nothing. Not because the information doesn’t matter, just because nobody’s required to give it to you here in the US.
Catherine Murphy [ Catherine Murphy Studio ], Education Director at Healthy Materials Lab, broke it down in this reel: Europe regulates that transparency. The US doesn’t, so it’s on architects and designers to do that digging themselves, usually one spec sheet at a time.
That’s exactly the gap Healthy Materials Lab’s courses exist to close, so building pros can make confident, healthier material choices without losing hours to research every single time.
We’ve admired this organization for some time. They’re a design research lab out of Parsons School of Design, built around the idea that health belongs at the center of every design decision, and we’re grateful for how much clarity they bring to a genuinely murky corner of this industry. Their courses are linked from Parsons Healthy Materials Lab
And when you’re ready to source the materials themselves, our team and showroom are a resource too.
Reposted Video by Parsons Healthy Materials Lab
“If building materials came with ingredient labels like food, choosing healthier options would be much simpler.
Instead, architects, designers, and specifiers are often left to navigate complex safety data, certifications, and limited ingredient disclosures just to understand what’s in the products they specify.
Even at their strongest, regulations don’t require the level of transparency needed to make fully informed decisions.
That’s why material health knowledge is so important.
At Healthy Materials Lab, our courses are designed to help you understand what to look for, where to find reliable information, and how to confidently select healthier, lower-carbon materials - so you can spend less time researching and more time designing.
Start learning from the bio link” 💻
