Elements of Wellness Design are built around the principles of natural beauty, energy symmetry and color balance which directly impacts and improves the health and well-being of people. Embracing Vastu FengShui design principles aligns with the body's circadian rhythms and the five principal elements that we are all made of.

Designing for wellness, resorts and boutique hotels emphasize fitness and meditation incorporating saunas and detox spas as well as secluded green areas where plants and elements of nature are in abundance. Old doors carved with sun rays and chakras, lotus and florals are bursting with positive energy. Wellness is a sensory experience, be it a running stream or a waterfall or the rustle of leaves, the more relaxing the experience, the memorable it is.

Green design brings nature indoors, beautiful lush plants that purify the air we breathe and reclaimed wood antique armoires and chai tables create a sustainable conscious home. Feng Shui and Vaastu Shastra are sister sciences that are based on the ancient knowledge of balance of energies between humans and the places they inhabit. Old Indian doors were studded with metals and beautifully carved in a unique way to create a vortex of energy. Vastu is the yoga of your home and aims at keeping energy fluid. Blocked energy creates stress that impacts your health, career, finances limiting your growth.

Aligning the five elements of earth, water, air, fire and space that make up our body with the universe is done with the corresponding directions. The northwest is the air element, which affects relationships and communication. When the air element is balanced, you experience harmony. The air element affects the nervous system and the mind. If this zone is blocked in the body, you could suffer insomnia and depression. Sheer light Blue blue curtains on the windows and a beautiful turquoise beaded sari tapestry make a beautiful backdrop welcoming guests in an abundance of love.

The northeast is the water element, related to growth and prosperity. Our body is almost 60% water and this area affects our circulatory and lymphatic system. A beautiful marble fountain against a wall lined with Ganesh and Buddha wall carvings in golds and blues decorates the room in blissful energy.

Southeast area of ​​your home is the fire element connected to your digestive system and your energy levels. A balanced southeast keeps you lively and cheerful. Imbalance in this zone leads to food allergy and tiredness. Antique old door armoires in rustic reds and warm patinas enhances this zone as well as taking care of the harmful electromagnetic radiation that emanates from our gadgets.

Southwest is related to the earth element which translates to family support and career. The lower back is the corresponding zone of the body. Bring in the earth element with plants and warm taupe colored curtains. A beautiful brass Sri Yantra balances this energy zone as do pictures of mountains.

In the fifth line of the poem “Design”, an invisible hand enters. The characters are “mixed” like ingredients in an evil potion. Some force doing the mixing is behind the scene. The characters in themselves are innocent enough, but when brought together, their whiteness and look of rigor mortise are overwhelming. There is something diabolical in the spider’s feast.

The “morning right” echoes the word rite, a ritual – in this case apparently a black mass or a Withces’ Sabbath. The simile in line seven is more ambiguous and harder to describe. Froth is white, foamy, and delicate – something found on a brook in the woods or on a beach after a wave recedes. However, in the natural world, froth also can be ugly: the foam on a polluted stream or a rabid dog’s mouth. The dualism in nature – its beauty and its horror – is there in that one simile.

So far, the poem has portrayed a small, frozen scene, with the dimpled killer holding its victim as innocently as a boy holds a kite. Already, Frost has hinted that nature may be, as Radcliffe squires suggests, “nothing but an ash- white plain without love or faith or hope, where ignorant appetites cross by chance”. Now, in the last six lines of the sonnet, frost comes out and directly states his theme.

What else could bring these deathly pale, stiff things together “but design of darkness to appall?” the question is clearly rhetorical; we are meant to answer, “Yes, there does seem an evil design at work here!” I take the next-to-last line to mean, “What except a design so dark and sinister that we’re appalled by it?” “Appall”, by the way, is the second pun in the poem: it sounds like a pall or shroud. Steered carries the suggestion of a steering-wheel or rudder that some pilot had to control. Like the word brought, it implies that some invisible force charted the paths of spider, heal-all, and moth, so that they arrived together.

Nowadays, there are many ways you can go about getting your website logo design created. There are hundreds of companies that offer logo designing services but, you must be able to tell the difference between a professional logo design company and an amateur freelancer. Most of the time businesses just search for the most affordable service without knowing the huge difference between an average designer and a good designer service. There are many reasons you should hire the services of a professional designing company, as can be learnt here.

Remember that your website logo sketch acts as the identity of your business and it is used in order to promote your company to your audience. So, it is most important that you take the sketch seriously and get it designed from a professional designing company. An amateur, freelancing or cheap designing service simply means that your business image is also going to look cheap and unprofessional. A professional company would have all the tools, applications and the expertise required to create the most effective logo for your company.

A company that is not a professional logo design service is going to compromise on a multitude of factors so as to save costs. And, the result is going to be a cheaper design. For example, many freelancers and cheap companies use clipart, whereas the professional ones use entirely original images. You can expect a professional designing company to use only Pantone colors that produce the best colors and the best printing results as well. This technology is used by printing and designing companies so as to produce precisely the same color used on the software.

When designing your website logo sketch, professional companies keep an eye on color psychology. For example, certain colors are more effective for the promotion and representation of certain types of products. And, some colors are a clear turn-off for customers. It is the job of a professional designer to know what colors are going to work for a given type of business, and he/she would know how to get the maximum impact for your business.

The unique thing about a professional logo design is that it should look the same whether it is printed on a 10 meter tall signpost or as a 1 cm logo on a stationery. Expect a professional designing company to create a logo for you that can be used in different formats, with JPG, TIFF and PNG being the most widely used formats.

However, it is also important that the logo be received in the EPS vector format as well. A vector file can be resized to any size without the logo losing its quality. So, the logo can be resized to create a large banner and it is not going to get stretched and look blurred. However, that is something which is not possible in the case of other types of files. Therefore, it is most important that you get your website logo design created only from a professional designer.

Are you trying to find a professional logo design company to handle your logo designing job. Make sure to visit the website given here to find the right website logo design firm.

For every business owner, understanding the business aesthetics is crucial. The need multiplies manifold if you happen to be into online business wherein your online presence means everything since you are an online platform for buyers and sellers to connect. A shopping website designing is not an easy task that can be achieved just like that. Although it is much more tricky and cumbersome than how it seems. When you run such as website, your day-to-day tasks include selling products, filling orders, receiving payments and last but not the least – satisfying the customers.

Yes, the website design truly matters a lot. It has to be developed in such a way that is user friendly and gives ease of access to one and all. Whether the website would excel or fall depends on the viability of the design considering the level of different categories of customers to whom the business would be catering to. Moreover we cannot assume that the potential customers will find you themselves rather you need to be prominently seen online to attract more and more traffic on your website. For any viewer to stay and proceed with making a purchase on your website, it is necessary that the design is perfect in every way.

Choosing a professional Ecommerce Website Design company with expertise and robust standing in the market gives you the required boost and a robust foundation to begin with. They are the ones who are expert enough to develop a multifaceted promotional strategy to outgrow your competitors by alluring more and more customers towards your website. The steps are many but the ladder to success has to be a complex one else the fruits fetched won’t be cherished.

Few of the many services that fall in the purview of such designing companies are content development, structuring the pages, designing the internal as well as external pages, overall navigation provisions, credibility factor considering both company as well as customers and so on. How would you feel if your home or workplace is a mess? Do you think it would be a welcoming atmosphere for your prospective customers? Would you prefer too much cluttered stuff or limited organized stuff to be chosen from or looked upon?

The answer definitely would be an organized place (irrespective of the fact whether it is real or virtual) wherein the structure itself becomes the guiding force behind boosting your sales. The website should be such that it tempts the customers to go ahead and buy what is required in addition to what they feel are good buys for them. Any company offering website designing services is aptly experienced and knowledgeable to be able to comprehend with your needs along with the current market scenario.

Before even properly starting this article, let me just tell you this: Your B2B website is your way to success in this 21st Century. You need to realize that there is a lot more than just a company logo and contact information that makes up a fully-fledged successful website. Your website needs to speak to its customers, it needs to be a part of your sales proposition. Be it a product or a service that the buyers buy directly from your website, or whether it is that you sell consulting or software projects, understand that your buyers are doing their research online in any scenario.

Therefore, the more your services or products are complex in nature, the more you require your website to work for you because today, the buyers want to make purchases online.

I repeat, since the B2B businesses are complex than the typical B2C businesses, they, in fact, need much better user interfaces. The B2B websites should put emphasis on usability more because this will help the users to accomplish more advanced tasks on the website.

This being said, rushing straight to the design of the B2B website can lead to a disaster.

Here are the things you and/or a professional web design company in Noida need to take care of before design:

1. Ask the End Customer

The key to a successful website is to remember that your website is more about your prospects than you. Your prospects or the end customers are the ones who will be buying the product or service from your website. Therefore, taking their opinions into consideration before starting to design your B2B website can save you heaps of extra costs and time.

You can initiate this by directly asking your customers the following questions-

• How did you come across our website?
• How much time did the website take to load?
• Were you able to figure out the Menu of the website?
• Was the description of our products/services sufficient?
• How was the product display image? Di you find it to be of good quality?
• Did our FAQ section resolve your queries?
• Describe in detail your buying process?
• What according to you, matters the most while evaluating options?

2. Ask your Sales & Marketing Team

Since they are the ones who are regularly in contact with your clients and customers, their opinions play an important role in deciding how your B2B website should be. Your clients/customers usually want valuable information, pricing information, fast response and a quick solution to his needs. Meanwhile, you as a business want more leads, more conversions, and loyalty from your clients.

To maintain a balance between what you want and what your customers want, you should ask the following questions to your Sales & Marketing Team-

• How do you want your brand to be perceived?
• Why your customers chose you and not your competitor?
• What are our advantages according to you?
• What are the generally occurring problems in our products/services?
• Who all are our big clients, what is the number of clients that we have served?
• What according to the Sales & Marketing Team are the primary goals that the website should accomplish for succeeding?

3. Come up with a Buyer Persona

While many B2B businesses tend to not consider it as an important step, having a Buyer Persona ready can help you better understand your business environment, what type of clients usually buy your products and around what time do they make the purchases.

For creating an effective buyer’s persona, consider these factors:

• Interview your clients/customers
• Interview your Sales & Marketing Team
• Carry a survey for your prospects
• Mine your in-house database for understanding the qualities of the best and the worst customers
• Review your web analytics report
• Interview your customer service team
• Use keywords to recognize the topics of interest
• Track your social media activities and keep a tap on the engagements with your connections

4. Map your clients’ Buying Process

There are namely three stages in a buying process:

1. Awareness: Here, the buyer undertakes initial research, makes sense of the problem for which he looks for solutions (later), recognize the opportunities, shifts his priorities.

2. Evaluation: Here, the buyer discovers the product/service that can help him resolve the problems. He researches and gets educated about the solution. Later, he goes through the various other evaluation options like checking out the other alternative solutions.

3. Decision: Lastly, on this stage, the buyer is already inclining towards one choice – either yours or your competitors. They are just looking for ways to justify their eventual decision.

Your website is a sales tool for you and, for your buyers, it is a tool for helping them make a better decision. Analyzing your clients’ buying process will help you think about the content and site architecture that will work the best for you and your clients and future buyers.

Following are the kind of questions you should consider figuring out before beginning to construct your website:

• What role will your website play in supporting each of the 3 stages of your buyer’s buying process?
• What questions should be answered, where?
• How should your website be structured so that every piece of information on it is in accordance with the buyer’s persona?
• What all questions should be answered and in what flow will be they answered?
• What are the various types of content that should be there on your website: blog articles, eBooks, webinars, newsletters, etc.?
• What important role will the customers’ testimonial play and how will you present them on your B2B website?

5. Create the content and conversion plan

Since there are different stages in a buyer’s buying process, your content should be such that your buyers understand what they have to know and what they need to know at each stage and convert.

In the awareness stage, you need to make your buyer about the fact that his business has a problem or an issue. This is the top-of-the-funnel stage. At this stage, the buyer will be expecting high-value blog posts, eBooks, videos, tip sheets, etc.

Onto the next stage i.e. the evaluation stage, your buyer has clearly identified the problem with his business and is now gathering huge amounts of information. This is the middle-of-the-funnel stage where the buyer will be expecting webinars, seminars, podcasts, case studies, comparison charts, etc. from you.

Finally, at the last stage i.e. the decision stage, your buyer is ready to make the purchase after identifying the solutions. This is the bottom-of-the-funnel stage where the buyer is expecting things like a free trial, a live demo, a discount coupon (if applicable).

6. Identify the User Objective of the website

Being a B2B company, your most important objective is to identify and understand the user objective or your website and get them to take up the most wanted call to action. A call to action can be anything from getting them to sign up for an email newsletter or having them provide their personal data, or calling your salespeople to discuss the offerings in detail.

7. Audit your current website and its content

This involves figuring out what content and web page is working for your website and what is not, what are your buyers looking at when they visit your website, which webpage of your website is bringing in the maximum conversion and which page isn’t.

Consider the clarity, distraction, user confidence, and the FUD i.e. Fear Uncertainty and Doubt while auditing your website and its content.

One of the most important aspects of auditing is emphasizing on content marketing. For succeeding with your B2B website, you need to attract visitors to your website with amazing content – a blog, a video, or anything else that is of great value. This being said, if your website is full of broken links and pages, stock images, and an old school layout, you will not be able to do well.

While conducting a site audit, you have to focus on the following-

1. Content – Which pages are your buyers looking at? How are your buyers navigating from one web page to another? Where is your traffic coming from?

2. Metrics – What are the current conversion rates, how well are the pages of your website optimized?

3. Messaging, focus, and usability – Is your content easy to understand and comprehend? Is there a single flow towards action or are there many distractions? Are the users confident about the information on your website, do they feel like this is the information they need or are there sources of friction present in the website?

8. Clarify the user flows

The user flow is the path a user will follow on your website to achieve whatever he is trying to achieve. To make sure that your buyers have a good user experience, you need to have the maximum knowledge about the exact steps that the buyers generally take on your website. By the end of a buyer’s user flow, he should believe that your business really understands his needs.

9. Creating and testing wireframes

A Wireframe is the blueprint of a website that defines the following things for each page of the website-

• Information on the page
• Layout
• Key messaging & flow
• Call t action placement
• Navigation
• UI notes

With the help of the wireframe, you can look at the different elements without any hindrance. If you decide on all these elements while designing the website without wireframing first, it would become really confusing and soon you will begin to spend a lot of time discussing with your team about what should go where on the website.

10. Explain what you expect from your new website

Lastly, you should define clearly the guidelines that the designers and copywriters should follow for developing your website. Clearly define the site copy, the tone of voice, the design, the layout, the structure, and the graphics.

Define the following before beginning to design a website:

• Tone of voice
• Length of copy
• Clarity and the hierarchy of sentences
• Readability
• Call To Action
• User Confidence

Conclusion

There is a difference between a B2C website and a B2B website. You have to put a lot of thought into your B2B website before you start the actual design process. These days, with the best web design services, you get the benefit of this entire research process with the actual designing part of the website. These days, the top website designing company India can offer you services for researching and figuring everything out before starting on with the actual design process. For B2B business, the customer centric-website approach becomes of maximum importance because you get a targeted website as well as a design that makes a lot of sense to your buyers intead of random beautifications.

All of the above mentioned steps are just one part of ensuring a successful B2B website. The other part includes continuously monitoring the website while making tiny improvements over a a period of time and taking care of the SEO part to ensure that it is properly listed in the search engine result page.

Remember that your website should be considered as a sales tool/a sales rep that will draw your prospects to you and get you conversions.

Designing a mobile application needs a tough toil, hard work, an expert knowledge of coding, and more. This might be true a few years ago. The scenario has completely changed, and easy ways are developed fast to offer more convenient options to developers. They don’t need to remember all coding. Nor do they implement strong technical knowledge for developing an application. You need to decide your framework for designing a mobile application and the complete thing gets so easier. If you are planning to design an android app, here are the best frameworks that you can use.

What is a framework?

A framework is nothing but a software library for preparing the platform for designing an application. With the use of frameworks, you can design your application easily. Here are some of the best options for your applications.

PhoneGap:

PhoneGap is specially designed for hybrid applications. With this, you can reuse your web development skills to prepare an application based on HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. With this framework, you can create experiences for multiple devices. This framework comes up with real benefits since you can design application for all regardless of what devices they use.

There are some good features that you cannot ignore for this framework. You can develop an app without the command line. You can see the changes immediately after implementing it. There is a big library for plugins that help you design a profitable application easily.

Corona SDK:

Corona SDK is a cross-platform framework and helps you design application for multiple platform and devices. This means that you can design an application once and publish the app for any platforms. It definitely boosts your mobile app development process and it allows you to do more things that you cannot expect on other platforms. You can update codes, save changes, and view results instantly on Corona SDK. The benefits that this framework offers to you are numerous plugins, frameworks for designing lightweight and fast applications, and one codebase application for multiple platforms. Mobile development has always come up with a few challenges. If you have the technical ideas, you can easily solve them with this framework.

Xamarin:

This is another popular framework for your mobile application. This helps you design native applications for Android, iOS, and windows. The codebase of this framework is C# and it is compatible with all platforms. You can save your time for designing application.

Sencha Touch 2:

Sencha Touch 2 is the preferred option for many android app developers. It helps developers to design application with rich UI experience. This is another cross-platform framework based on HTML5 and JavaScript. Some built-in features of this framework are truly marvelous that include fluid animation, smooth scrolling, and adaptive layout design. The pros of using this framework are quite long. You will have high-performance, native-looking UI widgets, adaptive layouts, backend agnostic data, and advanced mobile chatting.

Appcelerator

If you are an expert in developing JavaScript code base, this is the framework that you must use. You will get a direct access to native APIs with Hyperloop. You can write codes in JavaScript and this framework allows you to run it on different platforms. You will also get a mobile testing facility.

JQuery Mobile:

It is an HTML5 based framework that is designed for developing responsive websites and mobile applications for all devices. It depends on – write less and do more factor. You will design an application that runs on different platforms. It allows you to design high-branded responsive applications that run flawlessly and smoothly on smartphones, tablets, and desktop platforms.

Ionic:

You will get the features of LiveDeploy that help developers in code updates, A/B testing, content changes and more. There are a lot of features this framework generally offers, including UI components, themes, animations, and codes.

So, these are the frameworks that really help you to create a better application within a very short span of time. For using these tools, you no need to be expert in the app development. Basic knowledge is enough for using these frameworks. If you are seeking an advanced option for your app development, hire a company that has been serving satisfactory and quality services to clients. This is the best option when you want to make your app unique.

A motif is a principal or main design in a composition. When the motif appears together with other designs in the composition, it domineers in size as well as the number in relation to the other designs. The motifs are bigger in size and greater in number when compared with the other designs in a composition. The motifs, images or elements can be repeated and organized in several pleasing patterns in a composition. Motifs, images or elements can be repeated according to the following formats.

i. Full drop format

ii. Half drop design

iii. Simple format

iv. All over repeat

v. Positive and negative repeat

vi. Mirror reflection design

Full Drop Repeat: In this arrangement pattern, the full size of the motif or main design appears in all parts of the composition. The motifs either run horizontally or vertically throughout the substrate or material. The full view of the motifs must be seen.

Half Drop Repeat: In this design, the motifs or main designs are dropped by half by the first arrangement so that there will be halves at both ends of the cloth or paper such that when the sides of the paper or cloth are rolled, it would result in full designs.

Simple Repeat: In this arrangement style, the motifs are repeated across the material in a simple pattern. Sometimes, they are placed haphazardly in the composition without any forethought plan. The focus of simple repeat pattern is that the motifs should be repeated in the composition.

All Over Repeat: The all over repeat pattern has the principal designs or motifs appearing or running through all the parts of the material.

Positive and Negative Repeat: This repeat pattern is achieved by alternating the positive and negative areas of the picture area. The positive area or image area rotates in placement with the background which is usually composed of textures to form the repeat pattern. It is also referred to as Counter Change design.

Mirror Reflection Repeat: In this repeat pattern, the main design or motif is repeated in a mirrored manner. This is achieved by placing and alternating side by side the right and left parts of the main motifs or design.

The various repeats can be adopted and used by artists especially textile designers and graphic artists who usually engage in printing. However, a skilled printer must strive very hard to create other repeat formats on his own to meet the specifications of his work. These motif arrangements can be curled from the existing and already accepted formats used by many printers globally.

Your focus should be on making them look more spacious by using the art of designing and decoration. There are many aspects, including light, space, color, etc. you can work upon and lend the magic to your living room. Based on your tastes and preferences, you can use either a minimalist theme or a modern design to make the living room stand out in true sense.

Here are some of ways to use to make your living room look spacious –

Try new things in place of old ideas

If your living room has not looked spacious all those years, this means the time has come to switch to trying new things instead of relying on old ideas. Maybe the traditional ideas you’re sticking to are not helpful for small space. Your focus should be on using only those items that draw attention to the vertical space as only this can help expand the area of the room.

Keep ample space for relaxation and entertainment

A good living room is one that has ample of space for relaxation and entertainment for the family. Its size and shape should never matter as this area of the house is for the members to bond over tea, TV and talk. So, if anything comes in the way and makes the room look occupied, you got to take it away. This is how spaces can be de-clogged and you can feel good about them.

Decorate with mirrors

Use of mirrors is nothing new in rooms to make them feel larger. You can hang a large mirror in the middle of the room to create a focal point and achieve a feel of spaciousness. If possible, keep the mirror behind a light source and let right reflect and a nice ambiance is created. You can put the mirror in a way to also create an illusion of another window easily.

Use neutral colors

Use of neutral colors on the walls, floor and ceiling is something that will definitely do wonders for your small living room. They will give the impression of expanding the space as soft hues reflect light and can illuminate a room. Plus, such colors can create soothing and calming environment together with enlarging an area or at least making it feel the same. You can paint the room in a subtle manner and make the spaces look bigger than actually are.

Get furniture with a lightweight feel

Furniture will take up a lot of space in the room. So, you have to be very careful when you buy it as having big and bulky size won’t serve your purpose well. Rather, you need to consider its visual weight as you need to go with the size, color and design. The one with lightweight appearance will make the spaces look bigger than they actually are. This is a trick a top interior designer always uses to transform living room perfectly.

To increase employees’ job satisfaction and productivity technology is used by organizations to redesign jobs and work schedules. Technology changes the organization’s work style and employees’ performance analysis process. Technology is not just an instrument which transfers input to output. This term is used as such a machinery and instrument which is sophisticated in natures and develop output through computers and other electronic instruments. This technology looms the industrial sectors and now cloth can be produced much quicker and faster than before.

Electronic instruments developed for money transfer and finance management, open dynamic progress in banking and finance sectors. Workplace style and work lives of employees are being affected by technology. Continuous improvement is demonstrated in any organization to enhance productivity and efficiency simultaneously. This continuous improvement requires modification in all organizational processes. The term re-engineering comes from developing a better electronic version. In any organization, re-engineering fundamentally demands altering the ways we do things.

Its primary rule is to commence from a plan sheet to rethink to alter current management system. This redesign means to spruce up the process by removing antiquated elements from any work design.

Management responsibility is to understand the key elements and core processes that insert worth to organizations’ distinctive competencies. Since early 1990s, process re-engineering has been popular and all major companies of European countries and of America have introduced some changes in support of work redesigning. The employees, who continue their jobs after redesign process in organization, found that they are not doing the same job. Work redesign process can include more employees’ services excellence, interaction with customers, coordination with suppliers and colleagues, more responsibilities, creativity, follow-up and incentives.

It is mostly tough on employees and takes 3 to 5 years to complete the whole process re-engineering. During this time period, workers get anxious while taking more responsibilities, challenges, new work style and because of risks involved. Implications for process re-engineering is designed and selected on individual and group basis. Employees’ motivation and reinforcement, cyber loafing and ethics related steps are taken on individual basis. Along with decision making, communication & coordination and organizational politics are taken on different look; for group level implications.

By introducing new technology in workplace, job rules and interpersonal relationships are also being changed. For analyzing work tasks its characteristics need to be understand first. These task attributes, collectively affect different jobs and determine employees’ performance, motivations and relationships. Tasks attributes mainly include expertise variety, task identity and its significance, independence provided and feedback. By keeping in mind these tasks characteristics employees’ development need strength can be evaluated for specific job; on the basis of core job dimensions, critical psychological state and personal and work outcomes.

Technology is also facilitated in establishing an ideal work design to enhance overall performance. Organizations are looking towards offering alternative work schedules options for employees. Employees need flexibility in a changing work place and work schedules options as in organizations they act as a strategic tool.

Today, one of the significant objectives in MEP engineering design for HVAC design engineers is to improve energy efficiency, maintain air quality and thermal comfort. Energy efficiency, air quality and comfort in a building depend on how heating, cooling and air distribution systems are designed and this is where careful ductwork design plays a significant role. Ductwork and HVAC system design are important as it ensures indoor air quality, thermal comfort and ventilation. If the HVAC system and ducts are not designed accurately, it could lead to poor air quality, heat loss and make the conditioned space in the building uncomfortable.

The primary function of the ductwork design system is to ensure a least obtrusive channel is provided through which cool and warm air can travel. When designed accurately, HVAC air distribution systems will play an important role in countering heat energy losses, maintaining indoor air quality (IAQ) and providing thermal comfort.

To understand how ductwork can be designed in a cost-effective and efficient manner, this article decodes ductwork design and provides a brief outline of the design process, methods and standards.

What is Ductwork?

The basic principle of ductwork design is to heat, cool or ventilate a building in the most efficient and cost-effective way. The primary function of ductwork is to design conduits or passages that allow air flow to provide heating, cooling, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC).

In the duct design process, the basics of air flow must be understood. Return air goes into an air handler unit (AHU), through a filter and into the blower and with pressure it goes through the A coil or heat exchanger and then it goes out into the supply air system. If the ductwork is designed correctly it enables the AHU to produce the right amount of air through the heat exchanger. In a typical air distribution system, ducts must accommodate supply, return and exhaust air flow. Supply ducts provide air required for air conditioning and ventilation, return ducts provide regulated air to maintain IAQ and temperature and exhaust air flow systems provide ventilation.

For ductwork design to be efficient, MEP engineering design teams need to have designers with a mechanical and engineering background. Ductwork design specialists or building service engineers must also possess thorough knowledge of other disciplines such as architectural, civil and structural concepts to ensure HVAC systems are clash free.

The Ductwork Design Process

The ducting system design process is simple, provided that the specifications are clearly mentioned and the inputs regarding application, activity, building orientation and building material are provided. Based on the information provided calculations can be completed to create an energy-efficient and clash-free design. Typically, air conditioning and distribution systems are designed to fulfil three main requirements such as:

• It should deliver air flow at specific rates and velocity to stipulated locations.

• It should be energy efficient and cost effective.

• It should provide comfort and not generate disturbance or objectionable noise.

The process of ductwork design starts once architectural layouts and interior design plans are provided by the client or MEP consultants. Building service engineers then require specification requirements such as application, the number of people, the orientation of the building and architectural characteristics to make calculations on heat load and air flow. Before any calculations are carried out, single line drawings are drafted to showcase the flow of ductwork in the building. Once they are approved, calculations for heat load and air flow are conducted. Once the heat load calculations are complete, the air flow rates that are required are known and the air outlets are fixed. With the calculations, specifications and layout, the ducting system design layout is then designed taking into consideration architectural and structural details of the conditioned space and clashes with other building services such as electrical, plumbing (hydraulic) and mechanical services.

To start the ductwork design process there are inputs required regarding details about the type of application, specification requirements, building orientation, architectural characteristic and material.

• Application type – Ductwork design will vary based on the type of application the building will be used for such as manufacturing, data centers, medical applications, scientific research and comfort applications such as restaurants, offices, residences, institutional building such as schools and universities .

• Specification requirement – To create an efficient duct design, designers need to know what type of activity will be conducted and the average number of people that will use the conditioned space. This will help in calculating the air flow, velocity and heat load required to maintain temperatures and IAQ. In comfort applications, for instance, an office or restaurant will require different duct design and air velocity than a residence.

• Orientation and material of the building – The orientation of building and material used plays a key role in gauging heat absorption which will help determine the cooling and ventilation requirements. Based on whether a building faces north, south, east or west, and where it is geographically located, heat absorption can be calculated. The type of material used for construction also affects the amount of heat gain and loss of the building.

The challenges of incomplete inputs or non-availability of required inputs are discussed in an upcoming article on Ductwork Design Challenges and Recommendations.

Ductwork Design Methods

Ductwork design methods are usually determined based on the cost, requirements, specifications and energy efficiency standards. Based on the load of the duct from air pressure, duct systems can typically be classified into high velocity, medium velocity and low velocity systems. There are three commonly used methods for duct design:

1. Constant Velocity Method – This method, designed to maintain minimum velocity, is one of the simplest ways to design duct systems for supply and return air ducts. However, it requires experience to use this method as the incorrect selection of velocities, duct sizes and choice of fixtures could increase the cost. Moreover, to maintain the same rate of pressure drop in duct runs, this method requires partial closure of dampers in duct runs (except index run) which could affect efficiency.

2. Equal Friction Method – This conventional method used for both supply and return ducts maintains the same frictional pressure drop across main and branch ducts. This method ensures dissipation of pressure drops as friction in duct runs rather than in balancing dampers. However, like the velocity method, partial closure of dampers is required and this could lead to noise generation.

3. Static Regain Method – This method commonly used for large supply systems with long ducts is a high velocity system that maintains constant static pressure before each branch or terminal. While this is a balanced system as it does not involve dampering, longer ducts may affect air distribution to conditioned spaces.

While different duct design methods used vary from application to application, duct system performance and system balancing and optimization need to be considered. After the air handling unit (AHU) is installed, the system needs to be balanced and optimized to enhance performance. In system balancing and optimization, air flow rates of supply air outlets and return air inlets are measured, and dampers and fan speed are adjusted. Especially in large buildings, balancing air conditioning systems may be expensive and time-consuming, but it is required as it provides benefits that outweigh the cost incurred in installing the system. To minimise total and operating cost, many optimization methods are used as such as the T-Method Optimization described in the DA3 Application Manual of AIRAH (Australian Institute of Refrigeration Air Conditioning).

To design air distribution systems that are energy efficient and cost effective, HVAC system designs must include basic engineering guidelines and adhere to certain design standards. Let us consider some of the guidelines and standards used in the industry in different countries.

Ductwork Design Standards

When designing air conditioning systems, HVAC design engineers must be knowledgeable about the basic methods, guidelines and standards applicable, from the type of units used, calculations required, methods of construction, type of material, duct system layouts, pressure losses, duct leakage, noise considerations to optimization using testing, adjusting and balancing (TAB). Listed below are some of the standards organizations and associations in the US, UK, Australia and India, that provide manuals, codes and standards for the HVAC industry.

US

• SMACNA (Sheet Metal and Air Conditioning Contractors' National Association) – It provides a manual on HVAC systems duct design that includes basic yet fundamental methods and procedures with importance on energy efficiency and conservation. While the manual does not include load calculations and air ventilation quantities, it is typically used in conjunction with the ASHRAE Fundamentals Handbook.

• ASHRAE (American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers) – It is an association that emphasises on the sustainability of building systems by focusing on energy efficiency and indoor air quality. The ASHRAE Handbook is a four-volume guide that provides the fundamentals of refrigeration, applications, systems and equipment. Updated every four years, the handbook includes international units of measurement such as SI (systems international) and IP (inch-pound).

UK

• CIBSE (The Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers) – is the authority in the UK that sets standards for building services engineering systems. The Codes and Guidelines published by CIBSE are recognized internationally and considered as the criteria for best practices in the areas of sustainability, construction and engineering.

• BSRIA (Building Services Research and Information Association) – is an association that provides services that help companies enhance their designs to increase energy efficiency in adherence to Building Regulations, mock-up testing of systems and BIM support.

Australia

• AIRAH (Australian Institute of Refrigeration Air Conditioning) – provides technical manuals for professionals in the HVAC industry and information ranging from air conditioning load estimation, ductwork for air conditioning, pipe sizing, centrifugal pumps, noise control, fans, air filters, cooling towers , water treatment, maintenance, indoor air quality and building commission.

India

• BIS (Bureau of Indian Standards) – is a national authority that provides standards and guidelines as per the International Organization for standardization (ISO). The handbooks by BIS stipulates the code of practices applicable to the HVAC industry such as safety code for air conditioning, specification for air ducts, thermostats for use in air conditioners, metal duct work, air-cooled heat exchangers and data for outside design conditions for air conditioning for Indian cities

• ISHRAE (The Indian Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers) – provides indoor environmental quality standards and testing and rating guidelines based on common IEQ parameters standards and criteria for the classification of buildings based on energy efficiency.

While HVAC design engineers must keep relevant standards in mind and ensure that local codes are applied in designs, energy efficiency is a primary objective as well. Ductwork design plays a significant role in regulating indoor air quality, thermal comfort and ventilation. The key function of ductwork design is to provide the least obtrusive channel through which cool and warm air can travel in the most efficient and cost-effective way.

Inaccurate duct designs could result in poor indoor air quality, heat loss and uncomfortable conditioned space in the building. A well-designed air conditioning HVAC system will ultimately optimize costs. By regulating pressure loss, selecting the right duct size, balancing air pressure and controlling acoustics, ductwork designers could optimize manufacturing, operational, environmental and commissioning costs.