High-Performance Building Designs
SEED Building Systems makes it easier to design and build high-performance dwellings with cost-effective solutions, flexible design options and efficient manufacturing.
How to Get Started
Whether you're a homeowner, builder/developer, architect/designer, municipality, or non-market builder, Tooketree can help bring your project to life with SEED Building Systems. From adapting existing plans to developing a new design, our team can help you find an approach that works for your project, goals and budget.
1. Explore designs
Work with your own architect or designer and bring your plans to our team. Or, browse the Passive Design Solutions catalogue for a design that meets your project needs, or explore the CMHC Housing Design Catalogue for practical multi-unit housing options.
2. Finalize your drawings with Tooketree
Our team will work to integrate SEED Building Systems into your design while keeping your project goals, requirements and budget in mind. Together with you and your design and/or construction team, we'll review the drawings, identify any necessary adaptations and finalize the details for manufacturing.
3. Manufacture and build
Once your project is ready to move from design to construction, our team manufactures your SEED panels to your finalized specifications. The panels are then delivered for assembly and integration into your building project, helping streamline on-site construction and bring your high-performance building vision to life.
Building a better home starts long before construction begins. The choices made at the design stage influence everything from construction costs and energy performance to long-term comfort and durability. Tooketree makes it easier to bring these priorities together with SEED Building Systems.
Find the Right Design
Searching for a home design? Start with the catalogue of thoughtfully developed building plans from our partners at Passive Design Solutions (PDS).
Explore Building Designs at Passive Design Solutions
PDS offers a collection of carefully considered home designs with sleek architecture and high-performance specifications that are well suited to SEED Building Systems.
Planning a multi-unit housing project or looking for practical solutions to address housing needs in your community? The CMHC Housing Design Catalogue is another valuable resource for municipalities, developers and housing organizations.
Featuring more than 50 multi-unit and accessory dwelling designs, the catalogue includes plans for townhouses and rowhouses, multiplexes, and accessory dwelling units. All of these designs can be panelized using Tooketree's SEED Building Systems, offering an opportunity to combine thoughtfully developed housing plans with efficient prefabricated construction.
For municipalities and developers looking to address the Missing Middle housing gap, these designs offer a practical starting point for exploring scalable, high-performance housing solutions.
Why High-Performance Building Design Matters
Buildings are a major contributor to climate change. According to the United Nations, the buildings and construction sector accounts for approximately 40% of global CO₂ emissions. These emissions come from two main sources: the materials used to construct buildings and the energy required to operate them.
Embodied carbon refers to the emissions associated with the manufacturing, transportation, installation, maintenance and disposal of building materials. Materials such as concrete and steel can have particularly high embodied carbon due to their energy-intensive manufacturing processes.
Operational carbon comes from the energy used to heat, cool and power buildings throughout their lifespan. Poor insulation, air leakage and inefficient building systems can significantly increase these emissions.
Both matter. In fact, Architecture 2030 estimates that embodied carbon will account for almost half of total new construction emissions between now and 2050.
Building more efficiently is an important step, but energy efficiency alone isn't enough. We also need to consider what our homes are made of.
Why Building Materials Matter
A highly energy-efficient home can still have a significant environmental footprint if its materials are manufactured using energy-intensive processes or rely heavily on petrochemicals.
At Tooketree, we look beyond operational energy savings. We prioritize natural, recycled and carbon-storing materials that help reduce the environmental impact of construction.
Our SEED (Sustainable, Ecologically-responsible, Efficient and Durable) Building Systems use materials such as:
Wood: A renewable, plant-based material that stores carbon captured from the atmosphere.
Blown-in cellulose: Made primarily from recycled newspaper, providing effective insulation while giving existing materials another life.
Recycled wood fibre board: An insulation product made from wood fibres.
We also use high-performance membranes that provide airtightness, vapour control and weather protection while allowing moisture to dry in either direction.
Together, these materials help create high-performance building envelopes that are energy efficient, durable and designed with the environment in mind.
Building Better with SEED Building Systems
At Tooketree Passive Homes, we manufacture prefabricated wall, floor and roof panels designed to support Passive House-quality construction.
Our SEED panels integrate structure and insulation into high-performance building components manufactured in a controlled factory environment. This approach helps reduce on-site labour, improve construction consistency and make the building process more predictable.
The result is an efficient, high-performance building envelope that can help reduce energy costs, improve indoor comfort and lower the environmental footprint of your home.
Our systems can be used for Passive House and Net-Zero projects, as well as other high-performance building designs.