High-Performance Renovation Design
Your home has more potential than you think. We help you realize it.

Experience You Can Trust

BrightBuilt Home has been designing high-performance homes in Maine, New England, and beyond since 2013. Over that time, we've developed a deep understanding of how homes flow and function: from how rooms connect and light moves through a space, to understanding high-quality thermal envelope and mechanical systems. That same expertise now guides our high-performance renovation and retrofit design work, which we bring to homes that are already standing, already lived-in, and ready to become something better.

Sustainable renovation and whole-home retrofit work can be more complex than new construction in a number of ways. You're working within existing walls, with inherited systems, and often with a family still in residence. The right approach starts with a clear design, one that addresses the spatial questions (which rooms change, how flow and light improve), the performance questions (where the envelope needs attention, how the mechanical system evolves), and the practical questions (what order makes sense, what your budget accomplishes). We work through all of it before construction begins, so you're making informed decisions rather than reactive ones.

Our work has been recognized in the New York Times, Dwell, USA Today, and NPR, and we've received the LEED for Homes Innovation Award. We bring that same standard to every high-performance renovation we design.

The brighter path

to your forever home.

A smiling middle-aged man and woman standing outside in front of a house, each holding a drink and enjoying each other's company.
Architectural blueprint of a modern house with trees outside, showing a side view, interior bathroom, stairs, and multiple levels.

Thoughtfully Renovated. High-Performance. Yours.

New England’s housing stock was built for a different era. Many of these homes are beautiful, well-situated, and worth investing in. They just weren’t designed for the energy costs, comfort expectations, or spatial demands of the life you’re living now. A renovation designed by BrightBuilt changes that with a full design process that considers your home as a complete system and plans accordingly, including deep physical improvements and system upgrades.

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Is High-Performance Renovation Design Right for Your Home?

BrightBuilt’s renovation design services may be a fit if you are looking to:

  • Plan a full-scope renovation, addition, dormer, or major exterior update

  • Rework a layout that no longer fits how you live

  • Improve comfort, efficiency, and year-round performance

  • Coordinate spatial improvements with envelope, mechanical, and performance upgrades

  • Reduce reliance on fossil fuels through a thoughtful design process

  • Understand what improvements will have the greatest impact before construction begins

Brightly
Designed Homes

A home reflects more than just smart choices–it reflects you. At BrightBuilt, we plan with purpose, make sustainability second nature, and simplify.

Your Vision,
Our Expertise

Every renovation starts with listening. What do you love about your home? What has never quite worked? What do you need the space to do five years from now? We take your answers and develop a design that respects the bones of your home while raising everything else: performance, comfort, light, flow, and efficiency.

We help homeowners expand cramped floor plans, bring natural light into dark interiors, eliminate fossil fuel dependence, and dramatically reduce energy bills, all while maintaining the character of their space. The result is a home that feels completely like yours, but works the way you’ve always wanted.

Frequently Asked Questions

  • A high-performance renovation considers how an existing home works as a complete system, including layout, comfort, energy use, envelope, mechanical systems, ventilation, and long-term livability.

  • A deep energy retrofit is a comprehensive approach to improving a home’s energy performance. For BrightBuilt, this work is strongest when it is part of a larger renovation design process, not a narrow set of isolated upgrades.

  • No. Weatherization and targeted energy upgrades can be valuable, but BrightBuilt’s renovation design services are intended for larger, design-led projects where spatial improvements and performance upgrades can be planned together.

  • BrightBuilt provides renovation design, specifications, and construction support. Homeowners work with a general contractor to complete the renovation, and BrightBuilt can remain involved to help ensure the work aligns with the approved design.

  • We start by understanding your home as it stands today and where you want it to go.

    We then assess the structure, envelope, mechanical systems, and spatial layout, to develop a design that addresses all of it: the rooms that change, the systems that upgrade, and the performance improvements that make a real difference in how your home feels year-round.

    You see and approve the design before construction begins. No surprises.

  • With a completed design in hand, you work with a general contractor to bring it to life.

    We'll help you identify builders experienced with high-performance renovation and remain involved through construction as your design team, reviewing submittals, answering questions, and making sure the built work matches the design intent.

  • When construction wraps, we walk through your completed home with you.

    Your renovation is now performing the way it was designed to: tighter envelope, quieter, more comfortable, and ready for decades of use.

    This is the home you imagined and the one you'll want to stay in.

Our Process

Ready to Get Started?

If your house is at a turning point - green remodeling on the horizon, a layout that has never quite worked, or a comfort problem that won’t go away - we’d love to talk. Tell us about your home and what you’re hoping to accomplish.