Site Lines: Designing envelopes for Passivhaus townhouses

Architect Gavin Finnan describes the design of Passivhaus townhouses in a south London regeneration project, focusing on how their external envelope was fundamental to performance. South Gardens is the first phase of Elephant Park, a major regeneration project that sits... View Article
Brick: Meeting aspirations – Andy Batterham of Ibstock

Meeting brick aspirations

Andy Batterham of Ibstock looks at the ongoing renaissance in brick, and how providing for increasing demand for colours, as well as the trend for grey brick, is helping architects and specifiers reinvigorate this traditional building material. It is fair... View Article

Cladding: is our response to tragedy adequate?

FunderMax’s Paul Hughes questions whether the UK is doing enough to prevent further disasters following the Grenfell fire, and suggests where improvements should be made. In the early hours of 14 June 2017 Grenfell Tower, a 24-storey social housing tower... View Article

Editor’s comment – February

Comment by James Parker, editor of Materials for Architecture, February. Now that spring is finally rearing its head, the events season is upon us. If you are attending ecobuild which is fast-approaching at the start of March, you may well... View Article
Workspace at your service

Workspace at your service

Offering flexibility for tenants, a serviced workspace is instrumental in supporting the success and growth of businesses, argues Simon Eastlake of Office Space in Town. Agrowing demand for modern, flexible office space with ‘future-facing’ tech capability is prompting small and... View Article

Retail parks need to shape up

Fighting a losing battle with the internet to attract shoppers, the design of retail parks must evolve to offer consumers a compelling case to visit. Gary Johnson and Paul Starbuck from retail, sport and leisure specialist architects LK2 describe why... View Article
Idea

Future Watch – Incubating a zero-carbon idea

An ambitious technology-driven project is underway which sees architects collaborating with the materials sector to find a ‘transparent’ answer to the housing supply dilemma. Sébastien Reed reports The Carbon-Free Group (CFG) was founded in 2007 as a critical response to... View Article

CIAT supports interim Building a Safer Future report

CIAT welcomes and supports the interim report of Dame Judith Hackitt’s independent Review of Building Regulations and Fire Safety and looks forward to contributing to the next phase. In response to the interim findings, Alex Naraian PCIAT, President of CIAT, said ‘At... View Article

British Woodworking Federation calls for the creation of a Building Safety Fund

Iain McIlwee, CEO of the British Woodworking Federation statement following the release of the interim Hackitt Review report: “The British Woodworking Federation, whose members manufacture approaching three million fire doors in the UK each year, welcomed Dame Judith Hackitt’s interim recommendations on the regulatory structure, however,... View Article

Shelter comment: Grenfell six months on

Polly Neate, CEO of Shelter, said: “Six months on from the horror of Grenfell and there is still much to be done to aid the survivors and to ensure that nothing like it can ever happen again. “We have seen... View Article
Nigel Ostime

View Point – Nigel Ostime from Hawkins\Brown

Nigel Ostime, project delivery director at architects Hawkins\Brown, offers some thoughts on how to counter the ills of Design & Build using current procurement. There has been much in the media recently about the poor quality achieved through Design &... View Article

RIBA responds to Draft London Plan

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has responded to the publication of Mayor of London’s Draft London Plan. RIBA President Ben Derbyshire said “Me and my team at the RIBA look forward to working with the Mayor of London... View Article
regeneration

Future Watch – Setting the stage for regeneration

With cities’ night time economy being seen as increasingly important in the future, Tim Foster, partner at Foster Wilson Architects, reflects on how theatre design projects that put placemaking at their core can catalyse regeneration. Following the debate around placemaking... View Article