Last year, a development of 105 homes on the outskirts of Norwich became the first social housing project to win the prestigious Royal Institute of British Architects Stirling Prize. The Goldsmith Street estate was built by London architecture firm Mikhail Riches for Norwich City Council, and is the largest Passivhaus scheme in the UK. Passivhaus […]
With the widening gap between the richest and poorest across different measures of inequality, there is growing awareness that income is not the only factor that impacts living standards. This has led to increasing interest in the distribution of wealth. While wealth can take various forms, the most visible way households accrue and store substantial […]
A key change in the UK’s housing market over the past twenty years has been the growth of the private rented sector (PRS), with more living in the sector than ever before. This growth has led to the view that there is now a ‘generation rent’ who are priced out of home ownership and stranded […]
Sometimes it takes an intractable problem to inspire an inventive solution. Faced with an ageing construction workforce and a shortage of apprentices, the Netherlands has come up with what may prove to be the makings of a housing revolution. Collaborating with the public and private sectors, Eindhoven University of Technology has been working on a […]
In April, the Labour Party launched its strategy for tackling the housing crisis in England. Housing for the Many presents a 50-point plan, with proposals that include: investing £4bn a year to build one million ‘genuinely’ affordable homes over 10 years lifting of council borrowing caps removing the ‘viability loophole’, making it impossible for […]
It has been widely argued that securing adequate housing for ex-offenders reduces rates of recidivism. However, it is not uncommon for a person to be released from prison with nowhere to live and there have been criticisms over the statutory support available for prison leavers, and the lack of housing options available on release. Being […]
Housing is one of the challenges of our time. The task for architects and designers is to create affordable, robust housing that can accommodate the needs of a rapidly growing, but also ageing population. And it’s not as easy as simply building. The demands and expectations on house builders to also be community builders and […]
The role of housing goes far beyond physical shelter and safety. It introduces people to a community to which they can belong, a space which is their own, a communal setting where they can make friends, form relationships and a place where they can go for support, social interaction and reduce feelings of loneliness and […]
Earlier this year, official figures showed that rough sleeping in England had risen for the sixth successive year. The data showed that 4,134 people slept on the street in 2016, an increase of 16% on the previous year’s figure of 3,569, and more than double the 2010 figure. Many of those enduring long-term homelessness have […]
Guest blog: Matthew Carmona and Lucy Natarajan Here at The Bartlett, UCL we recently completed a major study of the eleven years of publically funded CABE, the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment. We evaluated the work, history, and impact of the organisation, and the ‘tools’ it used to promote good urban design across England. […]
