Josh McCosh photographed at van Heyningen & Haward Architects in Chalk Farm, London. 

Photo 
Timothy Soar 

It was not a surprise, but the Young Advisors at Platform Performing Arts were brilliant clients. They were passionate, engaged, and determined - what more could you want? All our best projects have grown from a shared journey with our clients, with all the iterations, debate, and discussions delivering the best outcomes. We struggle with client representation, often from local authorities, who have no authentic input to make and conceal it behind a weary cynicism or procedural barriers. So, it was especially praiseworthy that London Borough of Islington had the imagination and courage to find and appoint a panel of young people to be our client. A great facility for young people resulted.

All our recent Governments have paid lip service to sustainability, but have been utterly hypocritical by avoiding the fiscal policy or legislation that is needed. If we are to mitigate climate change and stay within vaguely tolerable planetary boundaries we need systemic change. Intelligent, responsible, construction needs to become normal. So the single policy change would be to implement legislation now that delivers the UK's legal commitment to Net Zero made in the Climate Change Act 2008.

In our practice it is clear that clients from the heritage sector have a much more nuanced understanding of materials and their long term value. They find use of lime as a binder and sealant, biogenetic insulation, and earth, timber and stone obviously sensible.

We have  tried to persuade clients to move to timber and biogenic materials, using our expensive One-click software to demonstrate the impacts of material choices. The adoption of a lean timber-frame for our passivhaus primary school at Houlton for Urban&Civic is due to gradual advocacy and discussions on two earlier projects, which U&C embraced and then encouraged.

The biggest obstacle is the inertia of supply chains ‘business-as-usual’, and the pursuit of lowest cost. Most of our contractor clients feel most comfortable with a high-carbon palette of concrete, cement, steel, aluminium, plastic insulation, carpet and vinyl. That’s low risk to them, but the polluter doesn’t pay in this instance.

We find it almost impossible to get clients to pay for POEs, which is a shame as it would enable them to realise the full value of their buildings, learning lessons from them, and improving our construction knowledge & culture. I would like a simple declaration of actual energy and water use to be legally mandatory for every building, every year, and to be held on an open searchable GIS database, as this would force the issue.

It’s encouraging to see the likes of Webb Yates, Engenuti, and Amin Taha pushing the envelope of ‘normal’ with timber and stone structures. We look forward to when a Tier 1 contractor’s supply chain can engage with the climate crisis, and use their considerable skills to use natural materials and processes that cause less impact.

At Houlton the entire development programme, and the masterplan, revolve around newts. Although that’s not obvious, the pond-studded green corridors make it an exceptional place to be. 

This country has huge finance, design, and construction talent, a large economy, and stable institutions. Within a couple of years we could have collectively evolved - and created a new paradigm for construction.

At vHH we actively tried to minimise cementitious materials, new metals, plastics and composites. We recognise that some are needed, but usually there is a better choice. We often find we can deliver the performance another way. There is a particular challenge with glazing, and we look forward to glazing which does not rely on the short, carbon-intensive, lives of sealed units.