The terrace of eco-houses was built for housing association Radian Group
Southampton-based contractor FE Chase has completed a terrace of zero-carbon homes in Whitehill Bordon, Hampshire, to a design by Ash Sakula Architects. Built for housing association Radian Group, the £600,000 development consists of three prototype affordable homes.
The houses are the result of an open design competition run by East Hampshire District Council and Radian, and won by Ash Sakula in 2012, to design an adaptable eco-terrace to the highest possible sustainability standards.
Each of the two-storey homes contains a kitchen/dining space and a living room on the ground floor divided by the staircase, with two bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs. The landing on the upper floor acts as a laundry area, with a washing machine and airing cupboard placed under a high roof opening, where a hanging clothes dryer is located.
Sunken rear terraces lead on to a “wild-planted” communal green space (above). Below: The landing utility area has drying space beneath the high roof
The Code for Sustainable Homes level 5 terrace is constructed from cross-laminated timber, and clad in sweet chestnut shingles and lime render on wood-fibre insulation as part of a highly insulated envelope. Internally, passive and active systems of comfort control are used, including a gas condenser boiler and radiators, a mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR) system and stack ventilation throughout the house.
Photovoltaic panels mounted on the homes’ asymmetrical saw-tooth roofs at an optimum pitch of 30 degrees, provide the homes with sustainable power.
The living area of each home opens out on to own its own sunken patio within a shared communal garden that is “wild planted” to encourage natural wildlife habitats. Next to the terrace is a building that contains a communal recycling and refuse storage area for the three houses, with an attic built as a home for bats and eaves for house martins.
Since the houses were built the government has scrapped its 2016 target for all new-build homes to be zero carbon.
Robert Sakula, partner of Ash Sakula Architects, says: “I hope that all the research and development that we and the rest of the construction industry have done to create these kind of eco-houses will not be wasted in the light of the government’s recent change of policy, abandoning its target of all new houses being carbon neutral by 2016.”
The recycling building has an attic home for bats with eaves for house martins
