This year, Ferguson Mann Architects signed up to the UK Architects Declare initiative, which calls for the declaration of a state of emergency with respect to the world’s climate and biodiversity.
With the world’s leading climate scientists warning that we have around 10 years to limit climate change catastrophe that will affect hundreds of millions of people, Architects Declare recognise that the twin crises of climate breakdown and biodiversity loss are the most serious issues of our time.
We have always considered that sustainable and regenerative design should be at the heart of sensible design practices. The company’s history of working with existing buildings has also recognised this; and as building performance continuously improves, the case for reducing embodied carbon by retaining existing buildings has never been more important.
The initiative, which we endorse, contains an 11-point pledge that seeks to raise awareness of the issues surrounding climate change:
- Raise awareness of the climate and biodiversity emergencies and the urgent need for action amongst our clients and supply chains.
- Advocate for faster change in our industry towards regenerative design practices and a higher Governmental funding priority to support this.
- Establish climate and biodiversity mitigation principles as the key measure of our industry’s success: demonstrated through awards, prizes and listings.
- Share knowledge and research to that end on an open source basis.
- Evaluate all new projects against the aspiration to contribute positively to mitigating climate breakdown and encourage our clients to adopt this approach.
- Upgrade existing buildings for extended use as a more carbon efficient alternative to demolition and new build whenever there is a viable choice.
- Include life cycle costing, whole life carbon modelling and post occupancy evaluation as part of our basic scope of work, to reduce both embodied and operational resource use.
- Adopt more regenerative design principles in our studios, with the aim of designing architecture and urbanism that goes beyond the standard of net zero carbon in use.
- Collaborate with engineers, contractors and clients to further reduce construction waste.
- Accelerate the shift to low embodied carbon materials in all our work.
- Minimise wasteful use of resources in architecture and urban planning, both in quantum and in detail.
Images: Lakeshore, Bristol. Re-use of redundant building to provide EcoHome apartments.
For more information on the Lakeshore project, click here.
