Fig Tree Retrofit

The two-and-a-half-bedroom first floor was rather inequitable and the open-plan ground floor had no room to escape the hurly-burly of family life.

The conclusion was that the 133m2 floor area was nevertheless enough and that the existing set of rooms could be fine-tuned through ‘micro-moves’ – so no extensions, no structural steelwork, no massive concrete foundations. The response instead was to:
Repurpose a shed-like outbuilding into a quiet garden reading roo
Create a sleeping platform to enhance a previously inadequate bedroo
Construct a work-station over the stairwel
Add storage and desk spaces so that everything had a place and everyone had a space to work.

These interventions were all made as joinery pieces from ordinary materials that read as a set of insertions. They sit alongside the Victorian fabric comfortably but distinct to it.

The project also included a whole-house-plan to reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions which were substantial. While the windows were all double-glazed, improvements included:
2 inches of insulating plaster to all external walls
Roof and floor insulation
PV to the main roof
Air-source heat pump

This reduced the heating demand by 50 per cent and has led to a total annual energy use intensity (EUI) of around 55kWh/m2yr (meeting LETI retrofit target). If the PV generation is included then this figure drops to 35kWhr/m2yr which complies with the RIBA 2030 target for new build.

After the first nine months of occupation, measured energy use is substantially less than modelled. As the embodied carbon associated with the works is around 10 kgCO2/m2yr (compared with RIBA target for new build of 625), this project shows how retrofit can slash whole-life-carbon-emissions and improve comfort and liveability.