BedZED is the UK’s largest mixed use,
carbon-neutral development. When it
was built in 2002, it set new standards in
sustainable building. BedZED comprises
82 affordable dwellings in a mixture of
flats, maisonettes and town houses, and
approximately 2500 m2 of workspace/
office, and is built on a brownfield site.
The BedZED
urban system
reconciles
high-density with amenity, providing each
dwelling with a sky garden or terrace.
A combination of passive measures and
proven, cost effective active technologies
form the strategy of an integrated,
sustainable development. A rigorous
specification process helped reduce the
environmental impact of the construction
process.
The scheme includes a biomass
combined heat and power plant, an onsite
sewage treatment and rainwater
recycling system, and natural wind driven
ventilation.The idea
was to show how
it was possible
to combine workspace with housing
whilst matching the residential densities
of the surrounding dormitory suburb,
and actually increasing overall standards
of amenity - particularly gardens and
public open space. This was achieved
by matching south facing rows of single
aspect residential terraces with north
facing live / work units or workspace. By
placing gardens on the workspace roof, it
was possible to give almost every home
a garden or terrace, whilst achieving
high levels of cool northlight within the
office space.
Five years
after full
occupation, there has
not been one complaint from residents
about workers on the site, indicating
that the combination of different uses
has been complimentary on the whole.
The design team tried hard to do the
right thing in the right place. A complex
mixed income residential brief from
Londons' oldest housing association -
the Peabody Trust asked for one third
of the homes to be social rent, one third
shared ownership and one third private
for sale. A requirement for a mixture of
both large and small family homes as
well as one and two bed flats, led to a
wide variety of different plan unit types,
each changing to suit the position within
the masterplan and cross section. North
facing workspace can be divided up into
small units each with its own front door to
the street, or knocked through to create
one large workspace the length of an
entire terrace, with enough deskpace
for a thirty to forty person office.
This enables a mixture of fairly sizable and micro start up
companies to integrate themselves in this community. BioRegional
reclaimed were very successful at reclaiming structural steelwork and
softwood walling studs from local demolition sites for remanufacturing
into useful new structural components. (read
more)
