University of Sheffield
"The judges were impressed by the duo’s rigorous sustainable approach and ‘carefully worked out social programme’, commenting: ‘A lot of thought has been put into post-occupation evaluation, which is very important for continued sustainable living’, and adding that they enjoyed the realist strategy taken.
‘It's a really sophisticated project about making an unloved building joyful,’ they said."
This project proposes the creative re-use of the University of Manchester’s former UMIST Campus as an environmentally conscious form of inner-city living. The campus masterplan proposes turning teaching buildings into housing co-operatives sitting above community functions operated by the Carbon Conscious Collective. The Renold Co-op is the first phase, introducing a primary school at podium level and utilising the larger spaces of former lecture halls.
Above, the repeating floor plates of the tower offer the flexibility for self-build cassette construction, designed for adaptation and disassembly and enabling lifetime homes and opportunities for material re-use. The project offers a three-point consideration of carbon: embodied, operational and life-cycle. A ‘traffic light’ assessment of elements guides every decision, evaluating embodied carbon against operational performance, with any upgrade considered against a material’s potential for re-use, repurposing or recycling.
University of Sheffield
MArch Collaborative Practice
Housing the Public
Re-Housing Manchester
