Housing Focus – Page 13
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FeaturesWinners revealed at 61st Housing Design Awards
Top prize goes to Totnes scheme built by Galliford Try subsidiary in collaboration with the council and a community group
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FeaturesLovells wins £24m housing refurbishment contract
Morgan Sindall division wins deal to revamp 2,200 homes for Three Oaks Housing in Wiltshire
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FeaturesTellytubby land: BedZed revisited
Peabody’s BedZed was the housing scheme that first got everyone talking about zero-carbon living. But is it all that it was cracked up to be?
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FeaturesHouse prices stay steady in June
Values remain at May level thanks to restricted supply and rising demand, with sale volumes up 80% since January
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FeaturesDan's Den: Libeskind goes flatpack
If you’ve got a couple of million euros you don’t know what to do with, why not buy your own Libeskind-designed house? Dan Stewart looks at what you get for your money
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FeaturesNeighbours: Lovell and Tarmac on reaching code level four or above
The house on the left aims to meet code level four, but next door they’ve got even loftier pretensions. Stephen Kennett reports on goings-on at a site in Nottingham
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FeaturesStone Alone: Crest Nicholson's boss on surviving a crisis
Crest Nicholson was knocked sideways by the disintegration of the housing market and the failure of the global banking system, and for 10 months chief executive Stephen Stone shouldered the weight of a collapsing company. Tom Bill found out what it took to keep smiling
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FeaturesThe peasant's revolt this ain't: Chelsea vs the barracks
This gang of Chelsea residents is on the cusp of pulling off a very English coup. Emily Wright met their ringleaders
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FeaturesOperation Hip: Igloo's Bermondsey Square
Bermondsey Square, the centrepiece of a £60m regeneration project in south-east London, is intended to seduce the young and trendy with its take on inner-city living
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FeaturesSleeping beauty awakes: the St Pancras Midland Grand hotel
The fairy-tale castle that is the Midland Grand hotel has been asleep for a very long time. Now the arrival of the Eurostar has roused it, and it is once again to become the most stylish address in London
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FeaturesEdward Cullinan's Stonebridge estate: pride of place
Edward Cullinan’s mixed-use Hillside Hub completes the overhaul of a north-west London estate that John Major once avoided for fear of being shot. Dan Stewart finds it a reformed character
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What it costs: Heat pumps
They are amazingly efficient, but setting up a ground source heat pump may be tricky if you haven’t considered all the factors. Peter Mayer of BLP Insurance gives us the lowdown
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FeaturesNo biomass, no turbines, no solar panels. Is Passivhaus the way to zero carbon?
The German Passivhaus standard is winning admirers in the UK, many of whom argue that its simple approach to low-energy building is far more practical than the Code for Sustainable Homes
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FeaturesVince Cable: 'This industry could collapse'
When the person who says this is Vince Cable, a man with a gift for eerily accurate economic predictions, you know things are serious
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FeaturesMargaret Beckett: is 240,000 homes a year possible?
Housing minister Margaret Beckett answers this and eight other questions about the state of the sector
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FeaturesGlamorous address: Candy & Candy's One Hyde Park
Candy & Candy’s One Hyde Park is coming along quite nicely, thank you. Which is just as well, because when you’re spending £100m on an apartment, you do rather want the builders out of the way before you move in
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FeaturesPerfidious Weymouth: Portland's 2012 Olympic sailing story
It doesn’t bode well. The first venue to be completed for the 2012 Olympics should have been a regeneration triumph, but instead the sailing facilities on the Dorset island of Portland have sparked resentment among the locals and a grudge against a neighbouring town. Michael Willoughby headed to the south ...
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FeaturesNo nimbys here: will Tory councils accept their party's housing policy?
The Conservatives want to give local councils more power to plan development for their areas. But given that so many Tories – especially in the South – are fighting proposed housing schemes, why should housebuilders believe their plans will work? By Muireann Bolger
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FeaturesOlympic legacy: lowering the bar again
First, the Olympic village was downsized by 1,300 homes. Now, the media centre is likely to be replaced by a ‘mixture of temporary and permanent facilities’. Whatever happened to the 2012 legacy? Joey Gardiner investigates
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What it costs: Insulated renders
Insulated render systems save energy and look good. Peter Mayer of Building LifePlans sums up the variety of choices and highlights some topical issues and lifecycle costs