Jo Smit
NewsMeet the parents
The opening of the Hall of Fame exhibition at the Building Centre this week was a chance to hobnob with the great and the good in construction, and in some cases their parents ...
NewsWatch out Chardonnay housebuilders' wives have moved in
Regenerate's editor spends a lot of time in the company of housebuilders but thankfully none resemble the fictional boss of Whitewater Contractors
NewsCompulsive viewing
Al Gore's hit film An Inconvenient Truth has struck a chord in the industry, but how much will it change as a result? The inconveniently true answer is probably not a great deal
NewsThe big switch off
Electrisave has a gadget that enables you to see how much money your wasting on energy in your home, the only problem is you end up being an energy-saving addict who lives in the dark and never offers cups of tea for fear of boiling the kettle ...
NewsMoney grabbers
Taxes and tariffs as alternatives to section 106 may sound like good news for housebuilders, but could just give the local authority machine more ways to extract their money.
NewsBarratt blazes a trail in US brownfield regeneration
UK housebuilder wants half of its Californian operations to be in urban renewal sector by 2009
FeaturesBuilding Homes Quality Awards 2003
The third annual gathering of British housebuilders took place last week in Park Lane, London, to recognise the achievements of the best companies in the industry. Here's a taste of the evening's celebrations …
- News
C&M hunts for rival in South-east
Country & Metropolitan is aiming to acquire a rival housebuilder by the end of the year
- Comment
Step on the gas
Gordon Brown’s Budget pledges to deal with the logjams in the planning system, release sites for housebuilding, review the progress of PPG3 and more, are further proof of the prominence of housing on the government’s agenda. ...
FeaturesThe way we live now
Three years after the government launched PPG3 and ahead of its review of housing supply, looks at the guidance that has won over housebuilders but still has some way to go before it convinces all of their customers
FeaturesWelcome to our chateau
Laing Homes is turning a 19th-century hospital into 190 chateau-style homes – one-third of them affordable. How do affluent buyers feel about sharing their castle with social tenants? We talked to its first residents and to marketing manager Christine Tiernan.
FeaturesHolliday homes
David Holliday, managing director of Kent-based Ward Homes, has found his place in the sun. With huge housing growth predicted in the Thames Gateway, he couldn't be in a better position. But he won't be resting on his laurels – as we found out, he's flat out keeping up with ...
FeaturesPrescott's paradox
In his sustainable communities plan, the deputy PM showered south-east England with public money and gave permission for 200,000 more houses – and left many in the housing industry complaining bitterly of Stalinist tactics. How did he manage that?
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The planning blighters
For the past decade, planners have told housebuilders to develop live–work units. Their dream was to turn desolate inner cities into hives of lucrative information-age industries. So why have they done their best to make sure it didn't come true?
- Comment
A virtue of necessity
"Does it stack up?" might not only refer to the technical challenge of developing prefabricated building systems to produce modern homes.
- Features
Faith in pod
Prefabrication is being held up as the answer to any number of housing problems, but are housebuilders ready to embrace the technical changes necessary to make it happen?
FeaturesA life more ordinary
One year after resident Debbie Norris moved into her factory-built semi – a scheme dreamt up by Wimpey, the Guinness Trust and Britspace to prove that modular was a good way to build a new home – she had a few bones to pick with representatives from the alliance. But ...
FeaturesModels of efficiency
The scions of The Peabody Trust might have been doing some head-scratching after approving the designs for its most recent modular housing scheme at Raines Dairy in Stoke Newington.
FeaturesTapping in to timber
Factory build doesn't mean homes have to look standard and samey, as Sunley Homes and Environ Country Homes are proving.
- Features
Transfer fever
Council housing could soon be just a memory as local authorities hand over the keys to social landlords, who will use them to unlock billions in private finance. But will the result just make the overheating in the industry even worse? Josephine Smit takes the temperature