notes

Look at pretty much any new housing development and it probably looks like this; traditional, familiar materials and forms - bricks, tiles, small windows, maintenance-free pvc pretending to be wooden window frames and iron gutters. Look around the show house and you're likely to see heating radiators below the window cills and a gas boiler in the utility room. The houses will be a selection of a few standard plans, probably given variety by varying brick colour or extra cladding materials. It matter not a jot which way they face and the chances are that behind the brick is a timber frame. Because the houses have to comply with building regulations controlling energy conservation the houses will be very well insulated and airtight, but those small windows, designed to minimise heat losses, are of little use when it comes to grabbing the free heat available from winter sunshine, while the airtightness is a nonsense when every kitchen, bathroom and utility room has to have an extract ...