Comments on: Home

By: Mike Kalam

Mike Kalam — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 22:03:37 +0000

John fantstic house – would love to come and take a look at the house in greater detail. I think many of your design features need to be made mandatory for new build projects!

By: Hannan

Hannan — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 21:01:02 +0000

Thanks John and Jo for a great visit, the house is really interesting and the work you’ve done is amazing. Thank you!

By: Fred Vellacott

Fred Vellacott — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 21:16:40 +0000

The above website is a consultant based in London who is a top authority on Rammed earth- and passionate about avoiding concrete use. He does workshops occasionally which would give you the hands on skills or would work with yourselves/ a contractor. Realise this is probably too late-but highly recomended

By: Alison

Alison — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 14:10:04 +0000

I think this house is a great achievement, see the link to The Times write up, beginning “I have seen the future – and it’s in Birmingham”. We really need to do imaginative and green things with our terraced houses in UK. Ten out of ten!!

By: Hanjit

Hanjit — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 14:07:17 +0000

This is a great design. I am not aware of their being many zero carbon houses around, so for one of the first to built in Birmingham is very good. This is simply fantastic becasue it will produce lots and lots of energy. Also it will effectivly help the enviornment and it is a great news that it won the RIBA award, lets jsut hope there will be plenty of other ‘zero carbon houses’ to come as I believe we may have just seen an insight into the future.

By: John Christophers

John Christophers — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 16:44:39 +0000

Thank you Mike for your very kind appreciation. Your point about contemporary Japanese architecture interests me, as I think the philosophy/approach/aesthetic they call “wabi sabi” is similar to what we are trying to do with using natural materials (earth floors etc) and valuing their “imperfections” as part of the character, quality and richness of those materials.

John

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 16:40:54 +0000

Thank you and your family most sincerely for generously
opening your magnificent home. You have achieved something really quite remarkable and your translation of vision into reality is truly inspirational, as was your impromptu and fascinating presentation. Quite
aside from all the exemplary green aspects, I was also deeply impressed by your skilful use of space and light. The house seemed quite “Tardis” like and I hope you all enjoy many happy years in it.

It also reminded me of the successful integration (and
fluidity) of living space and immediate environment in (the pictures and film I have seen of) leading contemporary Japanese domestic architecture.

Finally, it also seemed to have a grounded, peaceful and entirely human scale and feel.

I work in the public sector and although we have won a couple of national awards for good corporate citizenship, I am sure that there is much we can learn from your pioneering work.

I hope that, in time, your example can translate into standard construction practice generally and contribute to the world which we are leaving to the next generation.

By: Catherine Rock

Catherine Rock — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 14:30:33 +0000

Inspirational! many of the principles you have applied should be mandatory for all new-build and extensions/refurbs.

By: Nancy

Nancy — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 14:29:35 +0000

I rent my house & feel powerless to improve its many ineffficiencies! Great to see the place although I can’t even get my landlord to install a modern boiler. would like to consider a co-operative/communal living model – might be more accessible to me.

By: Malcolm Mummery

Malcolm Mummery — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 14:27:27 +0000

Amazing what can be achieved in old or new property. If there were more projects like this (many more) there would obviously be less need for power stations & wind farms etc!