We are architects and consultants designing low-carbon, energy-efficient buildings fit for the future. Through a creative dialogue with our clients we seek to create inspiring, atmospheric spaces that are a pleasure to use, responsive to needs of their users and that bring lasting improvements to the quality of people’s lives.
Architecture today awards 2024
23 July 2024
The Dundon Passivhaus has been shortlisted in the 2024 Architecture Today Awards Individual House category for buildings that stand the test of time. The house is now 10 years old and we have a lot of post-occupancy data from measuring electricity use, internal temperature and humidity. Post-occupancy evaluation (POE) is essential to understand whether buildings perform as predicted, and allows the modelling method to be tweaked on future projects. See here for more about the project.
ABOUT US
Working from studios in London and Wells in Somerset, Prewett Bizley Architects produce inspiring, energy-efficient buildings with a sensitive approach to context. Through a creative dialogue with our clients we seek to create engaging, atmospheric spaces that are a pleasure to use, responsive to needs of their users and that bring lasting improvements to the quality of people’s lives.
We give practical and useful advice that enables our clients to understand the design process and make informed decisions. We are committed to achieving best value for our clients according to their particular needs. We try to observe the nature of places to understand their qualities, patterns and nuances in order to propose interventions that might heal or provide continuity with the existing context.
Having pioneered some of the most extreme low-energy retrofit projects to date in the UK we are passionate about the need to reduce the impact of buildings on the environment. We are part of the 15:40 Collective of architecture practices that share a commitment to radically reducing the energy consumption of buildings through a 'fabric first' approach, with extensive experience in delivering sustainable new-build and retrofit projects using Passivhaus construction methodologies. We offer consultancy services to building owners and other professionals on low-energy construction and Passivhaus design. We have a hands-on approach through which we continuously seek to improve the quality of construction on site.
Our architectural work is rooted in the wider activities of teaching, writing and research which allow us to combine thought and technical innovation with a practical approach to the realities of development and construction. Current research focuses on rural architecture, self-build housing and how the principles of low-energy construction can be applied to retrofit of listed buildings. Please see our Journal for more information. Our work has been recognised by a number of awards, including the Malmesbury House which won an RIBA Award in 2021, and the Dundon Passivhaus in Somerset which won RIBA Regional and National Awards and was a finalist for the prestigious Stephen Lawrence Prize. We were winners of the BD Sustainability Architect of the Year Award 2017.
We work closely with Interior Designer Emily Bizley and can offer a fully integrated service incorporating architecture, interior design and energy analysis. We work throughout the south of England with recent projects in Devon, Somerset, Dorset, Wiltshire, Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Surrey, Sussex, Kent, Cambridge and London.
from our journal
The word tone suggests both visual and aural sensations, a reminder that the feeling of a place is perceived through all the senses, not just what we see.
One of the most successful urban regeneration projects of recent years, Borneo Sporenburg shows how strategically planned high-density low-rise housing can make an atmospheric and desirable piece of city.
In our work we often extend the roof out beyond the building envelope to create sheltered outdoor spaces, ‘intermediate territories’ between inside and outside that blur the distinction between the house and the landscape.
Perhaps the most radical aspect of the landscape is the way food production takes centre stage, subverting the traditional hierarchies of the country estate. Once the owner of a country house might have demonstrated their taste and learning through references to classical mythology and architecture, but here they are showing it through the provenance of the food they grow. Showing off the exotic fruits grown on their estates was often part of a land-owner’s repertoire but it happened backstage in the walled garden. Here the new no-dig kitchen garden is on axis with the house and new apple orchards stretch off to the horizon.
The buildings of the past that we most admire tend to be those made in a way that represents something of the spirit of their age. We perceive beauty when we sense materials being worked with artistry and judgement by people working to the best of their abilities in ways appropriate to their times. So what is an appropriate way of building for our time, and what might it say about our culture to future generations?
Congratulations to Patrick McEvoy of our London office whose Pavement Art Gallery proposal is one of 3 winners in a competition organised by the London Festival of Architecture to design a temporary public space for a site within the square mile of the City of London.