I’ll design your social housing for free.
DO you register the frail man sitting on the pavement by your cash point, hands cupped in desperation? Or the young girl hunched in a doorway just down the street?
The truth is that, the rise in homelessness over the past decade has become impossible to ignore. Rough sleeping is the tip of the iceberg. For every rough sleeper you see in London there are seven households living in temporary accommodation, waiting for a permanent place to call home. Almost every week brings fresh headlines about the lack of affordable housing. And the consequences are everywhere around us.
But even in this climate, I was floored by the Children’s Commissioner’s recent report that 124,000 children in England live in temporary accommodation — even shipping containers and converted office blocks.
When I hear about a mother having to sleep with the doors open to prevent her baby from getting heat rash, or whole families living in homes as small as 18 sq m, I can’t help but think about my own children, aged four and one. It breaks my heart picturing them with no room to play, freezing cold in the winter, their healthy development threatened by their environment. It’s no way for a child to grow up.
However, over the bank holiday weekend, I’ve realised that being devastated, being heartbroken, isn’t enough. It puts me on par with all those politicians, civil servants, and developers who could do something…but don’t. Whether this is because they don’t have the money, a solution at hand, or because they just don’t want to make the effort. I should use my privileged position to actually try to change things.
The Resi Foundation
Jules and I have long spoken about our desire to start the Resi Foundation, where part of our profits each year are directed towards pro-bono design for housing associations and councils who want to build good social housing.
Why us?
Often, when looking to put a housing project out to bid, a council will choose a developer who’s able to handle everything from design to construction. This sounds good but creates a conflict of interest. Managing these projects in their entirety, developers usually design homes that can be constructed as cheaply as possible — boosting their profit margins.
Moreover in the last decade, the cost of building a home has soared by 42%, while the average government grants for doing so have gone in reverse — dropping from an average £102k to just £33k per home. It’s no wonder building social homes has been a struggle.
But a home is more than just a roof over your head. There’s a science to a good one. You need natural light, good ventilation, space to grow, play…live your lives! At Resi, our architects have designed more than 1,700 homes across the UK, with these principles always at the forefront.
By having an architect at the helm — rather than a profit-driven developer — I truly believe we could create social housing that does more than just shelter, but transforms lives. What’s more, this would allow contractors to bid on constructing well-designed projects for competitive prices, rather than letting bottom lines influence design decisions.
That’s why Jules and I wanted to create the Resi Foundation — we even bought the domain! But as with so many passion projects, our vision was slowly lost under the day-to-day workload.
Until now.
Less talk, more action
After seeing the conditions so many families live in, I can no longer sit back and do nothing.
The Resi Foundation might not have a fancy website designed or a slick press launch, but that’s not important. What does matter is getting the ball rolling and letting councils know help (free help!) is available.
If you are a council, charity or housing association and you want our help to build quality social housing email me: Alex@resi.co.uk.
My team can handle…
- Scoping advice pre-brief / tender package
- Concepts
- Proposed designs
- Planning
- Building regulations
- Third-party expertise and partnerships
All free of charge. That’s right. Completely and utterly FREE.
We want to create homes that last. Not boxes built for box-ticking exercises or dingy containers stuck at the back of a development. Real homes for real people.
If this sounds like something you’d like to be part of or would like to see in your local area — let me know. I’m done with sitting on the sidelines.
