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Axis Design’s work in Brandwood End was recently featured as part of an article in the local press exploring the benefits of considering Secured by Design principles as part of the housing design process.

Click on the image for the full size version.

If you’re interested in hearing more about how we use both online and offline tools to help us collaborate better with clients and the public, come along to The Building Centre on Tuesday 30th to hear Rob Annable talk at the Collaboration Cafe Symposium event organised by Slider Studio

Speakers Include:
Michael Kohn, Slider Studio (the developers of StickyWorld)
Rob Annable, Axis Design
Paul Wilkinson, Be2Camp

Discussion Panel Includes:
Robin Nicholson, Edward Cullinan Architects
Ben Derbyshire, HTA
James Goodfellow, Make Architects
Darren Comber, Scott Brownrigg
Renee Tobe, Head of Architecture at UEL
Peter Murray, Wordsearch and NLA
Ty Goddard, Centre for School Design

Thanks to everyone who came to see us at the West Midlands Design Fair, we really enjoyed the event and hope you all enjoy your copy of the Axis Design newspaper.

We were joined by the guys from Slider Studio and we took the opportunity to show our innovative work in the online consultation field and YouCanPlan in Lozells. Our investigations into self-publishing tools were done with the help of bookleteer.com and newspaperclub.co.uk.

blurtonvision.co.uk needs your help… the new web site allows anyone who wants to take part in creating news about the neighbourhood to tell a story.

You could write something, take pictures or videos or even just use your mobile to send text messages. We’d like to hear from any residents in Blurton Farm, Newstead or Old Blurton who’d like to help us keep everyone in touch with the latest news and events from around the community.

Get in touch with Rob Annable at Axis Design architects if you’d like to take part…

2009 was a busy year for us here at Axis Design. So busy in fact that we neglected to tell you about it and haven’t updated the blog since the summer! Hopefully we’ve more than made up for it with the printing of the first Axis Design newspaper, covering numerous projects we’ve been involved with during the last couple of years.

You can pick yourself up a copy if you come and see us at the Designed Environment West Midlands Design Fair on the 25th February, where we’ll be teaming up with the guys at Slider Studio to talk about our consultation work using advanced digital tools. We’ve been using another example of an advanced digital tool to make the newspaper thanks to the new service launched by http://newspaperclub.co.uk.

Here are a few excerpts along with some images from the paper; you can also download a PDF copy of the full newspaper here: Axis Design newspaper

Birmingham Municipal Housing Trust

Axis Design Architects continue to play a key role in Birmingham’s latest housing developments. As one of the architects for the first two phases of the initiative to allow local authorities to build new homes, Axis Design have developed proposals for 5 sites across the city that will set the standard for the future of housing in Birmingham. Each scheme has been designed to deliver Code for Sustainable Homes level 4 and with the help of code assessors Brooks Devlin we have provided a renewable energy strategy that recommends the use of photovoltaic energy which could benefit from the recently announced Feed in Tarrif (more images available on our flickr page)

The quality of supported housing for the 55+ market in the UK is a topic we’ve been discussing here at Axis Design a lot over the last few years. This year’s brief for the British Homes Awards gave us the opportunity to explore some of our ideas and show how we believe the industry could turn to existing housing solutions from the holiday home sector combined with improved landscape and infrastructure to meet the aspirations of retiring baby boomers.

Here’s our response to the Lifetime Homes challenge set by the British Homes Awards 2009 (click images for full size):

Eco Lodge Parks 

Asset rich but cash poor; dire pension and savings forecast; inheritance tax worries; probably working until our seventies. The kids could help but they are mortgaged to the hilt and need help with childcare and top up fees.

Today’s reality for the youth of the 60’s, nurtured on the NHS, fashioned on the Mini, honed by world travel, inspired by JFK, rock & roll heavy….   their 21st century living is essentially about affordability and equity release creating third age choices and financial security.

What if we could sell up the family home, spend one third of the proceeds on a third age home, then invest the rest, buy a villa in Goa, or help the family?

In eco-Lodge Parks you can….. and even generate letting income over the next 20 years.

Thanks to Jez Sanders from Red Landscape for collaborating with us on this work. Although we didn’t make the shortlist we’re still very pleased with the concept and hope to get the opportunity to develop it in the future.

(see the full entry for further text)

Read the rest of this entry »

Today sees the official opening of the passive solar spaces we designed on behalf of Waterloo Housing for the latest phase of Brandwood End in Kings Heath. Thanks to funding assistance from Birmingham City Council we’ve been able to provide two storey glazed spaces to the rear of ten houses of mixed tenure. Designed as flexible spaces alongside the kitchen/dining room we believe that the life style benefits of sun spaces are equally as important as the energy/economic benefits.

Like our work in the refurbishment field, we’ll also be doing extensive post-occupancy monitoring of these properties over the next 3 years. We gave a short presentation at Ecobuild this year covering all these issues and the slides are available online.

After months of intensive collaboration with software developers Slider Studio, we can now announce the launch of our latest development in community consultation innovation. On behalf of Birmingham City Council and Urban Living we’ve created a 3D software platform for the Lozells neighbourhood that allows residents to see the latest proposals for the area by the city’s urban design team; then send feedback and chat with other residents and project team members.

The options can be viewed from above or from street level with the ability to switch between proposals from any point, helping the viewer make comparisons. It can be used both as an offline tool at venues without an internet connection and also online from home, outside of the usual time/location constraints for consultation events. The online option allows us to update the proposals as the project progresses and demonstrate the impact of the feedback we receive. Hopefully this project will provide a platform that Birmingham City Council can continue to deploy in future projects, commissioning 3D information to use in the software and for the creation of rapid protoyped models to use at public events.

Visit the project web site and download the software at: http://vision-lozells.org

 *UPDATE: You can also see video footage of the software being used for the first time at a recent event by visiting the Lozells News web site. *

This week we’ve been working on sketch proposals for a building for the Friends of Cotteridge Park resident group. Designed to be a robust part of the landscape that can be quickly/cheaply put up in stages, the project uses a combination of off-the-shelf products and earth sheltering. You can see full details at the project site: http://cotteridgepark.org.uk/shelter

Works is progressing well with phase 2 of the ecoterrace project and like the previous properties we’ll be taking part in some open days for the public. Come along and visit us!

107/109 London Road,
Chesterton,
Newcastle Under Lyme,
ST5 7JE

Open days:

• 7th March 10am-2pm
• 14th March 10am-2pm

4/6 Victoria Street,
Chesterton,
Newcastle Under Lyme,
ST5 7EW

Open days:

• 18 April 10am -2pm
• 25 April 10 am -2pm