As part of an innovative exercise, in collaboration alongside five other architectural practices, McGinlay Bell were invited by Igloo Regeneration to rethink current terraced house design. The project initiative was promoted by the Scottish Government through the ‘Custom Build & Self Build Challenge Fund’ in order to test-bed design innovative thinking for the added value of custom build as an alternative to the UK’s mainstream housing delivery.
Igloo Regeneration, in partnership with housing contractor CCG, asked all the practices to embrace the construction principles of low-carbon, customisable, timber-panelled modular housing design. Following a number of client / contractor design workshops, we were asked to develop a new typology for the contemporary terrace house based on an open brief for a three storey, three bedroom house type with an area of 100sqm and of a construction budget ranging from £142K to £153K.
Our proposals presented two core typologies. Embracing ideas around off-site manufacturing (OSM) and free-plan structures, our response to the brief primarily focus on exploiting the potential of the inside volume as a customisable project. Our design studies considered a playful use of the house section, lifetime user patterns, and the placement or rooms in the volume offering the possibilities of 1 ,2 , 3 or 4 bed house type scenarios utilising a single construct and efficient structural volume.
