Latest BACA News:

The UK’s first amphibious house passes the float test with flying colours. Water from the neighbouring Thames was pumped into the dock in order to float and balance the concrete hull of this groundbreaking building.

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The float test was recorded on camera for a forthcoming TV show of the pioneering design, located in Marlow.  Members of BACA and the engineering team from Technicker watched as the dock in which the house will rest was filled with water to simulate flood conditions, and the concrete hull the building will rest on tweaked, to perfect its balance and test the waterproofing.

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Aquatecture, a new book authored by BACA Directors, Robert Barker and Richard Coutts, is now being advertised on the RIBA bookshop website.

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Due to be published by RIBA Publishing, the specialist book incorporates the Practice’s considerable knowledge and research experience in designing with water, from building to masterplanning levels.

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With water playing such a vital role in our lives and societies, the book lays out the case for the importance of designing for water, now and in the future, in order to best prepare us to adapt to the uncertainties of future climate change.

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Historical cases of issues with water and innovations in designing with water are examined, along with measures to mitigate the threat posed by water in the form of shortages, such as droughts, and excess, in the form of flooding.

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BACA architects are runner-up in an ambitious plan to build a floating village in London’s Royal Docks, as part of the Mayor of London’s Vision. The team, led by Hadley Mace, developed plans for a floating village conceived as a ‘Crown’ in the Royal Docks. It would form the head of a future necklace of floating settlements that could extend throughout the Docks along a watery ‘Champs Elysee’ boulevard.

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A fundamental approach to BACA’s plan was that the development should not be an extension of the dock edge. Rather, it should be set away from the dock edge and surrounded by a ‘blue belt’, to provide space to breathe and express the unique ‘aquatecture’. The village design has the bold ambition of the original dock builders and would be innovative, inspirational and iconic: a legacy that future generations could be proud of.

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Designed and built in Britain, the HM team’s approach was to make a uniquely British floating village, both bold and playful. Their floating village design contains all the components one would expect from a quintessential British village but on water, with small local stores, a village hall/gallery, and even a floating village pub set on the edge of the village blue.

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‘The village is set in a giant blue park, where water is the public realm. We envisage all sorts of events to cater for everyone; like dragon boat and rowing races, carnivals, boat shows, gondolas, floating weddings and there is space for people to just sit and look out.’

‘Though, sadly, the public were not invited to comment on the shortlisted proposals, hopefully there will be a chance to input into this important new London landmark in due course.’ BACA still plan to build a British floating village somewhere else in the UK.

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The Director stated that ‘he wished the winning scheme every success and hoped that this pilot floating village would be the catalyst for more floating development throughout the UK.’

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BACA director, Robert Barker, has received two shortlists for his own house, Forest Mews.

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Not only did the judges recognise the scheme in the best housing development category but they also recognised the complexity of building the delicate brick piers and shortlisted the scheme for the Innovative use of Brick and Clay Products. If you think it is worthy of winning the Architect’s choice award, please cast your vote here:

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http://www.brick.org.uk/best-housing-development-1-5-units/

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http://www.brick.org.uk/innovative-use-of-brick-and-clay-products/

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Pre-application plans have been submitted for a flood-resilient home on an exclusive stretch of the Thames. This replacement house will not only create a beautiful residence with panoramic views of the river, but it will also add more space for water thus helping to reduce flood-risk to neighbouring properties.

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The house is designed around an existing willow tree, which frames the entrance, and a new cutting for boats to pull right up to the house. The main house is lifted high above the flood level allowing the entire ground floor to flood without damaging the house. A bridge back to the mainland allows safe access to the house even during a flood.

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Planning approval has just been granted for BACA’s design for a substantial luxury eco house in the north of England.

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The home, commissioned by a well-known sporting personality, marks another achievement for the Practice’s 100% record on planning.Work on the site, located in Durham, should begin within the very near future.

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The substantial 7,000 sqft property will incorporate the latest in energy-saving technologies, such as solar slates, combined with all the modern conveniences expected of a high-end home in the modern-day.

2014’s Grand Designs Live saw the BACA stand as busy as ever with visitors taking advantage of the popular ‘Draw my Dream Home’ service. BACA’s architects translated vague visions into real representations on paper, with proposed projects ranging from earth houses, barn conversions and a modular pre-fab house to tree houses in Costa Rica. Here are a few of the best sketches.

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The capacity to sketch live in front of clients greatly speeds up the design process and clients are often amazed at how quickly the BACA team can sketch out ideas in front of them – it really gets the design discussion going.

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Richard Coutts’ sketching abilities were enjoyed en masse by an audience of Grand Designers during his ‘Live Design Workshop’ on the Monday of the exhibition.  Richard drew 12 individual designs as he demonstrated the BACA design process over the hour-long session before he returned to the BACA stand to continue bringing to life individuals’ dreams and visions in front of their eyes.

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Many countries have already learned to live with regular flooding and it seems this could be in the UK’s not-too-distant future as well. Director Richard Coutts and engineer Roger Falconer ask: how can we live with water and can it actually transform our society for the better?

TUE 3 JUN 2014 2:30PM – 3:30PM

EDF ENERGY ARENA

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Imperial Square, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL50, UK

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BACA architects took to the Grand Designs Main Stage on Bank Holiday Monday with a series of informative talks.

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Jessica Laurance kicked off the day with George Clarke to talk through her new build “Forest Mews” which has been recently completed. Jessica presented the build process and the problems faced with the highly constrained mews site. Stop motion pictures of the site throughout the build relayed the different stages of the job perfectly and George was impressed with the quality and atmosphere of the completed building.

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BACA director Richard Coutts was next on and presented a “Live Design Workshop,” showing how to compile your brief and what is involved in the design process at an early stage of a job. Drawing the audience’s dream homes live, Richard sketched his way through 15 meters of sketch paper! Cameras overhead captured the process and projected to the main screen for the audience to appreciate.

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Robert Barker then joined George Clarke and Rachael Hill, a National Flood and Coastal Risk Manager and member of the Environment Agency to talk about “Living with Water”

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The debate covered possible building solutions to the UK’s ongoing flooding issues, what people can do to their own existing homes to protect against flooding and where to get the appropriate information and guidance. The discussion made the audience aware that all property is vulnerable from flooding in one way or another and we can all help reduce its impacts.

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We will be at the BACA Stand B2 at the Excel centre all of this week to discuss your own dream home or help with possible solutions to constraints on your site.

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Richard and Robert will be appearing at The Times Cheltenham Science Festival this June.

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A Waterproof World? - 2.30pm Tuesday 3rd June

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Maggie Philbin of Tomorrow’s World fame will be chairing the event, with Prof. Roger Falconer joining the BACA Directors on stage for the hour-long discussion, ‘A Waterproof World?’.  The panel will be exploring how we can live with water and whether it can actually transform our society for the better.

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The debate will be highly topical following the damage to their properties suffered by so many homeowners during the severe flooding earlier this year, with the floor being opened up to the audience for questions following the speakers’ presentations and discussion.   The formidable expertise of the panel serves to make this a fascinating insight into the causes of flooding, reducing risks from it and solutions for the future.

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A Waterproof World?

2.30pm, Tuesday 3rd June

The Times Cheltenham Science Festival, 3-8 June 2014

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Green Sky Thinking Event 2014

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BACA architects has developed a speciality in water-related design and are leaders in flood-resilient architecture and masterplanning.

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Drawing on their award-winning research – the LifE project – BACA will present their Amphibious house (currently under construction and the first of its kind in the UK), Aquobox (a demonstration flood-resilient building for the BRE Innovation Park) and the MIPIM 2014 award-winning island development, Nijmegen (€365m Dutch Room for the River Project).

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BACA have recently completed a chapter on flooding for the forthcoming Metric Handbook. BACA will also convey their vision for tackling future climate issues, from individual buildings to whole climate-adaptive cities.

Director Richard Coutts will be heading to Cannes to receive the Practice’s latest award, this time for the Eiland Veur Lent project in Nijmegen, Holland.

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The ‘island retreat’ design has been awarded the MIPIM AR Future Projects Award for Regeneration and Masterplanning.  Part of the Dutch ‘Room for the River’ programme, the newly-created island in a major flood-relief channel combines water recreation, river ecology, flood-resilient development and sustainable infrastructure to create an holistic and self-sufficient ‘eco-leisure’ destination.

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The Making Space for Water programme marks a paradigm shift in flood mitigation, with developments designed to make space for floodwater and work in harmony with natural processes.  Construction began in late 2013 and once completed Eiland Veur Lent will be an exemplar, integrated solution and showcase for international architectural and technical innovation.

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Richard will be collecting the award on behalf of the Practice and attending the MIPIM Conference for the full three days.

BACA has contributed a chapter on Flood-aware design to the next (5th) edition of the architects’ reference book, The Metric Handbook. Since its conception, The Metric Handbook has become the major handbook of planning and design for architects. Due to be published in early 2015, the forthcoming edition has been updated to take account of the most recent changes to regulation and practice, in particular the increasing emphasis on environmental legislation.

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The Practice was approached to apply its expert knowledge of flood mitigation and masterplanning by providing a dedicated chapter on ‘Flood-aware Design’. This will be the first time that such a chapter has ever featured since the Handbook’s debut edition was published in 1968, another indication of the vital need for flooding and flood-aware design to be considered during the planning and design process.

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BACA’s Robert Barker has been invited to speak on the topical subject of water at the forthcoming ECOBUILD show next month.

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The BACA Director will be sharing the Practice’s specialist knowledge, vision and solutions in a talk entitled ‘Water-based Design’ during the Future Cities seminars.

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As demonstrated by the continuing fall-out from the devastating floods that have been ravaging parts of Britain in the past months, the importance of factoring water into future planning and architectural design is intensifying.  Robert will be drawing on BACA’s award-winning research, the LifE Project (Long-term Initiatives for Flood-risk Environment), to discuss alternative ways in which we can work with water, rather than defend against it, to cope with increased volumes of water in the future.

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Robert will also be presenting some of the Practice’s cutting-edge, flood-resilient designs, including the UK’s first Amphibious House and award-winning Nijmegen ‘Room for the River’ project.  You can hear Robert delivering his talk at the Water-sensitive urban design (WSUD) – managing urban water seminar, taking place at ECOBUILD between 14:30 -16:00, 4th-6th March 2014, ExCel, London.

As large parts of the UK continue to suffer from severe flooding, BACA have once again been called upon to appear as expert commentators by the UK media.

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This time appearing on ITV London News, BACA Director, Richard Coutts, presented the Practice’s innovative Amphibious House, a national first, demonstrating how the home rises to float within its own dock when flooding occurs and returns to ground level once water levels have receded.

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Also discussed were proposals from BACA’s award-wining LifE Project (Long-term Initiatives for Flood-risk Environments), a non-defensive and sustainable approach to working with water within future developments.

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Richard explained the growing need to consider and integrate water into our built environment as we adapt to coping with more frequent flood events.

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You can find the news clip on BACA's YouTube channel here.

Today we can proudly announce that BACA architects has received MIPIM’s Regeneration and Masterplanning Award for the Eiland Veur Lent project in Nijmegen, currently under construction.

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The awards will be presented during the annual MIPIM event at Cannes in March.

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Further information from BACA:

Eiland Veur Lent

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The Making Space for Water programme marks a paradigm shift in flood mitigation, with developments designed to make space for floodwater, working in harmony with natural processes, rather than building dykes and levees that limit flood storage and can be overtopped.

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Construction began in 2013 on a major flood relief channel between Nijmegen and Lent in the Netherlands. The holistic project includes a major dyke relocation and new flood-relief channel as part of the national ‘Room for the River’ programme to reduce flood-risk and support urban growth in Lent.

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BACA were invited to draw-up plans for the newly created ‘island’.  BACA’s ’Retreat’ proposal combines water recreation, river ecology, flood-resilient development and sustainable infrastructure to create a self-sufficient ‘eco-leisure’ destination. It will be an exemplar, integrated solution and showcase for international architectural and technical innovation.

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Including a 70m tall landmark tower, series of 100 luxury flood-resilient resilient homes and holiday lets cascading down to touch the water and link with a floating quay, plus a parkland for recreation, nature and seasonal flooding, the project will unite on many levels, fusing past with future, harmonising nature with development and re-connecting residents with the water.

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Following another spate of heavy rainfall across the United Kingdom, the issue of flooding once again found itself high on the national agenda.  

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BACA’s Robert Barker was invited by the BBC News to appear as expert commentator on their item regarding further devastating flooding, of real concern to millions of homeowners and businesses.

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Robert discussed both current and proposed flood-risk management techniques that BACA are employing to help clients and planners protect homes and businesses from the expense and distress of flood damage.  Larger-scale proposals were also introduced, that would make whole areas resilient to flood-risk, rather than just individual buildings.  Innovative uses of parkland areas and car parks for water storage during flood events, alongside cutting-edge underground water storage systems, are just some of the measures that BACA is utilising effectively to reduce flood damage.

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Robert also explored BACA’s radical proposal for government to create specific areas that would lie outside of traditional planning regulations by granting an Innovation Licence. These areas would be breeding grounds for innovation, where companies and individuals could explore revolutionary new ideas and build and develop them.  

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New methods that proved effective could then be permanently licenced and employed in the development of technology to reduce the increasing threat from flooding.

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After almost 10 years the practice still has 100% planning success.

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This year, amongst others, BACA architects helped to achieve planning consent for 670 new homes as mixed-use redevelopment of a major brownfield regeneration site in Norwich; and secured planning consent for one of the most ambitious houses of the 21st century – and it is designed to passivhaus.