This project is the new headquarters for an employee-owned ethical finance company, built around regenerative architecture and circular economy principles. An almost entirely timber structure was constructed within two existing steel-frame agricultural barns, retaining as much of the original fabric as possible to minimise embodied carbon.
Restoration of the 24-acre site was central to the brief — over 450 trees, a kilometre of new hedging, 8 acres of wildflower meadow, and 12 acres of restored ridge-and-furrow grassland grazed by a local shepherd. Native planting, bat boxes, bird boxes, and pollinator habitats are woven into the fabric of the building.
Where new materials were not essential, reclaimed materials were researched and sourced. These ranged from internal glazed screens and panelling incorporating salvaged and reclaimed wood, flooring finished in bio-based bacterially grown tiles, and a kitchen worktop and external dining tables cut and polished from precast agricultural concrete planks found on site.
