Residential restorations are an important part of protecting and preserving our national heritage, but new build developers should pay heed to the lessons learned from our architectural histories
We are heritage property specialists, who have won over 100 awards for our conversions of period buildings into beautiful places to live.
Simon Vernon-Harcourt, Design & Planning Director at City & Country, comments:
There are over 370,000 entries for listed buildings on the National Heritage List for England.[1] Taking place this month are the Heritage Open Days (6-15th September), an annual celebration for our country’s history and culture, and a chance to see first-hand some of our most beautiful heritage buildings across our country. Keeping these buildings alive is a source of national pride – but also a great expense, as the National Trust discovered last year, when its annual costs exceeded its income by nearly a quarter.[2] If we were to squander these properties, however, the cultural cost to our country would be far higher.
The Victorians were master planners and architects. They knew about good design, efficient building methods, how to efficiently heat and cool a building, and maximise natural light, without compromising on architectural beauty. They have left a strong blueprint for today’s developers to follow, both for restoration and for building new. At City and Country, we’ve had the privilege of restoring a number of heritage buildings into homes for 21st Century residents – including but not limited to a Grade II Listed hospital building at The 1840, and Factory No.1 We are also responsible for building high-quality new homes across the country, using the lessons learned from heritage restoration to inform our new build schemes.
Before heritage buildings come into our care, they are often at risk of decay caused by damp, vandalism, and damage from extreme weather caused by climate change. These buildings are the best of British craftsmanship, but they cannot last forever without expert intervention. Our modern-day responsibility is to restore these homes to the high standards of contemporary life, paying homage to the craftsmanship and beauty of these buildings, whilst ensuring they are not just fit for habitation, but ideally adapted to cater to every need and want of contemporary living.
High quality restoration is a cross-industry endeavour. We partner up with historians, architects, and interior designers on every single project. That means a lot of research before we can even get boots on the ground. We will often go through a century’s worth of plans and technical drawings, looking at the original use of the building and how it translates into modern day living. For example, The 1840’s hospital design is made up of wide corridors with lots of rooms shooting off – as such, final restoration means that every apartment has a different, bespoke layout.
Conversion and restoration is the equivalent to a shot in the arm for these properties, and crucially offers a sustainable housing approach compared to the alternative of knocking down and building new. The property sector is responsible for around 40% of global greenhouse gas emissions – simply put this is neither sustainable nor compatible with net zero targets.[3] By restoring these precious heritage buildings, we allow local communities to keep in touch with rich local history and culture. The older a building is, the less likely it is to have generational peers. We have a responsibility to our society to protect these buildings wherever we can.
From a sustainable perspective, often heritage buildings have good bones to build back up from – thick brick walls, and established floors and roofing already in place. Residential conversions from older buildings mean an increased delivery of homes without ever needing to lay a single brick – contributing to local targets for ‘new’ homes without relying on housebuilding. Likewise, the restoration of old properties circumvents the carbon emissions associated with the materials and construction process of new homes. We will then do the works to upgrade the property into energy-efficient homes – connecting them up to district heating systems, installing underfloor heating, improving the fabric and insulation and upgrading the interior design to ensure it is of the highest possible quality.
There is another lesson to be learned here for the developers today – because there is an important role for housebuilding in our national housing delivery. That lesson is simple: today’s new build is our grandchildren and great grandchildren’s heritage.
Like the Victorians, we must employ good architecture and build strong, beautiful homes and buildings today. These are what our descendants will inherit in the decades and centuries to come.