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PRESENTATION Sarah gives talk at CAT (Centre of Alternative Technology) and meets legendary eco self-build heroes Pat Borer and David Lea.
Conference – Sarah and Jo Marsh present Ty Pawb at the RSAW 25th Anniversary Conference in Cardiff.
Book launch – Sarah speaks at the book launch of Future of Museums and Galleries at Central St Martins. Es re nientendit red. Pales! Seridi sulvitermium do.
RESEARCH TRIP VeloCity team visits Copenhagen to look at innovative highdensity car-free housing typologies.
PROJECT UPDATE Work progressing well on our new gallery, Found in Brecon, opening July 2019.
Triennial 2019 VeloCity selected to exhibit at the Oslo Architecture Triennial 2019 opening in September.
Conference – AJ Summit on Climate Emergency Sarah talks about growing villages differently.
Opinion piece – BBC Wales News interviews us on our approach to placemaking in the countryside. READ HERE
Urban Design London ‘Tomorrow’s Market’ – We joined a round-table conversation on the future of markets citing Ty Pawb as an exemplar case study
REUSE OF MODERN AGRICULTURAL BARNS – FY are excited to be working with our good friends Dom & Kate Ash creating a rural live/work complex in the Cotswolds.
RICHARD REID – a very sad loss of a great architect, mentor and generous supporter of collaborative working.
MANIFESTO LAUNCH We launch our VeloCity manifesto, Growing Villages Differently at the Oslo Architecture Triennale – this year’s theme is Degrowth tackling important issues around climate change and reshaping our society.
RIBAJ PiP WEBINAR – As author of the Infrastructure and Placemaking chapter in the RIBA Rethink Design Guide, Sarah shared insights on VeloCity’s current work with Blenheim Estates on growth and connectivity in the countryside.
SANDI TOKSVIG AT TY HEDFAN – We were really excited to host Sandi and Jenny Eclair at our Welsh house, Ty Hedfan, for the Extraordinary Escapes Channel 4 series, catch our episode here
WREXHAM SHORTLISTED FOR UK CITY OF CULTURE 2025 – Welsh Secretary Simon Hart said “I am absolutely delighted to see Wrexham on the shortlist, it already has much to be proud of (including) an award-winning culture and arts hub in Tŷ Pawb.” More here
‘Gentle Radicalism’ – Sarah curated the Architecture Club Spring Forum debate, ‘Gentle Radicalism’ which discussed new approaches to growing vibrant and viable communities in the countryside with speakers including Rob Hopkins of Transition Towns, Ben Rawlence Chief Executive of Black Mountains College, Petra Marko from VeloCity and Robbie Kerr from Adam Architecture.
Award – VeloCity is a finalist in the World Architecture News Female Frontier Award in Team of the Year category
RIBA SECOND LIVES – FY presented Tŷ Pawb in this important exhibition exploring re-use and retrofit and participated in a talk with Mikhail Riches and Ian Chalk architects. More here.
JUDGNG AJ RETROFIT AWARDS – we are delighted to be judging these important awards a second year running with some great entries supporting re-use and the reduction of our carbon footprint.
CENTRAL ST MARTINS – Sarah’s students on the MA Narrative Environment course produced a playful and compelling campaign for VeloCity deploying an ancient oak tree as the narrator.
OVERALL WINNER Ty Pawb is Overall Winner of AJ Retrofit Award 2019 as well as winning Best Cultural Building under £5m.
Everybody’s House Wrexham celebrates Ty Pawb’s successes with a special Civic Pride Event in Wrexham.
BETTER BIKE SOCIAL – Judith Sykes and Sarah were really excited to present VeloCity at the kick off of this mini-bike festival curated by Joe Morris of Morris+Company. More here
HAGGERSTON CAREERS DAY – we participated in another school event that was all about promoting careers in the creative arts.
Awards – Stonecrop and Ty Pawb are both shortlisted for the RIBA Regional Awards, but the judges’ visits are postponed until 2021 due to Coronavirus.
Project – Blenheim Estate publish VeloCity’s green vision for the Estate.
AGE UK’S BID FOR NOTTING HILL POLICE STATION – FY have contributed to Age UK K&C’s bid to embed a community hub in the police station designated as an Asset of Community Value and currently on the open market.
CLIMATE CAREERS FAIR – What job will you do when the world is 2 degrees hotter? Our Director, Jeremy Young, joins Ben Rawlence and other activists and experts to impart their knowledge and advice at Back Mountains College online conference 30 April.
Community-led Housing Festival – Sarah joined a panel discussion as part of Thames Valley Community-led Housing Festival, presenting VeloCity and the importance of where and how we build housing in the countryside. You can hear the talk here
AJ SPEC BUILDING STUDY – Features Stonecrop, a new build house in Rutland.
BLENHEIM COMMUNITY PATH OPENS – As part of the ongoing work Blenheim Estate are doing with VeloCity, spring saw the opening of another new community walking and cycling path across the Park, linking Hanborough train station to the surrounding villages to provide a safer, traffic free route. Read more here.
PETT LEVEL BEACH HOUSE – FY have planning approval for a new build beach house on the East Sussex coastline commanding amazing views to Dungeness and the cliffs where David Bowie shot the clown sequences in his Ashes to Ashes video. Construction commences later this year.
RE-SHAPING THE HIGH STREET – Sarah and Jeremy visit Sarah’s home town, to look at important work being undertaken by Yeovil Art Space to help regenerate the town centre.
BUILDING CULTURE – Tŷ Pawb is featured as a case study in ‘Building Culture’, a publication looking at the procurement of UK Arts construction projects, with recommendations for future best practice.
PLACEMAKERS CONFERENCE – Sarah joined a panel discussion on Rural and Small Places organised by Community Housing Cymru.
NEW STUDIO – we are upgrading our Voss Street office which should be completely finished in April – party time!
WALES WEEK – we celebrated another great Wales Week event at the RIBA with an exhibition, talks and an amazing ceramic installation by Ruth Peterson created in memorial of the Grenfell victims.
Talk – Architecture Foundation 100 Day Studio series – Day 68, Sarah and Annalie Riches talk about their collaboration on VeloCity
TE WHARE MARA – meaning Garden House in Māori has won planning approval from Brighton and Hove planners. It is a new house for clients with a Māori heritage, designed around a series of gardens and with a glazed fernery built into the fabric of the building to house New Zealand tree ferns.
RSAW SPRING CONFERENCE – Sarah was honoured to be the Chair of the annual conference with speakers including Niall Maxwell, Mhairi McVicar and Dan Benham.
AJ RETROFIT AWARDS – another year judging this important award which promotes re-use and working with what we already have to protect our planet’s valuable resources.
AWARD WINNER Bay 20 Community Centre & Boxing Club wins RICS Community Benefit Award, “it is a welcoming refuge for the local community”, said the judges.
More can be read on the project in RIBAJ, AJ & Dezeen.
PECHA KUCHA AT THE SILO – Sarah speaks about her personal vision for VeloCity at a Pecha Kucha held in the Silo at Shatwell Farm, home to Niall Hobhouse’s Drawing Matter collection in Somerset. More here.
GROWTH OR DEGROWTH? – fantastic turn out for an important debate with speakers Smith Mordak, Andrew Waugh, Eva MacNamara and Selina Mason organised by Sarah for The Architecture Club.
TALKS – a double bill with a road trip across Wales. FY speaking in Shrewsbury to the Shropshire Society of Architects and then on to the RSAW Spring Conference at Centre of Alternative Technology (CAT). More here.
AJ CLIMATE CHAMPIONS – This wonderful podcast series includes one by Jennifer and Sarah talking about VeloCity’s work with Blenheim Estate promoting walking and cycling routes in rural areas to disincentivise car-use and help tackle climate change. Listen here
POLICY FORUM FOR WALES CONFERENCE – Sarah spoke about aligning development and planning with net-zero goals.
ON SITE – a new house on the River Loddon is rising out of the ground. Taking cues from our previous Ty Hedfan river side house, it is elevated on stilts with living spaces hovering over the water and within the trees.
TALGARTH TALKS – we caught the second in a series of talks organised by our clients, Black Mountains College, a university founded as a response to the climate and ecological emergency. Writer and naturalist Carwyn Graves took us through a fascinating journey into the human and ecological history of Wales. Talgarth Talks
AJ RETROFIT JUDGE – Sarah is delighted to be judging this important award which saw our Ty Pawb project as Overall Winner in 2019.
Event – Wrexham’s Mayor launches the Civic Pride initiative with Ty Pawb’s award success’s marking the first inaugural celebrations.
BLACK MOUNTAINS COLLEGE – thank you to Eleanor Young, editor of RIBAJ, for visiting and writing about this important new university focussed on tackling climate emergency. FY are working on their new campus repurposing an old farmstead with the scheme currently in planning – read more here.
CITY OF CULTURE – we were thrilled to see Wrexham make the shortlist for City of Culture 2025 – congrats to Tŷ Pawb the centerpiece of their bid.
PLANNING AWARDS – this is the second year Sarah judged these awards with many strong projects including The City of York Housing by Tibbalds & Mikhail Riches.
AWARD WINNER Ty Pawb receives the prestigious National Eisteddfod Gold Medal in Architecture and is shortlisted in the AJ Retrofit Awards for 2019.
VENICE CYCLE TRIP – Velocity team join cycling friends on a tour around the Italian mountains, culminating in Venice for the opening of the Architecture Biennale.
BEFIRST COMPETITION– FY are very pleased to be part of the Waugh Thistleton team shortlisted for the BeFirst Framework for housing and mixed use developments in Barking and Dagenham – all fingers crossed!
AT IN PRACTICE – Sarah talks to Architecture Today from FY’s Brecon studio about how their rural base allows them to focus on projects responding directly to the ecological and climate crisis.
FY WINS 4 RIBA AWARDS! – A bumper crop this year with Stonecrop winning 3 RIBA Regional Awards and Tŷ Pawb winning RIBA’s RSAW Architecture of the Year Award.
BD STRATFORD DESIGN CHALLENGE – FY contribute to BD’s series of opinion pieces on the future of retail citing Tŷ Pawb as a new alternative to the failing high street – a place where boundaries are blurred, activities mixed and retail is more experiential. Read here
RETROFIT FOR BLACK MOUNTAINS COLLEGE – great news that BMC has won a Levelling Up grant to renovate a derelict Victorian school in Talgarth and expand their campus. We are working with them to create new learning and shared co-working spaces for use by the college and wider community – the construction of the school in 1870’s pictured above.
Article – Stonecrop goes global and is featured in Abitare!
ART FUND MUSEUM OF THE YEAR – we are proud that Tŷ Pawb was a finalist in the Art Fund Museum of the Year with the award ceremony held at the Design Museum and announced live on the BBC One Show.
SHORTLISTED – FY teamed up with Tibbalds and Mikhail Riches to bid for the masterplan of The Core, a 47 hectare site north of Cambridge that over 20 years will see a new community of 10,000 people evolve.
PROJECT REVIEW
“It was designed around the needs of the family… but, more than that, the house was designed around the idea of framing the landscape.” – New house within Haslemere featured in Saturday Times.
RURAL 20 MINUTE NEIGHBOURHOODS – Judith Sykes and Sarah joined keynote speaker Professor Carlos Moreno, creator of the ’15-minute city’ concept, at the Town & Country Planning Association’s webinar focussed on how we can create compact and connected communities in rural areas. Listen here.
KEYNOTE SPEAKER AT WSA SHOW OPENING – we were honoured to speak about our work around the theme of ADAPT at the Welsh School of Architecture Student Show.
STONECROP FEATURED IN HOUSE & GARDENS – A great 8 page spread on the house we designed for Matthew and Nicky Lyttelton who wanted a green retreat which offered a more sustainable way of life.
BAGGY SPACE PART 2 – Sarah joined a panel discussion as part of Tŷ Pawb’s event programme for MILQUETOAST, an exhibition of artwork by Bedwyr Williams.
LISBON CONFERENCE 2021 – Petra Marko and Sarah presented VeloCity talking about the benefits of cycling as a path towards better physical and mental health.
MESSUMS ‘DISCUSSIONS ON ARCHITECTURE’– FY gave a talk as part of the series, set in Messums Wiltshire’s wonderful 13C tithe barn. Watch here
Consultation – Early discussions with residents of Cassington took place to share ideas to improve the village allotments and provide new affordable and energy efficient housing.
Opinion – Oxford Open Thought showcases VeloCity’s Vision on their open platform inviting ideas to shape the county as part of the Oxfordshire Plan 2050.
MODERN HOUSE PODCAST – so pleased to be part of this fantastic series which sees Sarah chatting with Matt Gibberd about the remarkable ways buildings are shaped by the people who inhabit them. You can listen here.
RIBA AWARDS – this year saw Sarah as the RSAW Chair of the judging panel for the prestigious RIBA architecture awards. The winning Welsh schemes included Grange Pavilion, a new community hub in Cardiff.
THE ARCHITECTURE CLUB PARIS TRIP – thanks to Narinda Sagoo, a group of us had an amazing day visiting the Foster Retrospective at the Pompidou, made even better with Birkin Haward fondly recounting his time working at Fosters.
LAND MANAGEMENT – HOW CAN IT HELP US REACH NET ZERO? – Sarah spoke about VeloCity alongside Rachel Fisher, Deputy Director of Land Use Policy at DEFRA, Sarah Cary, Exec. Director of Housing Regeneration Development, Enfield Council and rewilding expert Lulu Urquhart, hosted by The Conduit and chaired by Piers Taylor. More here.
RIBA BUILT ENVIRONMENT SUMMIT – Ahead of COP26 Sarah presented VeloCity at the RIBA conference and also contributed to their report presented at COP26 in Glasgow.
LOVE ARCHITECTURE FESTIVAL – Iris Papadatou and Sarah gave a talk on Stonecrop as part of Leicestershire and Rutland Society of Architects annual architecture festival.
Project launch – VeloCity are one of the partners behind the Bridport Community Railway & Renewal Corridor which looks to reverse Beeching and utilise an old rail line for a new very light rail and cycle and walking route. Launched at a Zero Carbon Dorset presentation the new route will see greater connectivity and benefits for both tourism and the many villages along its route.
RSAW 2020 Conference ‘Reduce, Reuse and Recycle’ – Sarah talks about light-touch living and designing in ‘baggy’ space
Awards – We judged an amazing selection of projects for FX International Design Awards 2020, congratulations to all winning and shortlisted schemes.
MESSUMS ARCHITECTURE SYMPOSIUM – held at their rural Wiltshire gallery in a beautiful tithe barn, we participated in a thought-provoking series of talks around the topic of Re-use, Re-cycle, Re-imagine. You can listen here (Sarah’s talk is 1.35 hrs in)
PROJECT COMPLETION Our new gallery Found opens, promoting Brecon as a town of creatives.
TORINO-NICE RALLY Jeremy completes an epic cycle following the Turin to Nice Rally route with mates Joe Morris & Will Lee.
FUTURE AWARDS Sarah judges excellent student work for Blueprint for the Future awards.
TY HEDFAN ON MODERNIST ESTATES – delighted that our Ty Hedfan joins an impressive array of architect designed holiday lets on Stefi Orazi’s amazing Modernist Estates website. You can book to stay at Ty Hedfan here.
Press – Final phase of Stonecrop is complete with great coverage in RIBAJ, Divisare,
Sunday Times and AJ.
Award – Ty Pawb makes the RIBAJ MacEwan Award Longlist.
FOUND GALLERY – The crowning glory and final phase to Found Gallery in Brecon.
HOUSE & GARDENS TOP 100 – FY are proud to be a new entry in their top 100 Architects and Designers.
Article – Three years on and Owen Hatherley in the Guardian cites Tŷ Pawb as offering a brighter future for the struggling high street READ HERE
FX Design Talking Spaces Podcast – Sarah and Petra Marko join the “Close to Home’ series to discuss how not enough architectural attention is focussed on the countryside highlighting our VeloCity vision to tackle isolation and poor quality housing. READ HERE
SOCIAL VALUE – Sarah’s article in Architecture Today discusses the challenges of the way we define and measure value and cites Grange Pavilion in Cardiff as an exemplar community-led project. Read more here
LONG LIFE, LOW ENERGY – an exhibition at the RIBA where FY showcased Ty Pawb as a project which reuses and retrofits a multi-storey carpark bringing sustainable, social and economic benefits.
PRESENTATION Sarah joins Negroni Talks #10 – Borderlands – and shares her view on “baggy space” as part of London Festival of Architecture