Passivhaus Client Clubs on tour!

Social housing providers from across Yorkshire and the North-West joined the Passivhaus Trust to visit the Duncombe Square Passivhaus development for City of York Council.

Duncombe Square is the first of City of York Council’s ambitious mixed tenure developments targeting Passivhaus certification. The 34-home project has been delivered by a project team led by PHT member Mikhail Riches with PHT Patron WARM as Passivhaus Designers and PHT member Etude as Passivhaus Certifier. 40% of the homes are for market sale, 40% of the homes are for shared ownership and 20% of homes are for social rent.

Duncombe Square York Client Club visit. Image credit: Passivhaus Trust

Networking

Yorkshire-based Chayley Collis from the Passivhaus Trust team joined around 20 people from a range of social housing organisations, including housing associations and local authorities. Council Executive Members of City of York Council, Cllr Jenny Kent and Cllr Michael Pavlovic also joined the tours, sharing their invaluable insights and Passivhaus positivity. The Council is firmly convinced of the multiple benefits delivered by the Passivhaus standard and is committed to the rollout with its ambitious Passivhaus housing programme. Two tours were offered for our cohort, with members of City of York Council, Mikhail Riches and WARM teams on hand to answer questions.

Duncombe Square York Client Club visit. Image credit: Passivhaus Trust

Show Home

The Duncombe Square homes range from 1-bed apartments to 4-bed terraced homes. As the homes are not yet occupied the Client Club attendees had a chance to look around a few different permutations. There was also a Show Home to look around at the end which had been thoughtfully labelled up with key Passivhaus features. A commercial space is located at the bottom of the apartment block, which will be used as sales office and as a Passivhaus training hub during the first 6 months of operation. The Show Home is available to view 5 days a week - find out more on the Shape Homes York website.

Duncombe Square York Client Club visit. Image credit: Passivhaus Trust

Community building

Building on the experience from the award-winning Goldsmith’s Street project in Norwich, the project team have honed their designs to simplify and value engineer, while keeping an aesthetic and unique community-friendly design. Mikhail Riches’ have made efforts to create community through a range of measures. Private rear gardens are connected to shared ginnels with growing beds, encouraging residents to make connections with the neighbours. Parking spaces are minimised and in a shared space, freeing up land for to accommodate the larger Passivhaus footprint and also maximising green space.

Duncombe Square York Client Club visit. Image credit: Passivhaus Trust

Cost-saving design

Cost is obviously a theme that is frequently raised in our Passivhaus Client Clubs..The project was delivered in spite of the fact that the cost of timber frame rose dramatically during the construction, requiring the team to do some further value engineering to ensure the project could still meet Passivhaus within the agreed budget.

Examples of cost-saving design employed on the project included:

Use of simple geometry in design, including terraced housing and some 3 storey blocksto enhance form factor and reduce build complexity.
Creation of ‘false windows’ to create the visual effect of larger windows, whilst optimising solar gain
Being able to site the two terraces in south-facing locations to maximise performance in PHPP
Choosing different coloured doors, which, at no extra cost, enhances the aesthetics and sense of community of the project
Rationalising the number of external brick-built stores
Removal of ASHP enclosures, which also results in better heat pump performance
Changes to hard landscaping

Duncombe Square, York. Image credit: Mikhail Riches/ Tim Crocker

Passivhaus Client Clubs

Our Passivhaus Client Clubs offer a chance for local authorities and housing associations to ask questions among peers and Passivhaus experts and explore any challenges and barriers to delivering Passivhaus that there might be. Help with make the case with colleagues, dealing with procurement and supply chains, dealing with challenging sites, and managing costs were all questions that were raised during the day.

The next online Passivhaus Client Club event for social housing providers is running on 11 November. The session looks at ‘Delivering the Passivhaus Dream’ and will explore true project costs, whether there is any capital uplift and how approval was ultimately secured. The session will also explore the vital relationship between cost and design in making Passivhaus not just possible, but practical when delivering social housing.