Sustainability Winner

The building is part of a rural community development in South Devon which looks to add to the area’s social and economic life. It sits amongst a two-acre plot which has space for skateboarding, smallscale farming, and play areas, hosting a cafe, event space, ceramics studio and surfboard shaping workshop. Sited in a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, where near-barren arable monocultures are often preferred over mixed use regenerative practices, the project serves as a case study for new forms of hyperlocal, sustainable rural development.

Derived from an existing dilapidated structure, the steel frame was galvanized in part because the building combines an internal insulated volume and an exposed flexible winter garden space. It was felt that the protection from galvanizing was essential to the external area. All flashings and reveals were galvanized to contrast the fibre cement and the exposed structural frame exists as a unified language. The project ethos sought to deliver maximum impact through minimum means and an approach that celebrated and supported local supply chains throughout the design and procurement of the project.

(Content provided by IDK Architects)

Photos © Toby Coulson

Posted onOctober 12, 2023 byGalvanizers Association