Safety & Security Feature Renewed liveability
Post-Grenfell, the fi re safety agenda puts the focus on facade design. Sandra Rubiano of AESG says recladding is a chance to improve sustainability, and overall liveability, and go beyond compliance.
Photo by Rolands Varsbergs on Unsplash
Safety & Security 27
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n recent years, the post-Grenfell regulatory landscape has rightly placed fi re safety as the primary driver for the design of facades within the social housing sector.
Likewise, with the introduction of the Building Safety Act reshaping the
facade landscape – and particularly for residential buildings over 18 metres – there’s greater accountability on building owners and a more rigorous approach to managing fi re risks required. While safety remains the essential starting point, there is now a growing
expectation that housing providers go further, addressing energy effi ciency, embodied carbon and aesthetics in parallel. T is presents both a challenge and an opportunity. T e challenge lies in balancing the oſt en-competing demands of cost, regulation and architectural integrity, particularly when retrofi tting existing buildings. T e opportunity, however, is in delivering facade solutions that are not only compliant but genuinely transformational.
LEARNING FROM GLOBAL BEST PRACTICE Countries like Denmark and Germany provide clear evidence of what is possible when facade design is elevated ‘beyond compliance.’ In Denmark, there is a national culture of resource-conscious design, where durability, material effi ciency and lifecycle performance are embedded into every stage of development. Germany, meanwhile, pioneered the Passivhaus standard, a model for ultra-low-energy buildings that rely heavily on high-performance facades to achieve their effi ciency.
In Denmark, there is a national culture of resource-conscious design, where durability, material effi ciency and lifecycle performance are embedded into every stage of development
T ese international examples show that innovation in facades can unlock
measurable improvements not just in energy performance but in resident comfort, building resilience and long-term maintenance costs. T ey also demonstrate the value of viewing facades as holistic systems – not a collection of parts but a key interface between people, buildings and the environment.
DECARBONISATION & THE NET ZERO OPPORTUNITY With decarbonisation now a strategic priority for the UK housing sector, retrofi tting facades has the potential to become a cornerstone of a provider’s net zero strategy. In fact, facade performance can make or break the energy profi le of a building, particularly in older social housing stock where thermal bridging and inadequate insulation are common.
Housing Management & Maintenance June/July 2025
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