Mayfield, Huntingdon

Client: Circle Anglia

Role: Environmental Services, Architecture and Landscape Architecture

Value: £5m

Set within the town of Huntingdon, this Code 5* level scheme will provide a sustainability showcase for Huntingdon District Council.

The Mayfield development in Huntingdon will provide 29 homes for rent and intermediate tenure with a mixture of one and two bed apartments and two, three and four bed houses.

To bring the design up to Code 5* Level, we embarked on a comprehensive programme which included low carbon and passive design consultation, an energy strategy report and sustainability statement, full SAP and EPC, TAS computer simulated thermal modelling and conducted a cost in use analysis alongside embodied energy calculations and post occupancy evaluation.

What makes this scheme unique is that its driving principles to achieve sustainability extend beyond the Code for Sustainable Homes – a zero carbon embodied energy is being adopted in the build process due to carbon banking of many of the materials, which may include straw bales and hemp along with zero carbon technology to heat, light and provide hot water to the dwellings.

Detailed and careful landscape, focused around the community, will encourage people to socialise and interact, further nurturing a real sense of a low carbon community.

Predicted low energy bills, and provision of live work units have all been designed in to provide a more financially sustainable development and help to combat rising fossil fuel prices.