A brand new competition by renowned house builder Barratt Homes and the Architects Journal (AJ) is giving designers and architects in London and the UK the chance to design the home of the future. They are being invited to create their vision of what a homeowner will want from a property between 2020 and 2025. Designs need to visualise how the properties will look and what features they’ll have in order to appeal to the mass market.
The winning submission will see the designer offered cash to cover their design costs and the chance to work with the property builder to produce a prototype. This job will pay additional fees up to £20,000 and could see the design become the template for the homes of the future in the UK.
Three other outstanding designers will be offered money to cover part or all of their costs and could be commissioned to build prototype properties too.
The overall winner and runners up will all be published in the Architects Journal as well as in Barratt Homes’ own materials. The competition is a great way for architects to envision what they believe will be important to home buyers in the coming years, predicting the future of the architectural scene in the UK.
The ultimate aim of the competition is to see one of the UK’s leading house builders creating properties with the help of a talented, forward thinking architect. This should lead to homes of the future being built with the people that will be living in them in mind, particularly in terms of the layout, the materials that are used and longevity of the structure. Technology and the environment will also both be considered in the design of the property.
If you want to pre-register your details to take part in the competition you can email them to 2020s-homes@barrattplc.co.uk. You can also find out further information by reading the article about the competition on the Architects Journal website.
At Coffey Architects we hope the competition gathers the interest it deserves. The architectural sector has been trying for many years to get house builders to be more conscientious with their designs. Hopefully the outcome of this contest helps to achieve that. As architects in London, we strive to continue focusing on the needs of real people in all the designs and plans we are involved in.