Our 2010 office Christmas trip was to the Architecture Biennale in Venice. Ben, Sinisa, Charlotte, Yeevon, Wei Han and Paul. Link to 5th September 2010 Guardian review: Guardian Review

Until the 2004 Housing Act there had been a lot of confusion and contradictory case law on the subject of what constituted a 'House in Multiple Occupation'. The new 2004 Housing Act tightened up the definition. The main element of the definition is that, in order for a house to be an HMO, there must be some sharing of facilities (baths, WCs and kitchens). On 6th April 2010, an amendment to the Use Classes Order introduced a definition of small-scale houses in multiple occupation (HMO) into the planning system. It split the previous Class C3 (dwellinghouses) into 2 seperate classes - Class C3 (dwellinghouses) and Class C4 (houses in multiple occupation). A change in April 2010 gave permitted development rights for changes of use from C4 to C3. and a further change later in the year (1st October 2010) made this permitted development reciprocal (i.e. C3 to C4 became Permitted Development). The effect of…

Ben's restoration and extension to the Old Bookshop in Buckinghamshire has been published in Build It magazine. Download the article here

10 October 2009: An office day out punting in Cambridge. Ben, Sinisa, Maddy, Andrew and others.

15th December 2009: an our office trip to Oslo. We enjoyed the snow and the Norwegian National Opera and Ballet building - which opened to the public in 2008. Charlotte, Sinisa, Ben, Andrew and Maddy.

A project disowned by Le Corbusier. Initially Le Corbusier's contribution to the postwar Berlin cityscape was meant to be part of the Interbau Building Exhibition of 1957 on the borders of the Tiergarten. However, when he announced his intention to build a massive 17-story "residential factory" containing 557 living units, the city authorities decided that they had better find him a suitable location of his own. The site offered to Le Corbusier was at the top of a hill in Charlottenburg with views across the city and immediately next door to Werner March's imposing national socialist architecture of the 1934 Olympic Stadium. Le Corbusier's design was one of his limited edition, off-the-peg unités d'habitation. Number three from a total of five in this series of giant residential buildings following those of Marseille and Nantes. The design for the unités was the result of Corbusier's long-term considerations about modern urban living.…