An IntervIew wIth PAtrIck Bellew, AtelIer ten - BetterBricks

Bellew: We have explored and developed high performance building technologies over many years with greater and
lesser degrees of success with our clients. In every project, we attempt to bring in a degree of environmental thinking;
usually phrasing it in terms of ‘no-brainers’ that one ought to do as a matter
of course on the building. The next level are things that are slightly more of a
stretch to reach, and then on to the more complex things that require a major
shift in thinking about how buildings perform. We have been fortunate, however,
to work with many clients for whom a push towards more sustainable design
has been at the core of the selection process of their design team. In the early
days, this type of client tended to be either owner/occupiers of buildings, such
as universities and schools, or they would come from the government sector or
The Blue Bird Restaurant and Store in London
cultural buildings such as art museums, schools again or public buildings of any
kind. These were people who both owned and operated the buildings and, as
it’s now phrased, the triple bottom line applied to very well. This means that they were paying the fuel bills, and so the
benefits of investment in energy reduction were clearly demonstrable throughout the life of the building. It has been
far more difficult to persuade the developers of commercial buildings, who are not paying their own fuel bills, to come
to the party and build high performance, sustainable buildings.
This has changed somewhat in recent years, particularly the last two years in the UK, where the corporate
social responsibility demands of the potential building tenants have moved our commercial sector much more
towards the development of high performance buildings. I would say this has certainly been helped by the
emergence of benchmarking rating systems. In the UK this is BREEAM, and in the US this is LEED. The impact of
these benchmarking systems has been really significant in encouraging developers to achieve higher standards
for their buildings, and recognize that they have a better chance of leasing a building that’s deemed to be high
quality, than leasing a building that’s either not certified or of a lower quality. In a way this is exactly what the
benchmarking systems set out to achieve in the first place. They are frequently derided by the nay-sayers as being a
painful process, involving too much paper pushing, and many other negatives. However, I think they add extraordinary
value in providing a level playing field for comparison of designs and design qualities.
Our experiences in the US in recent years have very much paralleled this situation in the UK. Our earlier projects were
almost exclusively with universities and one or two enlightened developers, such as Liberty Property Trust out of
Philadelphia. The universities were beginning to recognize the benefits of reducing their energy consumption and their
infrastructure costs when developing new buildings, if they
built them to a higher standard. At the same time, or soon
after, the property development sector recognized that there
were some pretty big changes on the horizon and started to
respond. I wouldn’t say that they are all the way there yet,
but certainly a good start is being made in certain parts of
the country.
To respond to the second part of the question, about how
to coordinate with other team members; the truth is that
sometimes it’s very straight forward, and sometimes it’s
not. Despite the fact that it is widely recognized that the
architecture of the building is a key component of the way that
buildings perform, and despite the fact that all the architects
that we work with seek to incorporate environmental design
Despite it is widely recognized that
the architecture of the building is a key
component to a buildings performance,
and despite that all the architects that
we work with seek to incorporate
environmental design measures into
their buildings, there still remains a
reluctance on the part of many architects
to compromise architectural or aesthetic
considerations for a technical one, no
matter how carefully they are explained!
measures into their buildings, there still remains a reluctance on the part of many architects to compromise architectural
or aesthetic considerations for a technical one, no matter how carefully they are explained!
As the calculation tools have become more user friendly and particularly more graphical in the way that they represent
energy flows within buildings, we have found it increasingly viable to speak with the architects at a graphical level, get
Patrick Bellew
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