Grand Designs (of a byegon era?)

[Ken Neal]

Having watched the first of the new series of Grand Designs on Channel 4 in the hope that Kevin McCloud had entered the 21st Century and was going to acknowledge global warming and the duty architects have to educate the public in environment conscious design, I was sadly dissapointed.

Can we ask him to a meeting to educate him and if he won't be educated, use him to save a bit of concrete in a foundation somewhere so that he won't be entirely useless for the whole of his time on this earth.

Alternatively, he, along with his collaborating architects, should be made to live in a glass box for a year to roast in summer and freeze in winter.

Rant over for now!!

[David OLIVIER]

I thought the un-insulated and unplastered stone walls (they'll probably leak air like a sieve) of a recent Grand Designs barn conversion nr. Ross-on-Wye were especially inappropriate to the coming era of fuel scarcity (after peak oil).

Nor is there much sign of GD featuring smaller houses, which use fewer resources. Yet I can't believe that 250+ m2 houses and barns have the UK monopoly on interesting architecture. A few years ago the average UK house was said to be a 78m2 semi. i.e. less than a third the size of the average GD.

I agree about AECB educating these people. They're not very carbon-literate.

D.

[Ken Neal]

I'm still ranting since I visited Interbuild and saw the company bragging that they had retrofitted a new house built in Devon that appeared on Grand Designs with aircon.

The house was built on a west facing cliff top of timber frame and well insulated with the west wall entirely glass to make the most of the view.  Any fool should hve been able to tell them that they were going to roast for a large part of the year.  Grand Design? Or Grand Cockup?  Its a Grand Design for a natural microwave oven.

I bet that one won't feature on Grand Designs Revisited.