photo by Dean Barkley using his Hexa plane
"To capture the imagination any great proposal needs one powerful idea. Communism had collective labour. Nestle coffee has George Clooney.
Richard Hawkes's house has a giant tiled arch. Without it he would have built a fascinating set of ecological wooden boxes fitted with some avant-garde sustainable technology. Boys' eco-toys.
As it is, the arch is Richard and Sophie's Millau viaduct, their Pantheon, their St. Paul's dome, because the extraordinary assertion that any arched or domed object makes is that gravity can be tricked.
The efficient parabolic form and its scary thinness stick two fingers up at the laws of the Universe and suggest that big heavy things like buildings can float.
It's one of the great illusions of architecture, pulled off here with utter bravado." Kevin McCloud
The Crossway PassivHaus first featured on Grand Designs in February 2009. The subsequent Grand Designs 'revisited' was featured in November 2011. This pioneering project became the first retrospectively-certified PassivHaus in the UK; was shortlisted for an RIBA award, the RIBA Downland prize, the Kent Design Awards and was a finalist in the Grand Designs Awards.
Crossway was among the first houses to be granted consent under PPS7 paragraph 11 (now the NPPF paragraph 55 - bullet point 4)
Diary blog - This is a blog of the Crossway project going back to before we started the build ! It went through a dormant patch but i'm now bringing it back to life with all the things we're doing.
Collated below are various media publications providing more information for your enjoyment & perusal.
"The rise of Carbon Appeal" article in the Sunday Telegraph "Life" magazine on 21st October 2012
As Grand Designs unveils its 100th house, Kevin McCloud reveals his personal favourites in The Radio Times. Crossway has made Kevin's top 3 !
Click here for a 360-degree virtual tour of the house!
photo by Dean Barkley using his Hexa plane
Grand Designs - Photo gallery - A brief diary of the build in photos
Grand Designs - where to buy - A brief list of key suppliers
Grand Designs clip - video clip from the final part of the programme
photo by Dean Barkley using his Hexa plane
Grand Designs magazine articles - August 2009 issue containing various articles about Crossway and the various technologies that make the house tick
Times magazine article - March 13th 2010 feature entitled “Ahead of the curve” written by Ruth Corbett with photos by Ray Main
John Lewis Edition Magazine - September 2010. Article about Crossway written by Ruth Corbett
Sustain Magazine - March 2010 Crossway has made it into Tom Wooley’s top 10 natural buildings in the UK (Volume10 Issue 06)
CNBC World Business - TV news report about zero carbon buildings featuring Crossway
Positive TV - A 15 minute video tour round Crossway with Jeremy Colledge from Positive TV
BBC news article & video tour - Includes me doing a short walk round tour
Austrian article celebrating Crossway getting its Passivhaus certification
Crossway's place in the Grand Designs Hall of fame !
Property Week video interview at Ecobuild
Daily Mail article Wed 18th Feb 09 - An interesting article if you excuse all the errors & misunderstandings !
Daily Telegraph article 18th Feb 09
Scottish Passive House Centre - article about Crossway with written info about the house written by Richard Hawkes
Architecture Today Magazine - March 2009 Article about PPS7 projects, including Crossway
Wealden Times article - July 2008 entitled, “Building the dream”
Wealden Times article - May 2009 entitled, “Designed for living”
Grand Designs Magazine Diary - Running bi-monthly from April 2008 to February 2009 in Grand Designs magazine covering the build of our arched eco house
Treehugger article - An interesting article with more info on the history of timbrel vaulting
Lafarge GTEC Aquaboard article
Dupont Energain article - Article from Buildtalk
Building sustainability article
Novinky (Czech) article - Anyone speak or understand Czech ?
Grand Designs Live article - by Robert Pike, following my chat with Kevin McCloud at Grand Designs Live at Excel, London
Boidus - article written by Robert Pike, a visitor during Crossway’s open day as part of the RIBA South East festival of architecture
My Lohas magazine - June 2009 article about Crossway in Chinese, i’d love to know what it says !