Unlocking Site Potential: Using design to invent what does not yet exist

Using Seven Apartments as a case study, the session focuses on a multi-unit scheme within a constrained and sensitive planning context. A key feature of the project is a new central lightwell, designed to improve outlook and bring daylight into deep-plan apartments. However, as is often the case in design and construction, solving one problem can introduce others. The addition of the lightwell raised new challenges, particularly around privacy, overlooking, and the impact on the building’s heritage, all of which required careful resolution.

Rather than treating these constraints as obstacles, the design team used them as a starting point for invention. How can light be introduced without compromising privacy? How can contemporary interventions sit comfortably within a heritage setting? And how can effective collaboration allow us to invent products that do not yet exist?

The team’s response was a bespoke glazing system, embedding finely engraved glass louvres within the glass itself, creating a gradient of transparency. Developed through testing and refinement, the solution maintains the views across the lightwell within the property, whilst ensuring the privacy of the apartments above and below.

Speakers:

• Siniša Rodić – Rodić Davidson Architects
• Elizabeth Cox – Rodić Davidson Architects

The talk explores how this detail formed part of a wider design approach, where planning, design and technical thinking were used together from the outset to improve the quality and viability of the scheme.

Underlying this is a broader reflection drawn from twenty years of practice. The session focuses on one principle in particular, Invent things: develop new solutions where none exist. It looks at how this way of working can be applied across different sectors and scales, particularly where sites are constrained and outcomes are not immediately apparent.

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Host or Publisher Building Centre