Inspiration

Brick is central to the building’s ability to mediate between competing contextual demands. The southern wing addresses the civic scale of the adjacent Law Courts and Assembly Rooms with a confident, formal elevation. The north wing, facing residential properties opposite, is more domestic in character, with punched windows set within a brick façade that strikes a considered relationship with the neighbouring streetscape.

The 800,000 brick facade blends four brick types: 50% Michelmersh Synthesis 01, 40% Wrekin Berkshire, 6% Wrekin Dark Red and 4% Black Smooth. Thirteen different radii were incorporated across the facade, with some varying by as little as 2mm over a two-metre length, demonstrating that technical ambition and design conviction need not be in conflict.

Freshfield Lane First Quality Multi was chosen as the defining material, its warm range of red tones connecting The Heights directly to the established fabric of Greenwich. Highly articulated brickwork, enriched with precast detailing, gives the elevations depth and rhythm, rewarding close attention while reading confidently from a distance.

Nine contemporary homes occupying the footprints of a former farm building cluster in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty on the Kent-Sussex border, with Freshfield Lane First Quality brick anchoring an external palette of charred spruce and black zinc roofing within a wooded agricultural landscape.

A near-complete reconstruction of a civic library combined with 26 new social rental homes, unified by Freshfield Lane Selected Dark brick and distinguished by a bespoke FabSpeed decorative panel referencing West Wickham’s local history.

Oberlander Architects’ Life Sciences Innovation Hub at the University of Dundee is a building that takes its environmental responsibilities as seriously as its economic ones.

A new five-room endoscopy unit at Cumberland Infirmary combines modular construction with a carefully detailed brick façade, delivering improved clinical capacity and a calm, welcoming environment for patients.

Artist Alex Chinneck has reimagined brickwork at Clerkenwell Design Week with A Week at the Knees, a freestanding sculpture that folds a Georgian façade into an extraordinary form.

Sheepcote Road in Harrow delivers 149 affordable homes by Threefold Architects, using layered brick façades and shared landscapes to create a contextual yet contemporary development rooted in community and place.

The Old Boathouse in Taplow combines conversion and new-build homes, with Florens Pollux and Polaris bricks creating a light riverside palette that reflects the Thames and honours the site’s heritage.