accessible to more people. The social
housing schemes we have worked provide
crucial spaces for community development.
Office spaces allow you to be ‘trendier’ and
create green spaces for workers to refresh
and increase the enjoyment of their jobs.
WHAT’S YOUR BIGGEST
CHALLENGE CURRENTLY?
Ongoing maintenance in public projects is
difficult, there is a shortage of skills and
training, as well as and funding. However,
this provides interesting constraints, which
we believe can partly be solved in the design
stage. We are continually pushing harder
and constantly testing new naturalistic
planting plans combining plants and seed
mixes to limit maintenance naturally – it’s a
great opportunity!
HOW HAS THE RHS AWARD
CHANGED YOUR PROFILE?
The RHS award from my show garden last
year (and for the show garden with Hosta
Consulting in 2016) both gave me the
opportunity to show what I can do as a
designer, which is particularly important
when a company is in its formative years.
The award has given me recognition within
the industry to try something different.
WHAT’S YOUR CURRENT FAVOURITE
BUILDING MATERIAL IN PROJECTS?
Following my RHS Tatton Park Show
Garden ‘Finding [urban] Nature,’ my
current favourite building material is waste
aggregates, including crushed brick and
concrete. Inspired by nature, which
colonises brownfield sites, we have been
using this material to create landscapes
which limits the damaging importation of
topsoil into urban sites and uses a waste
product. It’s a great material, with the right
choice of planting, we can create colourful,
floral ecological havens in cites.DO YOU SEE THE ROLE OF ARCHITECTS
AS ADVISORS TO BE AS IMPORTANT AS
THAT OF BUILDING DESIGNERS?
Architects have a unique set of skills;
thorough architectural education teaches
a holistic approach to dealing with the
places that we live. As a whole, architects,
working collaboratively with others are a
great resource to tackle problems in the
built environment.HOW DO YOU USE TECHNOLOGY
WHEN DESIGNING?
Like many practices, we use technology in
most of our designs, however we alternate
between hand drawing and computer work
to get the best from both worlds.
Fundamentally, technology is a tool and the
ultimate goal is usually creating drawings
that are legible to the client and
stakeholders, visualisations that present an
experience, or 3D models that allow the
testing of designs.
Technology has allowed us to refine our
processes to make them more efficient –
for example our planting plansautomatically generate plant lists
containing quantiles, required densities
and details about the plants. We can then
use this data to generate maintenance
schedules – each of these were previously
time consuming processes, and now can be
completed instantly.DO YOU THINK YOU HAVE A ROLE
TO DRIVE BRIEFS OR SHOULD
ARCHITECTS BE REACTIVE?
Our role is to make projects as good as they
can be. Some clients are un-confident of
what can be achieved, and we can tailor the
brief to push elements such as biodiversity,
water re-use and soil health, as well as
other elements. Other clients are much
more sure about what they’d like to
achieve, therefore the relationship is more
collaborative, rather than a guiding hand.WHAT ARE YOUR HOPES FOR THIS
YEAR AND BEYOND FOR YOU AND
YOUR PRACTICE?
We have a few exciting projects in the
pipeline, which are currently under wraps,
but all deal with interaction with nature in
urban areas. We have recently completed
our largest intensive roof garden for a social
housing provider Nottingham City Homes,
and we’re hoping to develop more work
similar to this. In the future we have made
an active decision to stay small and work
collaboratively with artists, sculptors and
other designers to create new opportunities
for nature. © Hosta Consulting24VIEWSWWW.ARCHITECTSDATAFILE.CO.UK ADF JUNE 2019