Smart House, Ditchling Road
Brighton BN1 4SE (corner Vere Rd)

The Smart House is a south facing bungalow dug in to the ground. It demonstrates a passive solar earth sheltered design, providing a warm comfortable home all year round whilst using almost zero energy. It has photovoltaic and solar thermal panels producing renewable energy and hot water on site and a grass roof to attract bio diversity.

The holistic design by Alan Phillips incorporated a sustainable approach from the outset, rather than simply adding on renewable energy as an afterthought. This illustrates that sustainable architecture has to begin with a thoughtful understanding of environmental techniques. In principle, the scheme could be constructed as a modular system that is designed to be fairly accessible to most people.

Video

Volunteer organiser Caroline Schofield and developer Colin Brace talk about aspects of the house design (3 minutes):