One year on from Urban Splash’s deal with Sekisui House and Homes England to create House by Urban Splash, its managing director Simon Gawthorpe says the business is making great progress with major developments underway right across the country.

Simon Gawthorpe

Simon Gawthorpe

Working with Sekisui House, a leading Japanese housebuilder boasting a major presence across Asia and the USA, Urban Splash has recognised that Britain can benefit hugely by opening its arms to global expertise. Sekisui House says its vision is focused on “tackling social challenges head-on with an eye to the global context”. And that’s precisely how it’s working with Urban Splash up and down Britain.

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Gawthorpe said when Sekisui House joined forces with Urban Splash, it realised that the best approach was to combine ideas and systems to create something bespoke for the UK market. He thinks Britain could create its own export economy for manufactured housing. In recent decades, many world-leading architects have emanated from Britain and design is something Urban Splash has always prioritised.

“As good as a system we might have in the UK, it is about the strength of the supply chain. In terms of us moving forward, we’re keen to work with our supply chain in a much more proactive way to make sure that it’s working for them and for us. I think the other thing is about more collaboration with some of our other MMC competitors. They’re not really competitors, they’re other fellow pioneers of MMC in one sense.”

Urban Splash - Port Loop in Birmingham

Urban Splash - Port Loop in Birmingham

Looking at the future, Gawthorpe said that by mid-2021 he would like to see House by Urban Splash up and running on 10 or more sites across the UK.

“I would also like to see the full integration with Sekisui House. They’re bringing lots of ideas over and as time goes by we will start to see more of this come through our products and in the design of these communities, explained Gawthorpe.

”As we look forward to five years or ten years time, the quality of the homes and the number of homes will be considerably more but we can’t do that on our own. It has to happen at volume and scale and I think that will mean an increase in the number of public and private companies working together.”

House by Urban Splash recently announced the reopening of its modular factory and has also reopened some of its construction sites across the UK.

Simon Gawthorpe is managing director at Urban Splash

You can listen to today’s podcast via Apple Podcasts or Spotify or SoundCloud or through the player above.  This podcast was produced by Blackstock Consulting founder Andrew Teacher and you can Tweet your views @andrewjteacher

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