Our first two projects are both in Swindon. We are working with Swindon Borough Council which is highly ambitious with regard to both sustainability and quality of design, to realise two developments of 150-200 homes.

Both sites offer challenges, not least of which is the fact they´re both currently very green spaces. One is a redundant allotment site with scrubland to the North, the other is greenfield agricultural land in Swindon´s ´front garden´. But our interest in these sites starts with what they already have: the trees, their open space and their ecology. We know from studies that it´s possible to develop a site and in fact increase the biodiversity there.

We aim to focus specifically on provincial and suburban housing projects where we feel that the standard of many current developments is particularly poor. Our aim is not to create ring-fenced ghettos but to focus on the social and physical relationships between Hab projects and the wider community to bring tangible improvements to both, and to work closely with the local community to establish how this can best be done.