All articles by Thomas Lane – Page 8
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Features
Pulp that paper trail
Flood damage is tough enough to repair without getting bogged down in faxes and reports. We explain how wireless technology has saved one company from drowning in paperwork
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NewsBrave new homes
To date, off-site manufacture has been more about hype than homes. But with the Housing Corporation pushing standardised housetypes, the time may be ripe for the production-line solution to revolutionise the market. We assemble the story
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FeaturesSheltered by Mother Earth
The tale of the three little pigs could take on a new meaning for children at an Old Kent Road nursery, which is built not of straw or sticks, but rammed earth. We went on site to find out how it was done
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FeaturesSeen my new mobile?
Young urban professionals like the idea of a £30,000 retreat in the country but hate the idea of owning a mobile home. So architect Buckley Gray has designed one that will change their mind for them.
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FeaturesHow's this for a high court?
Richard Roger's design brief for Antwerp's law courts was to create a roof that would add interest to the city's monotonous skyline. So the project team put geometrical thinking caps on and came up with some tall and dramatic shapes, as we found out
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FeaturesDeoxyribonucleic lighting
This astonishing concept of mirrors coiled into a DNA-type helix and floated in mid-air was intended to sex-up the Albert Hall's restaurant. But constructing it proved so complex that Arup was called in to check it could work.
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FeaturesThe techmeisters
Building systems have got a whole lot smarter – now services, IT and telecom facilities can be integrated to maximise efficiency. Just one snag: who is clever enough to actually install the technology?
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Features
Come and get me, copper
Any British architect with an ounce of street cred wouldn't dream of cladding their building in anything else – not without getting their collar felt by the style police …
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FeaturesCapsule hotels: Hotels in a nutshell
The man that got us eating raw fish off a conveyor belt is trying to sell us a night in a prefab sardine tin. But how will Europeans cope with Japanese-style capsule hotels?
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FeaturesAll you need, all the time
Imagine project data, emails and the company file server at your fingertips, whether on site or on the move. Then again, why waste time imagining: wireless technology is here and it’s about to do to data exchange what the mobile did to voice communication.
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FeaturesMay the best house win
For decades, timber frame has been reigning British champion of modular housing systems. Now a contender has emerged, and an enterprising housebuilder decided to arrange a contest between the two. We report from the ringside in Sompting, Sussex.
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FeaturesThe IT strategy at T5
People will look back on the new Heathrow Terminal 5 as a landmark in smart design
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Features
The Collaborators
We're told that online procurement and project management is essential to running an efficient job. But is it? And if so, which is the best provider? Luckily, we found a company willing to spill the beans …
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FeaturesIt makes you sick...
… to discover that many firms are turning a blind eye to the serious long-term health risks that their workers are being exposed to. We diagnose the problems.
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NewsGrowing panes
When other boys were collecting toy guns or football cards, Charles Brooking, to his parents’ chagrin, was accumulating doors and windows. Now his precocious fascination has culminated in a collection so large he’s run out of room to show it. We went to meet him.
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Features
Green giant
If you were to ask 100 people what an environment-friendly building looked like, not many of them would describe a glassy high rise. But they'd be wrong. Welcome to 10 Upper Bank Street …
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FeaturesAn engineer's babelfish
We can create wonderfully powerful and detailed pictures of how buildings behave thanks to an irritatingly repetitive, tedious and costly modelling process. Now one company has found a way to make it all work better
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FeaturesHard and fast
The project team had to build a village for 1000 students in 91 weeks on a budget that was tighter than a hippopotamus' leotard. The only chance was a risky, little-known construction method. Building found out what happened next
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Features
The end of the lines
The government's promise to plug broadband pipes into every new home in the UK looked like forward thinking a few years ago. Now it seems hopelessly out of date. Building keeps pace with the wireless revolution