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sustainable & affordable
community-focused housing

Fabric develop community-focused sustainable housing projects.

We're a not-for-profit Community Interest Company facilitating/designing/developing housing projects in urban and rural settings throughout the UK with a specific focus to allow them to be co-designed by the residents, ensuring they are affordable and sustainable.

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Our projects also promote aspects of co-housing and enable the inclusion of other community-related resources and services (such as shared renewable energy, permaculture and healthcare).

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We also offer design and construction skills training workshops - click here for more details.

who is this for

Our clients range from individual community groups to Councils...

community-led housing client types

Our clients vary from individuals simply wanting to build their own homes in better communities to Local Authorities needing to offer more affordable housing. 

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Whilst it’s commendable that a group of individuals can come together and create their own housing community (defined as community-led housing), there are a number of problems. Groups generally consist of people without the relevant skills or experience; they lack time and resources so projects can take literally years to come to fruition; some members “burn out” whilst trying to balance day-to-day living and working full time; and it’s difficult to identify suitable land in the right location that appeals to an already established group.

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We’re offering something different.

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We provide a hybrid community-led housing solution that is a fast-track alternative to the more traditional route, aiming to make sustainable & community living more mainstream. 

Our projects provide community-focused, affordable, ethical and sustainable homes on a much wider scale, and much faster, reducing the conventional route of delivering community-led projects from an average of 5 years to potentially just 1 year.

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The residents have a say in the design of their community. There is the opportunity to have a true mix of housing types and sizes with a huge emphasis on Self and Custom Build homes. The community is also offered different options for the legal entity, ownership and governance of the project, such as forming a Community Land Trust (CLT), a Co-operative Society or Community Benefit Society.

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Plus there is the possibility to include further community-focused elements, such as shared energy design and implementation; health & wellbeing services (including social prescribing); ecology & permaculture facilities; skills/knowledge sharing and behaviour change workshops; and commercial/business (start-up) support.

the process

We've simplified the process to make it much faster...

fabric - the process diagram
how we differ

Fabric co-ordinate the project with a team of experienced professional consultants...

fabric - the team.png

not-for-profit - being a Community Interest Company (CIC) we’re a social enterprise supporting the communities that we’re creating and then reinvesting any surplus earnings back into making our services even more efficient and therefore affordable

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location first - we start by identifying suitable land and determine the full scope of what can be achieved, creating a better match for the new residents and the existing neighbourhood

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understanding the new community - we use a unique set of tools and questionnaires designed to check the compatibility of a community group and clearly understand their social, design and service requirements, plus any special needs

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efficient co-design - we have developed a series of fast-track co-design workshops that draw out exactly what the community are looking for, whilst ensuring compatibility between the individual households

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more home choice - we offer (and encourage) a true mix of housing types directly responding to the community needs

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a broad range of excellent options - we draw on the strengths of our team of consultants and service providers all of whom have an excellent track record offering a very high quality and sustainable range of options, during the both the development of the project and throughout its occupancy

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professional-led - overall we offer a very structured & efficient approach that includes post occupancy testing as standard which can help to develop a project over time, but also feeds back into our own system, creating a continually improving service that adheres to the Theory of Change (ToC) process

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