Month: July 2026

This week, in our continuing series, we showcase our 3rd project, this stunning new build modern house.

Over the past 15 years, we’ve been fortunate to work on a wide variety of architectural projects, each with its own challenges and opportunities. This contemporary new build home from 2013, located near Swindon, is a great example of how thoughtful design can create a home that is both striking and practical.

The contemporary designed rendered box that projects over an ashlar limestone base offers clean lines, generous glazing and carefully considered open living spaces, bringing natural light into the home while creating a strong connection with the surrounding landscape. The minimalist kitchen and bespoke staircase are a couple of noteworthy design features. The design had excellent levels of insulation and Mechanical Heat Recovery Ventilation (MHRV) to provide an optimal internal environment with minimal energy losses. Every decision was driven by the client’s aspirations, resulting in a home that is uniquely theirs.

Projects such as this remind us that good architecture isn’t always about following trends. It’s about listening, solving problems and designing buildings that people genuinely enjoy living in for years to come.

This week in our continuing 15 projects for 15 years, we bring you our director James’ favourite project. Read on for an interesting and enlightening choice…..

“Looking back over the last 15 years at Thinking Buildings, we’ve had the privilege of working on hundreds of projects across the UK. Choosing just one favourite isn’t easy, but one project has always stood out to me – designing a new headquarters for Consolidated Fisheries Limited (CFL) in the Falkland Islands.

At first glance, it was a relatively familiar brief. A growing business needed a modern office that reflected its ambitions and provided space for future expansion. Their existing accommodation, like many commercial buildings on the Falklands, had evolved from adapted houses and no longer met the needs of the organisation. They had identified a potential site and had a clear vision for what they wanted to achieve.

What made the project so memorable wasn’t the type of building, it was where it was and how we had to deliver it.

Working with a client over 8,000 miles away brought challenges that we hadn’t experienced before. Long before remote working became commonplace, we were relying heavily on video meetings to develop relationships, discuss design ideas and move the project forward. Although I was fortunate to meet the client in person on a couple of occasions when they visited the UK, almost the entire project was delivered remotely.

The project itself progressed over several years, with changing briefs, planning challenges, budget considerations and, ultimately, the disruption caused by the COVID pandemic. Like many major developments, it experienced periods of momentum followed by unavoidable pauses, but every stage taught us something new.

Perhaps the biggest learning experience was understanding how architecture needs to respond to its location. While the Falkland Islands share many planning and legal principles with the UK, they have developed their own distinctive way of working. Designing there meant considering factors that we rarely encounter on projects closer to home. Material availability, shipping times, procurement, construction methods and overall project costs all had a much greater influence on the design process. Every specification had to be carefully considered, balancing performance, practicality and availability rather than simply selecting the ideal product.

For me, this project perfectly demonstrates what architecture is really about. It’s not simply designing buildings; it’s understanding people, place, logistics, culture and context, then bringing those together into a practical solution. It challenged us to adapt, communicate differently and continually rethink our assumptions.

Fifteen years on, that remains one of the things I enjoy most about architecture. Every project brings something new to learn, and sometimes the most rewarding projects are the ones that take you furthest outside your comfort zone, even if they’re thousands of miles away.”

You will remember from an earlier post that Thinking Buildings is celebrating 15 years of business this year! 

We have come a long way from the initial idea that Darren and James had around the kitchen table, to where we are now.  We thought it might be fun to delve into the archives of the last 15 years and share some key projects, and favourite projects, that have taken place.  Hopefully we’ll find some questionable fashion choices and dated haircuts too, if we’re lucky!

This first project we are sharing dates from 2011, our year of inception, and involved the conversion of an existing disused barn. It was set within the local conservation area in Oxfordshire, and the then small team worked on renovating it into a dwelling with associated parking areas and private gardens.  

The re-design created a 4 bedroomed dwelling and improved the internal and external layout to maximise the extensive ground floor accommodation and create an external covered car port.

A high quality finished project, letting in lots of natural light through the floor to ceiling timber framed windows.  

We look forward to sharing more beautiful projects to celebrate our milestone over the coming weeks.

“Will You Start The Fans, Please!”

Our younger followers might not understand the reference but TB were living their best 80’s selves last week on our summer social! The Crystal Maze Experience, in a hot and sweltering Manchester, was everything we hoped it would be. We played as two randomly selected teams, we were not competitive at all (if you know most of us, you know this is completely untrue) and we ended our time inside the crystal dome, where the fans whirled the gold tokens around us while we scrambled to collect them! The final scores were very close and we had a huge amount of fun!

The fun didn’t stop there though! Next we hopped next door and went crazy in Chaos Karts! Think real life Mario kart. More fun, and again, not competitive at all 😉 No-one could touch Leigh, he was top of the shop in both races!

We finished our day of action with a delicious feast at Dishoom followed by some drinks in a bustling city centre before heading back to our hotel.

Such a great, laughter filled, fun packed day, if a little warm. It really is a pleasure to treat the team to some well deserved R&R. It’s our way of showing them that we appreciate their hard work and it’s great to see everyone enjoying themselves together. Roll on the Christmas fun!