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Sean Hill

Posts by Sean Hill

Seeing Past the Plaster: Reimagining a Mews House for the Low-Carbon Age

by Sean Hill on Jul 22, 2025

Dilapidated Maida Vale mews house with faded façade and garage door, symbolising the potential of low-energy retrofits to transform London’s historic homes into sustainable dwellings.

In Maida Vale, one of London’s most quietly charismatic neighbourhoods, a crumbling one-bedroom house has just sold for £2 million.

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Topics: Retrofit Mews House Retrofit

Designing a Better Future, One Extension at a Time

by Sean Hill on Jul 17, 2025

Sustainable rear extension with full-height glazing, reclaimed brick walls, and natural light connecting the indoor living space to the garden, showcasing energy-efficient, low-impact design by RISE Design Studio.

At RISE, we believe your home should tell a deeper story.

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Topics: Sustainable Extensions

The Cost of Cutting Corners: Why Building Standards in the UK Need a Rethink

by Sean Hill on Jul 17, 2025

Aerial view of a terraced house undergoing a major renovation, fully covered in scaffolding and protective sheeting, highlighting the scale and care involved in a professional construction project managed by RISE Design Studio.

At RISE, we’ve seen the ripple effects of poor construction up close. The hidden costs. The broken trust. The dreams that crumble faster than the plaster on an uninspected wall. It’s a painful truth: too many people in the UK have entrusted their homes – their lives – to builders who …

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Topics: Cowboy Builders

Building Better, Faster, Lighter

by Sean Hill on Jul 16, 2025

Factory setting showing timber-framed modular units under construction, highlighting the precision, efficiency, and sustainability of offsite housing methods.

How offsite manufacturing is reshaping sustainable architecture

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Topics: Sustainable architecture Innovative Architecture Offsite manufacturing Modern Methods of Construction

Retrofit or Rebuild? The Developer’s Dilemma in a Carbon-Critical Age

by Sean Hill on Jul 16, 2025

A sustainably retrofitted brick building in London by RISE Design Studio, featuring arched windows, contemporary extensions, and a landscaped garden – showcasing the harmony between heritage architecture and modern low-energy design.

☉ In an era where buildings must do more with less – less carbon, less waste, less time – we find ourselves rethinking everything.

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Topics: Sustainable architecture Retrofit New build Rebuild

A New Tennis Pavilion for the Next Chapter

by Sean Hill on Jul 14, 2025

Existing single-storey timber pavilion at Sutton Churches Tennis Club with corrugated metal roof and multiple windows, showing signs of age and wear, set against a cloudy blue sky.

We’ve just been appointed to design something quietly ambitious for Sutton Churches Tennis Club.

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Topics: Sustainable architecture Sustainable Design sustainable materials sustainable structure Sustainable Tennis Pavilion

11 Things We Always Consider When Designing an Eco Home

by Sean Hill on Jul 14, 2025

Modern eco home by a pond in a woodland setting, designed with Passivhaus principles including deep eaves, timber cladding, solar orientation, and full-height glazing for energy efficiency and comfort year-round.

At RISE, we believe the homes we build should quietly work for the planet—while beautifully serving the people who live in them.

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Topics: Passivhaus Sustainable Design

Stone, Time and Legacy: A Conversation with Artorius Faber

by Sean Hill on Jul 11, 2025

Sean Ronnie Hill of RISE Design Studio and Edward Smith of Artorius Faber standing in front of large natural stone blocks, highlighting their conversation on stone, time, and legacy in sustainable architecture and material longevity.

At RISE, we’ve always believed that the materials we choose tell stories — about place, about time, about how we value what we build and who we build for.

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Topics: Sustainable architecture Stone Architecture Designing with Stone

Reinventing Timber: A New Chapter in Sustainable Building

by Sean Hill on Jul 9, 2025

A detailed view of three stacked Superwood planks in varying warm tones, showcasing the fine grain and engineered density of this sustainable, high-performance timber alternative developed for low-carbon architectural applications.

At RISE, we believe in material honesty. In designing buildings that respect the earth they rise from, and the future they help shape. So when a material like Superwood enters the conversation—a bio-based innovation that challenges concrete and steel—it catches our attention.

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Topics: Building materials natural materials sustainable materials

Beyond Repair, Built for Tomorrow: Crafting a Contemporary Rural Home near Faversham

by Sean Hill on Jul 4, 2025

Visualisation of a modern barn-style replacement dwelling near Faversham, Kent, designed by RISE Design Studio. The sustainable home features natural timber cladding, a pitched metal roof, open-plan living spaces and large openings connecting to the rural landscape.

Hidden behind a screen of wild grasses and hedgerow just outside Faversham sits a plot that tells a story many know but few want to face: a house that once served its time, now left to the elements, a shell clinging to life it no longer has. When we first stepped onto this patch of Ke …

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Topics: Sustainable Design Rural New Build Replacement Dwelling
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