FOOTPRINT+ podcasts

Vast quantities of post-consumer glass from commercial buildings are still lost to landfill due to contamination, logistics, and cost barriers. This session shares key lessons from implementing a new, scalable pathway to recover end-of-life architectural glass and return it to new building products. Through strategic partnerships with clients, upskilling the deconstruction supply chain, and stewarding recovered material, Saint-Gobain has developed a cost- and time-effective closed-loop solution.

This initiative is called Glass Forever, illustrated in a six-step circular flow:

• Diagnosis – Classification of glass types prior to dismantling.
• Dismantling – Controlled breaking of glass to prevent contamination.
• Sorting – Identification of acceptable cullet types for recycling.
• Collection – Organizing glass flows to ensure compatibility with flat glass production.
• Melting – Integration of cullet into new glass batches, reducing CO₂ emissions.
• Projects – Reuse of recycled glass in new windows and facades for construction and renovation.

This real-world initiative illustrates how industrial innovation and collaboration can unlock material circularity, reduce CO₂ emissions, and strengthen climate resilience across the built environment.

Chairperson

David Entwistle, Director of Major Projects - Saint-Gobain

Speakers

Gianluca Rapone, Associate Director - FMDC

Damian Rogan, Director - Eckerlsey O'Callaghan

In collaboration with Sano and Atelier One, the Sano Bamboo project is constructing a demonstration house to trial bamboo as a sustainable structural alternative for UK home building, with the aim of setting a new benchmark for healthier homes that align with wellbeing and environmental responsibility.

Bamboo is a rapidly renewable, high-performance material with exceptional strength-to-weight qualities, which can be grown in large quantities and at a rapid rate in the UK. Its cultivation and use in structural systems provide construction and property companies with a practical solution for carbon offsetting while championing circular, regenerative design. Bamboo is a clear alternative to traditional timber for residential homes.

This collaborative project will showcase how Britain can utilise home-grown materials while measuring the environmental performance, embodied carbon, indoor air quality, and resident health outcomes. Above all, the demonstration house will become a proof of concept that can be scaled across the industry.

Speakers

Christopher Matthews, Associate Director - Atelier One

David Jones, Co-Founder - Sano

1 Victoria Street is a historically layered site undergoing transformation into a responsible and future-focused workplace. In partnership with Mitsubishi Estate and architects AHMM, the project reimagines a building last redeveloped in the 1960s into a sustainable office space that responds sensitively to its heritage context in Westminster. 

Originally constructed as luxury flats in the 1840s and later adapted for office use following World War II damage, the building is now being renewed to meet contemporary commercial and environmental demands. Up to 52% of the existing structure will be retained by volume, significantly reducing embodied carbon, while new extensions, high-performance façades, upgraded MEP services and reconfigured cores comply with modern regulations while reducing climate risk to the asset. The scheme introduces active retail at ground level, high-quality office space above, and biodiversity-rich green terraces at upper levels. Together, these interventions demonstrate how adaptive reuse can balance heritage, sustainability and long-term urban vitality.

Chairperson

Helena Morris, Senior Development Director - Stanhope

Speakers

Gilli Hobbs, Director - Reusefully

Aisling Reynolds, Head of Environmental Sustainability - Keltbray

Hazel Joseph, Project Director - AHMM

171 Victoria Street is an iconic 412,000 ft² redevelopment and a good example of how sustainability has become core investment risk management, not an add-on. From day one, this project was aligned with Westminster’s strong retrofit-first policy, so the real question wasn’t whether to reuse the building, but how deep the retrofit needed to be to unlock planning certainty, future value and market appeal.

In the early feasibility stages, multiple redevelopment routes were tested through whole life carbon modelling, using environmental impact as a decision-making tool rather than a reporting exercise. The selected strategy retains the substructure and most of the superstructure, dramatically reducing embodied emissions and, critically, de-risking planning in a highly constrained borough. In this context, retrofit really is the new prime.

From an investment and agency perspective, the ESG strategy isn’t about collecting labels. Certifications like BREEAM, NABERS and Fitwel matter because they respond to occupier demand, but they sit alongside practical circular economy thinking, designing for adaptability, embedding material passports, and planning for end-of-life value. Each building element is treated as a recoverable asset, not a future liability. The result is an office designed to perform - environmentally, commercially and beyond its first life.

Chairperson

Jack Pugh, Building Project & Consultancy - Savills UK

Speakers

John Pritchard, Project Director - tp bennett

Joanna Conceicao, Sustainable Design - Savills UK

Stuart Jones, Asset Manager - Motcomb Estates

Energy performance is where the net-zero retrofit challenge will be won  but only if ambition is matched by delivery. Using Tower Bridge Court (TBC.London) as a live case study, this panel explores how one of London’s first all-electric, net-zero carbon retrofit workplaces translated energy ambition into measurable operational performance through building systems.

Bringing together the developer, architect and engineering perspectives, the discussion examines how energy targets were defined early, embedded into design, and delivered in practice. From all-electric strategy and operational energy performance to embodied carbon reduction and occupier wellbeing, the panel focuses on the decisions that mattered  and the trade-offs that shaped the outcome.

Chairperson

Karl Stauss, Head of Client Delivery - AET Flexible Space

Speakers

Basil Demeroutis, Managing Partner - FORE Partnership

Robert Smith, Managing Director - Material Index

Lance Routh, Director - Stiff + Trevillion

The Portman Estate’s relocation of its head office to One Great Cumberland Place presented an exciting opportunity to reimagine the workplace. The project aims to set a benchmark for sustainable commercial interiors across its 110-acre Marylebone estate.

The retrofit of the 8,400 sq ft office prioritises collaboration, wellbeing, and exemplary environmental performance while working within an existing base build. Sustainability informed every design decision including:

• Low-carbon and high-recycled-content materials
• Circular economy principles resulting in reuse of existing services, lighting, and finishes
• Inventive reuse of salvaged materials
• Specification of furniture to meet rigorous environmental, repair, and replacement criteria

Embodied carbon was measured and recorded to support The Portman Estate’s One Planet Action Plan, achieving carbon neutrality with minimal offsetting and setting a replicable benchmark for future workplace retrofits.

Chairperson

Joe MacMahon, Associate - Gort Scott

Speakers

Michael Jones, Project Director - The Portman Estate

Jess Daly, Principal Consultant - Bioregional

Megan Thacker-Brooks, Architect - Gort Scott

So what is Regenerative Design?

Regenerative design is increasingly discussed across the built environment sector, yet it is often unclear what it means and how it differs from other sustainability practices within construction. 

This session will provide a concise, accessible introduction to what regenerative design is, what it aims to do, and why it can’t be reduced to a checklist. 

Drawing on insights from the Regenerative Design Lab, a cross-sectional learning programme for built-environment professions, the speakers will share what emerges when people work with regenerative principles over time and what it means for practitioners trying to make change today. 

Chairperson

Timothy Clement, Director of Social Value & Sustainability - Morgan Sindall Construction

Speakers

Oliver Broadbent, Director - Constructivist

2 Finsbury Avenue is a 38‑storey, 106,000 sq m development set to

Chairperson

Marion Charlier, Central Engineering Lead - Arcelor Mittal

Speakers

Matthew Webster, Head of Sustainability - British Land

Ollie Wildman, Director - Buildings - Ramboll

Kathryn Castledine, Senior Sustainability Manager - Sir Robert McAlpine

Jonathan Davis, Technical Director - William Hare Group

David Chapman, UK Sustainability Lead - ArcelorMittal