How market standards affect building design: The case of low energy design in commercial offices

Abstract

This paper develops existing work on building design through a focus on one important yet understudied form of regulation: market standards. Market standards are agreed upon definitions of 'necessary' provision in buildings and are fundamental in 'formatting' markets and determining the value of a building in the market. The paper presents a case study of the design of 10 commercial offices in London, UK, the effects of market standards on the designs and on the potential for the development of lower energy buildings. Theoretically, the paper integrates literatures on standards, institutions and markets to argue that market standards do important 'work' in design processes that require closer scrutiny. In particular, we show that market standards are an important form of normative and cultural regulation in the field of commercial office design; format and act as calculative devices in property markets and result in forms of knowledge diminution that break the relationship between building design and occupiers' practices. Together, these effects result in particular designs being legitimised and valued, and lower energy designs being delegitimised, devalued and pushed to the periphery of the attention of commercial office designers.

Energy-related standards and UK speculative office development

“…In summary, in this sample almost all aspects of speculative office design were strongly standardized through conformity to these sets of regulations, guidelines and norms, which can be called 'market standards' (Faulconbridge et al, 2017). These have cumulative consequences in that they interlock and are backed by three forms of institutional legitimacy (Scott, 2008), with regulative standards demanding legal 'de minima', frequently backing up normative expectations of, for example, the environmental performance implied but not guaranteed by EPCs and BREEAM, and the cognitive-cultural demands of 'quality' represented by particular aesthetics, but more concretely BCO compliance and exceedance.…”

“…Such features as location and quality materials are undeniably linked with high-value buildings, but their influence is not the focus of this paper, which discusses buildings' expected or modelled energy efficiency. It is in this area that the most detail regarding what have been treated elsewhere (Faulconbridge et al, 2017) as different institutionally legitimated 'market standards' could be found.…”

“…(Pinder et al, 2013, p. 442; see also Guy, 1998, pp. 268-271) labelling and certification schemes) operate as energy efficiency or performance 'standards' in that they define acceptable, expected, normal, legitimate and uniform features and performance of buildings (Faulconbridge, Cass, & Connaughton, 2017). These include building regulations and building environmental assessment mechanisms (BEAMs) (Cole, 2005;Goulden, Erell, Garb, & Pearlmutter, 2015), the analysis of which has focused 'on technical features and building performance, with little emphasis on the questions of how and why they are used in practice' (Goulden et al, 2015, pp.…”

“…In speculative modes of development these understandings become particularly powerful in producing homogeneous designs stressing marketability, flexibility, performance and quality, which together characterize desirable office space. Achieving these characteristics and displaying that this has been accomplished is achieved through adherence to, or exceeding, 'market standards' (Faulconbridge et al, 2017) often in ways that render lower-energy alternatives illegitimate and unacceptable. However, the process through which such standards operate is not merely a reflection of the historical context of the UK property market: it is also a consequence of how standards are embedded in markets and performed at different stages of design and marketing.…”

Global-local tensions in urban green neighbourhoods: a policy mobilities approach to discursive change in Freiburg, Vancouver and Luxembourg

“…For example, the increase in green neighbourhood numbers has been facilitated and accompanied by a significant increase in the number of inter/national green building or neighbourhood standards and certification systems that seek to guide and regulate urban development such as LEED 1 in North America and BREEAM 2 in Europe. These schemes can be described as offthe-shelf, easy-to-transfer models 3 that are often incorporated into local (municipal) regulations thereby prescribing certain standards for new developments (Faulconbridge et al, 2018 (Bulkeley and Castán Broto, 2013).…”