A wide range of interesting articles that help you make informed decisions and deliver the best projects for your clients authored by our team of NBS subject specialists and construction industry contributors.
Sustainability
NBS Guide: Embodied Carbon Calculations
Learn how to align your carbon assessments with BIM workflows. This guide to Embodied Carbon Calculations, developed by NBS and Circular Ecology, sets out a practical, standardised approach to calculating the embodied carbon of building materials and products, and how to apply this data to BIM objects.
Must Reads
design-and-specification
The hidden cost of compliance: why architects are demanding a new era of product transparency
Few pieces of legislation have reshaped the UK construction industry as significantly as the Building Safety Act 2022 (BSA). Introduced to improve accountability, traceability and safety standards ...
Design and Specification
Brick slip cladding systems – the need for robust specification
This article from the NBS technical team outlines specification for brick slip technology, including history, technology, design, safety and testing.
design-and-specification
When product data creates risk, AluK delivers the clarity and support architects need
The need to build more homes, more quickly, has not changed. If anything, the pressure has intensified. However, the conversation around Modern Methods of Construction has evolved.
Specifying sports ground seating
The humble plastic folding seat is more than just a place to rest your legs during a sporting event, it provides a ‘safe zone’ around which you have personal space. Seating arrangements can also help ...
Design and SpecificationConstruction Products
Reduce embodied carbon from the start
Measure, compare and reduce upfront embodied carbon using trusted UK data and pre-built assemblies.
Biomimicry, taking our cue from the consumate engineers
Biomimicry is an approach to design that looks to foster sustainability by emulating nature’s tried-and-true solutions. The word biomimicry traces its roots to the Greek words “bios”, which means ...
Design and SpecificationSustainability
Digital Property: Open-Source Architecture
Digital Property: Open-Source Architecture Guest Edited by Wendy W Fok and Antoine Picon
Design and SpecificationDigital Transformation
Smart Cities, Future Cities, Sustainable Cities
Currently, the Earth is home to over 7.4 billion people, with over half of those living in an urban setting and using 80% of the planet’s resources. By 2050, the population is forecast to be just ...
Design and SpecificationSustainability
100 years 100 buildings
100 Years 100 Buildings John Hill
Design and SpecificationSustainability
Self-healing concrete
Cracking concrete and costly repair bills could be a thing of the past as university researchers trial technologies to deliver 'self-healing' concrete.
Design and SpecificationConstruction Products
Subscribe
Digestive 'smart' bricks set to power homes and recycle waste water
A new project to transform building facades into ‘biological computers’ made up of ‘digestive’ bricks that can create useful products from waste has been launched at Newcastle University.
Design and SpecificationSustainability
The digital construction revolution: When will BIM become BAU?
Digital technologies are changing the way we work, rest and play. In recent years the construction industry has been making its own digital journey as Building Information Modelling (BIM) begins to ...
Design and SpecificationDigital Transformation
Disability and the built environment inquiry launched
The accessibility of our homes, buildings and public spaces is set to come under the spotlight as a parliamentary committee launches a public enquiry.
Design and SpecificationSustainability
Here's what maths can teach us about how to design the perfect car park
There can be few things as frustrating as being stuck in a car park for four hours on a scorching Sunday afternoon; yet this was the unhappy fate of shoppers at a new multi-storey grid car park at an ...
Design and SpecificationHealth and Safety
NBS opens an Old Post Office memory box
As the extensive refurbishment of NBS's Newcastle headquarters reaches its final phase we open a box full of memories - of the way we, and our historic building, used to be.
Design and SpecificationDigital Transformation
NBS and open standards for BIM
At NBS we are committed to supporting open standards for BIM. Furthermore, we have been one of the most active organisations in the UK involved in developing these standards and encouraging their ...
