Services
Cass Design Consultants is part of the DLP Consulting Group, a multi-disciplinary
Employee Owned Trust with offices across the UK.
Architecture
Our architects work to create buildings that both inspire and perform. Combining a questioning attitude with an uncompromising belief in design quality, we aim to deliver original solutions that:
• exceed client expectations and are completed on budget and on programme
• create living spaces that enhance the lives of those who use them
• make a positive contribution to their surroundings
• make efficient use of resources such as land, materials and energy
We view scheme design and project delivery as a continuous, integrated process involving creative, technical and ‘hands on’ project management skills. This approach has been applied successfully across a broad range of building types, including housing, sport and leisure, cultural, commercial and industrial projects.
Cass Design Consultants is a Chartered RIBA Practice and has specialist expertise in conservation architecture. We provide all aspects of architectural design, from feasibility studies to completion, and can also offer Principal Designer Services if required.
We have developed a bespoke home design service through studioCass, a division of Cass Design Consultants tailored specifically to provide design and planning services for private residential clients. Please see ‘Private Houses’ on the main menu for further information.
Masterplanning
We have extensive urban design and masterplanning experience across the residential, leisure and commercial sectors, with particular expertise in dealing with large sites where a range of complex issues may need to be addressed, such as planning policies, poor environment and contamination, community needs and economic performance.
Cass Design Consultant’s work includes new residential areas, expansion of existing settlements, urban and rural parkland and business parks. Through good masterplanning we aim to optimise social and economic assets for our clients, to create a climate for investment confidence, and bring about development that is environmentally, economically and socially sustainable.
We also work in established urban areas, liaising with existing stakeholders and communities, to develop Design Codes and urban design strategies that address underlying issues such as market demand, social deprivation and poor environments.
Our specialist planners and landscape architects and conservation specialists are on hand to provide expertise as required to our masterplanners, providing a seamless integrated multi-disciplinary approach to all our work.
Conservation
Securing a meaningful and financially viable role for the future of historic buildings and landscapes has been a major theme in Cass’s work over many years.
We are an RIBA-Accredited Conservation Architect and our experience includes working with listed buildings, including private houses and within Conservation Areas, historic parks and heritage landscapes.
We are frequently called upon to negotiate development agreements with local authorities and conservation agencies such as Historic England as part of the planning process and are skilled at providing heritage statements to support planning submissions and appeals.
Ecology (BNG Assessment)
Ecology and biodiversity are becoming an increasing important consideration when designing and implementing development. Our ecology team works in close collaboration with our landscaping, sustainability, conservation, masterplanning, and architecture teams to ensure ecology and biodiversity are seamlessly integrated into the design process, becoming an opportunity rather than a constraint.
Our ecologists have extensive experience providing ecological deliverables required to be submitted alongside planning applications and in support of reserved matters condition discharge, including ecological surveys, habitat design and ecological impact assessments (EcIA).
We are experts in Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) and can provide survey, reporting and assessment suitable for compliance with current planning policy, advising on habitat creation / management strategies to achieve a projects BNG commitment, and carrying out feasibility studies for the establishment of habitat banks.
Landscape Architecture
Our landscape architects create attractive, sustainable and ecologically rich places which also provide an efficient, attractive and durable setting for development.
Cass Design Consultant’s integrated, multi-disciplinary method of working allows creative landscape architectural solutions to be embedded within the wider scheme concept from the outset.
We specialise in producing detailed Landscape and Visual Impact Assessments (LVIA’s), Landscape Management Plans and co-ordinating Environmental Statements to support planning applications. Working closely with our own ecologists and a wide range of other specialists we are able to engage constructively with statutory protection agencies and other interest groups at an early stage in the planning process.
We have extensive experience of habitat creation and management, including lowland heath, coastal exposure and erosion, species rich grassland, wetlands (often as part of SUDs) and soil-making techniques, including the use of waste materials.
Sustainability
Cass Design Consultants’ engineers and built environment specialists are highly skilled at assessing and enhancing the thermal performance of buildings and assisting in the development of projects that ensure enhancement of the scheme’s overall energy efficiency and sustainability credentials.
Our expertise ranges from reviewing the design of single dwellings through to assessing larger sites and complex commercial buildings. Our integrated approach provides ‘buildable’ solutions that meet planning and client requirements for low carbon & sustainability whilst also ensuring that the spaces developed achieve stricter thermal comfort criteria.
Our assessments often make use of passive solar design techniques including reviewing and managing the risk of summertime overheating, whilst maximising the harvesting of daylight and sunlight. We also provide detailed dynamic thermal modelling of various building types for naturally vented solutions. We are registered to certify buildings under Part L and to produce EPCs for both residential and non-domestic.
Planning
Cass Design Consultants work in unison with DLP Planning, which has an exceptional track record covering all sectors from one-off domestic projects through to large-scale multi-million-pound schemes. In particular the practice has worked extensively on projects that secure the self-sustaining regeneration of disadvantaged urban areas and strategic industrial sites.
Efficient project management is key to achieving cost effective and sustainable outcomes, and our multi-disciplinary structure enables us to efficiently reconcile the fundamental planning issues of environmental, design and social considerations, as well as development economics.
Communication and collaboration are at the heart of our approach to planning consultancy. We have many years’ experience in managing public consultations and stakeholder engagement through workshops, exhibitions and community liaison groups which secure the genuine involvement of local people.
Services include:
• Preparing and managing planning applications, and other related applications
• Preparing planning appeals and providing evidence at Inquiries
• Listed building negotiations and consents
• Planning feasibility studies
• Public consultation and stakeholder involvement
• Area-based regeneration/development strategies
• Promotion of development opportunities.