Critchley Conservation
Martin Critchley worked on historic buildings throughout his impressive 50 year career, where he won awards for his Conservation work and was even mentioned in the Pevsner book for Buckinghamshire.
Sarah Roberts (Director) took over the Conservation projects in the office in 2018 after completing her Masters in Historic Building Conservation (RICS Course Accredited), becoming Accredited with the Institute of Historic Building Conservation and becoming a Trustee of Hampshire Buildings Preservation Trust.
Our Approach
Our approach to Conservation projects is based on a strong understanding of the significance of heritage and how it affects our every day lives. Whether you drive past a historic building on your way to work, take your children to explore a castle, or whether you're fully immersed in working with traditional buildings on a daily basis, the historic and built environment will have some level of impact on you. We are here to ensure that our heritage is conserved and enhanced appropriately to its surroundings.
The historic environment is central to England’s cultural heritage and sense of identity, and hence a resource that should be sustained for the benefit of present and future generations. (Historic England)
We work on traditional projects and sympathetic conservation works that leave a light touch, through to modern intervention works that juxtapose the heritage so that it is not conceived as part of the original design.
We take a local, national and international approach to our Conservation within the CAAD studio, as it depends on the scale and significance of the project we are working on.
We base our Conservation Principles on the guidance from organisations such as Historic England, ICOMOs and the SPAB.
Heritage Consultancy
We provide consultancy advice to homeowners, professional organisations and charitable groups who are responsible for historic buildings, whether they be residential, commercial, industrial or ecclesiastical. As Conservation is something we specialise in here at CAAD, this sometimes means we will work alongside other professionals in the Architecture Industry to solely provide heritage related advise. This can include heritage assets themselves, or often also new buildings within Conservation Areas.
Every historic building is unique so if you would like Critchley Conservation to be involved in an aspect of your property which has not been mentioned then please reach out to us.
Planning & Listed Building Consent
Almost everything you do to a Listed Building will require some form of consent, other than general repair and maintenance.
We prepare the drawings, Heritage Report and manage the applications in-house on your behalf. This sometimes will consist of applications run in parallel to each other, including Planning Permission and Scheduled Monument Consent, if they are also required.
Damage to Heritage Assets
Whether the damage is accidental or not, we work with owners of heritage assets and insurance companies on damage that has been caused. Examples of this include fire and flood damage, subsidence, and general dilapidations of vacant heritage assets.
We generally Project Manage these projects and work cohesively with Historic England, the Local Planning Authority and any Insurance team that might be involved, so that this takes the stress and burden off the owner having to navigate this often complex and time consuming process.
Sustainability and Heritage
Buildings and the construction industry are one of the largest carbon polluters in the UK today and there is consensus that we urgently need to tackle carbon emissions from buildings. Around 500,000 buildings in England alone are protected by statutory listing and hundreds of thousands more are situated in conservation areas. They cover many building types from stately homes to public buildings, terraced streets and blocks of social housing. The potential carbon savings from making these buildings more energy efficient could be vast. We work with Local Planning Authorities and energy-experts to obtain Listed Building Consent for energy improvements to Listed buildings and other heritage assets.
