Mr Scott Batty
Scott Batty has 30 years’ experience making, building, designing, and shaping the profession of architecture.
In architectural practice Scott has worked as an employee, a sole practitioner, a partner, a freelancer and as the director of his own company. During this time Scott has mentored many young architects in the transition from academia to practice. Scott’s numerous built projects have won prizes, including an RIBA award. His work has been published and featured on television in the UK and North America. Scott worked internationally as a construction volunteer, including time in Canada building timber framed homes with the indigenous people of Northern Ontario. Scott self-built the house for his own family which has been published, won a Civic Society Award, and is the case study project for two academic research papers.
Batty has taught for 15 years in the School of Architecture and Cities, University of Westminster, where he interviews school leavers interested in studying architecture, Part 3 students in their final stage of architectural education and has taught at every stage in-between. As part of The Technical Studies team, Batty developed the curriculum including initiatives for students to monitor live building sites and to implement sustainable design principles.
No longer a practicing architect in the conventional sense – he operates in the field that exists between practice and academia, designing, building, and making.
Sites of Learning, Sites of Meaning: The Construction Site within Architectural Education.
The research explores the role of the construction site as an essential component within architectural education. What defines, and is unique to, the (Building) Construction Site as an in-situ classroom for learning and experience? How should the experience of, engagement with, and reflection on (Building) Construction Sites be a vital part in the education of architecture students? How can this experience help bring modern (Building) Designers and Constructors closer, improving professional understanding and process? What wider experiential role do Construction Sites play in the theatre of the modern city and how does this form part of the wider learning and enjoyment of architecture students? Visits to construction sites and the active monitoring of a project under construction are interactive experiences that develop students’ understanding of real construction practices. The author draws on the work of over 800 students, representing a cross section through architectural education, architectural practice and the construction industry in London. The research was presented as part of CREATECH ‘23 International Conference and Exhibition, Nurturing Future Talent in the Built Environment 2023 Event + Workshop, and the Production Studies International Conference 2024 at Newcastle University.
The Retrofit of 1960s and 70s UK Housing.
The UK built more houses in the 1960s and 70s than in any other time since WW2. Many houses of this period, an estimated 1.7 million, have a common design typology and common method of construction. The research explores a design language of Retrofit for houses of this period. The principle case study is a detached 1970s house belonging to the researcher that was Retrofitted 2018-23 with energy monitoring compared before and after Retrofit. The research concludes with a generic and widely applicable design proposal for the mass Retrofit of houses of this typology. The Research was referenced by the RIBA Practice Bulletin, presented to the Architects Climate Action Group (ACAN), received a Civic Award (St. Albans), and was featured in the RIBA publication, Environmental Design Sourcebook (McLean & Silver, 2021).
