Engagement for the Becontree Retrofit Guide, part of BeFirst’s Becontree Future House project, focused on climate resilience, housing suitability and home quality. From 52 survey respondents, 25 were shortlisted for phone interviews, leading to a final group of 16 participants reflecting the borough’s demographics and housing tenures. Becontree, the UK’s largest council estate, covers 10 sq km and houses 40 per cent of Barking and Dagenham’s population. 

 

Who is on the project? 

 

Archio Ltd

Urban Symbiotics

Simpleworks

Florence Collier at Humble Bee

Potter Raper

 

Describe the context of the community engagement. Why did the engagement take place?

 

The engagement was initiated to support the development of the Becontree Retrofit Guide, an integral component of the broader Becontree Future House project by BeFirst (LB Barking and Dagenham). This overarching initiative addresses the critical challenges of climate resilience, housing suitability, and the quality of existing homes within the Becontree Estate, one of Europe’s largest, and most historically significant, social housing estates. The client and team recognised that successful retrofitting must stem from more than just technical solutions, and so our engagement aimed to delve deeply into the lived experiences of residents living within their 100 year old homes. The engagement was instrumental in creating a Retrofit Guide which reflects the collective voices of the community. By directly involving residents, we designed a user-friendly and comprehensible guide which meets the genuine needs of the community. Our focus was on assessing the home’s suitability for contemporary living, evaluating their environmental performance, and understanding their impact on residents lives. As an example, at the outset of the engagement workshops we didn’t ask the group “what is your biggest barrier to retrofit?”, instead we wanted to know about their homes and their lives, so we asked “what’s your experience of your home?”. Archio made large scale interactive models to record the conversation, and these insights were fundamental in shaping the final outputs. The models allowed people to easily communicate where in their homes they had concerns, such as thermal issues or overcrowding.

 

Who did you engage with and how? 

 

We launched a borough wide call-out to engage residents from all backgrounds. Our approach combined online platforms, including the One Borough One Voice network, the Be First website, and a diverse social media campaign tailored to different demographics. We also leveraged peer-to-peer promotion through local stakeholders and community organisations to ensure a broad and inclusive reach. Our call-out attracted 52 residents, all of whom completed a survey detailing their reasons for wanting to join the forum. From these responses, we shortlisted 25 participants who then engaged in friendly, informal phone calls with team members. The final group of 16 participants was carefully selected to ensure diversity in demographics, geography within the borough, and housing tenure. We developed a demographic benchmark by analysing borough-wide demographic and housing tenure data. This guided the selection process to ensure the group was reflective of the local community, in terms of tenure and which house type they lived in. Over a four-month period, we engaged with group through four workshops held on Saturday afternoons. Three workshops took place in a drop-in space within the local shopping centre, selected for its familiarity, accessibility, and high foot traffic. The final workshop occurred in an empty home, scheduled for retrofit, providing a tangible context where participants could visualise the culmination of their collective input. Participants received a £20 Amazon voucher for each workshop they attended. Transport was arranged for residents with mobility issues, and all physical workshops featured hot food and refreshments, creating a welcoming and inclusive environment.

 

How did the project and the community benefit from engagement? 

 

Archio built large scale interactive models of people’s homes, in order to make the conversations engaging, and enable the residents to really understand how to technically retrofit a home. Capacity building was a big emphasis of this process, and the residents were brilliant students! The engagement significantly reshaped our approach to the Becontree Retrofit project, allowing us to maintain a holistic understanding of residents lived experiences. By facilitating open communication about daily life in their homes, participants highlighted key issues, from carbon footprint reduction to increased thermal comfort. Our guide was then designed to cover retrofit solutions to these common concerns, and different price points. One of the most frequently raised concerns was the kitchens within these homes. The kitchens had originally been designed for the 1940s family unit, they were only suited for a single user (namely, the 1940s housewife). Given this, they were no longer fit for a modern family. This insight prompted a shift in project scope to consider extensions and adaptations alongside retrofit measures, ensuring solutions that genuinely reflect community needs.