Scotland' Housing Expo

Full planning consent has been granted for a total of 53 architect-designed homes to be showcased at the Housing Fair, which will take place in August 2009. The Housing Fair organisers intend to designate 40% of the homes built as affordable, comprising a mixture of rented and low-cost shared ownership. This is well above the usual Highland Council requirement for 25% of new developments to be affordable.

Highland Housing Fair coordinator, Fiona Porteous, said: “We are delighted with today’s announcement. Local people have been very supportive of the Fair and see it not only as important for Inverness but also for the wider Highlands, Scotland and the UK.

“The Highland Housing Fair will be a landmark event for Scotland. Nothing like this has ever been done in the UK before and the planning for the event is going really well. We are absolutely committed to achieve the goals of the Fair and make the event the success that it deserves to be.

“The Fair also represents a superb opportunity for businesses that promote sustainable services and products because its ethos is to make sustainability a standard element of all housing design in the future.

“We are currently planning for the next Highland Housing Fair which will take place in 2011. Our ambition is to hold these every two years in the Highlands. Each Housing Fair will be different, creative, exciting and will address different issues that are facing the changing housing sector. There is of course interest from elsewhere, but we aim to set the standard high and to keep pushing the boundaries of design and innovation.”

The Fair will be based on a successful model that is found throughout mainland Europe, particularly Finland. Its purpose is to showcase the very best in housing design and innovation, with sustainability being the key theme throughout.  Other important themes of the Fair will be design, innovation, affordability and energy efficiency.

The Fair is fully supported by a consortium of agencies, including the Scottish Government.

The architects and developers that will create homes on the site were selected via a competition launched in January 2007. Accredited by the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland, the competition invited architects and developers to compete for plots at the site. Subsequent Fairs will be held every two years in other locations in the Highlands.

The Highland Housing Fair will be held in Balvonie, on the outskirts of the City of Inverness, in August 2009. For further information, please visit http://www.highlandhousingfair.co.uk

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For media information, please contract Lisa Mennie or Pauline Gregory at IAS SMARTS on 0141 222 2040