28/05/2026
A tiny handful of people from the UK were in the room.
That was the reality in 2007, when our co-founder Chris Herring travelled to his first International Passivhaus conference in Austria with his friend and colleague, Nick Grant, who later became Technical Director at the Passivhaus Trust.
At the time, Chris had been looking at Passivhaus as a possible next step for the business and its work around better buildings and climate change.
There had been a lot of debate in sustainable building circles, and among leading academics, about how far it was really sensible to go with insulation, airtightness and energy efficiency.
Chris and Nick went to find out more.
The conference was chaired by Helmut Krapmeier, then head the Vorarlberg Energy Institute, with around 1,000 delegates, but only a tiny handful from the UK.
What Chris and Nick saw convinced them that Passivhaus made sense as a practical standard built around better fundamentals.
Lower heat loss.
Better fabric.
Proper ventilation.
Careful detailing.
Buildings designed to perform properly over time.
Shortly after Chris' return, Geoff and Kate Tunstall approached the business about an eco-house they were planning. He proposed to them that anything less than a Passivhaus would be a wasted opportunity.
That project became the Denby Dale Passivhaus, one of the UK’s first Passivhaus homes and a major step in the early UK Passivhaus story.
Now, that thinking is being put into practice again.
Chris and fellow 21 Degrees founder Bill Butcher are part of a self-build group creating a modest Passivhaus terrace, designed around practical delivery, careful detailing and long-term comfort, incorporating much of what they have learnt since Denby Dale.
