Vista

Location

Peterborough

Main contractor

Morris Homes

Products

Stonepanel Stone Cladding

Overview

The site off London Road in Peterborough is the country’s largest zero carbon housing development.

The quality of the 300-house build has netted a host of accolades for the developer and site manager, including winning the Best Low or Zero Carbon Initiative at the 2013 Housebuilder Awards.

Morris Homes chose Taylor Maxwell’s Stonepanel™ natural stone cladding to put the finishing touches to the 80 homes in the rural phase of the Vista development.

The choice turned out to be an inspired one, as site manager Gary Davies explained; “The fixing of the stone cladding worked out brilliantly and looks fantastic, the elevations make it look extra special. “If you look at the houses, the stonework looks like it has been done by a stonemason even though it is effectively just jigsaw pieces of Stonepanel™, the bricklayers did a really good job of it.”

Taylor Maxwell’s role in Vista was slightly different to our usual Research/Guide/Provide process, as a representative from Taylor Maxwell explains: “Taylor Maxwell take a customer’s vision on board and provide a full solution for it. We provide stone samples, on-site training and assisted with the design and calculation of quantities to assist the onsite construction team.

“So at project Vista, while Stonepanel™ has a large range of colours and sizes available, we worked with Morris Homes and the bricklayers to find a solution whereby only seven component parts were needed to help them build their full design.”

Gary Davies - whose numerous, regional and national NHBC Pride in the Job awards, show him to be a well qualified and experienced judge - agreed that it was not just the product but also the support provided by Taylor Maxwell that helped to make the project a great success; “The service from Taylor Maxwell was really good. Their support team in Edinburgh were brilliant at letting us know about up to date information on deliveries and providing us crates of anything that we were short of.” he said.

“

The fixing of the stone cladding worked out brilliantly and looks fantastic, the elevations make it look extra special

”

Gary Davies
Morris Homes

“You allow a little bit for waste for different angles and certain parts of the build, it is very difficult to estimate the quantities you need but generally they were spot on. Taylor Maxwell came down and did a test panel onsite, and went through how to fix the panels and it all worked really well.”

Importantly it is not just the project partners and judging panels who like the Stonepanel™ finished houses at Vista: buyers are taken with them too. In fact they’re going so fast Morris Homes are building 20 more homes in the style of the rural phase off-plan to satisfy demand.

“We’re selling like mad.” Gary Davies explained. “On a brownfield site we’ve managed to make a very nice village near the town centre but the houses look like they could be in Derbyshire, you don’t see these elevations in many places. We’ve really enhanced the area."