Innovation in Commercial Retrofit: A Live Project Demonstrator
UK Green Building Council
The project
Produced by the UK Green Building Council, Innovation in Commercial Retrofit: A Live Project Demonstrator explores how sustainable technologies and processes can be considered earlier and more systematically during commercial retrofit projects. Intended primarily for building owners, developers, architects, engineers and wider project teams, the report introduces UKGBC’s Commercial Retrofit Innovation Map and a repeatable process for applying it during the early RIBA stages. It illustrates this approach through the refurbishment of the Grade II* listed No.1 Poultry building in London.
The report uses a structured editorial design to organise a technically complex subject. It combines bold condensed headings, clear typographic hierarchy and modular multi-column layouts with architectural photography, numbered processes, stakeholder diagrams and illustrated data visualisations. A branching, network-like visual language is used throughout to represent the Innovation Map, including diagrams showing the relationships between domains, systems, categories, interventions and individual innovators. Solution profiles later in the report use a consistent case-study format to compare each technology’s purpose, impact, costs and project context.
The report demonstrates how the Innovation Map was tested by more than 50 professionals on a live retrofit project, helping its team identify and assess solutions across energy, water, materials and building systems. The resulting map contains three domains, 46 categories, 162 interventions and more than 530 innovators. Selected applications at No.1 Poultry include the reuse of 219 light fittings, each avoiding an estimated 40.6 kgCO₂e compared with a new equivalent, alongside shower technology anticipated to reduce hot-water, energy and carbon consumption by 55% per shower. The project is intended to build practical evidence, reduce the perceived risks associated with innovation and inform UKGBC’s future engagement with industry, government and local authorities.
The digital tool
Festoon Studios designed and developed the Commercial Retrofit Innovation Map for and in collaboration with UKGBC using D3.js. The interactive tool translates a large and complex dataset into a clear, navigable visual system, allowing users to move between domains, systems, clusters, intervention points and individual solutions. Its visual language was developed prior to the report.
