About us
We are a small, multidisciplinary design practice with a focus on sustainability and community through research and design. The practice has worked in AONBs, and urban contexts to Passivhaus standards with great emphasis on high-quality design. The practice runs a community arts project, ‘The Giant Dolls’ House Project’ that engages participants in thinking about their immediate environment.
We work closely with our clients to understand their brief, priorities, timescales and the demands of the site – environmental and planning. We have experience with different complexities of planning, including a planning application in a conservation area of AONB. Because we are a small practice each client receives expert advice, care and insight from a senior architect.
Process
Our approach to a new project involves different stages, starting with determining what level of service is required and organising a fee proposal. After this initial meeting an appraisal is taken encompassing the needs of the occupants, so that layouts can be flexible for now and in the future. We then produce sketches, adopting a creative, flexible approach so that we can ensure we are all in agreement, before creating documents for planning.
Experience
We have a breadth of experience, particularly with the residential market. Catja de Haas has a Phd in research into the Home and Housing and teaches architecture at Bournemouth University. The teaching process enables the practice to be current with methods, insights and technologies required for good architecture. The practice is BIM ready. Alongside this academic experience, is her personal experience of understanding what it requires to make a successful home – her own home featured in The Times Magazine – more information on this link. She is well-travelled and has undertaken projects in a number of countries, as well as bringing up a family, working from home and being a carer for a family member. She brings these life experiences into each project whilst respecting that we are all individuals with our own idiosyncrasies.
Environment
We have a good knowledge of sustainability and can build to Fabric First or Passivhaus standards. We like to use local materials when possible and this love and understanding of materials is evident in our buildings. Although every client is different and each site has it’s own requirements, we are always sensitive to the landscape and a sense of place, as well as understanding light, space and form. We like the places we design to have blurred boundaries with the outside, so that there is a relationship between inside and outside. Our aim is to bring all these areas together to create something personal and beautiful for our clients.
Contact
For an initial consultation contact us by telephone
+44 7803627426 or email.
Collaborators
Stephen Foster — Foster Structures
Antonio Moll — Moll Architects
Catja de Haas
Founding Director
Catja, PhD, RIBA, qualified as an architect at Delft University under Professor Herzberger. She also holds an MA in housing and Urbanism from the Architectural Association in London. Prior to setting up on her own, she worked for Itsuko Hasegawa in Tokyo where she worked on projects in Japan and Malaysia, and Alsop Architects in London where she worked as a project architect on the firm's Dutch projects. Between 2000 and 2005 she ran a practice, Studio CS, with Sabina Riss. In that time she built the house in France.
The home in miniature was the topic for her PhD by architectural design (supervisors Prof Jonathan Hill and Christine Hawley) which she finished at Bartlett school of Architecture, UCL, in 2013.
The practice researches the home and housing while raising awareness of homelessness and the refugee crisis through The Giant Dolls’ house Project. The project is the result of her ongoing research into the use of imagination and miniature to explore the ideas of home, sustainability and community participation as well as the dolls’ house as a medium to bring about change. Catja has exhibited her own work and has presented her work at conferences and universities. She has been a visiting lecturer and crit at various universities.
Manuel Oganian Ojeda
Part 1 Assistant
Manuel joined Catja de Haas Architects as a Part 1 Assistant in early 2022 after graduating from the Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at the University of Edinburgh. He has become a master at Revit and a great addition to the team. Prior to working at CDH he co-led the refurbishment of an apartment in Athens as part of his semester in industry. He has also spent summer placements gaining experience at David Chipperfield Architects in London and Planning Systems Services Ltd. in Nairobi. Manuel grew up in Kenya and speaks Spanish and Russian fluently, in his spare time he enjoys film photography, sketching, and Jazz music.
Mariia Rusanova
Architectural Designer
Mariia is a Ukrainian architect and researcher with 5+ years of industry and teaching experience. She has worked on luxury residential projects, residential developments, commercial projects, and furniture design in Ukraine and abroad.
Mariia received her Bachelor's and Master's degrees in architecture and urbanism from KhNUCEA, Ukraine. She is currently writing her PhD on the preservation and popularization of the largest Avant-garde architecture heritage site in Kharkiv. She is the author of dozens of articles and theses and a participant of All-Ukrainian research projects.
Working on new projects, Mariia draws on her extensive academic and practical knowledge.
Mariia joined Catja de Haas Architects in 2022. Since her arrival, she has collaborated with Catja de Haas Architects to organize an exhibition as part of the London Festival of Architecture to showcase her students' works ‘Houses of refuge’.
Rusty
Office manager
Rusty joined us in June 2022 with a wealth of experience in uplifting spirits and nibbling office furniture. He joins us as office manager with the enviable tasks of napping and long walks in the park.