A CUMBRIAN Community Interest Company is hoping to ease pressure on the planet and housing in the county and beyond using a new type of building made of plywood. Digital Woodoo was founded in 2020 by directors James Robinson and his dad Steve, who were previously both on the board of Community Land Trust (CLT), Homes For Ulverston.

Both James and Steve come from an engineering background, with Steve working in the oil and gas sector and James as a technical designer in the marine industry.

“We started looking into how the Community Land Trust could deliver affordable homes and we came across this technology called WikiHouse, which is an affordable, sustainable, net-zero, open source, modern build method,” says James

“We realised early on that we could make more impact by doing it as a separate entity. So we left the CLT and set up Digital Woodoo as a Community Interest Company.

“We’ve now developed a line of products which has everything from small garden rooms, to community buildings and then homes, with the aim to help people around Cumbria to build their own affordable homes and community spaces.”

WikiHouse is a system developed by Open Systems Lab in which structural frames are made from precisely cut sheets of plywood that lock together to form structural building blocks.

The walls, roof and floor of the buildings are all designed with CAD software and then cut out of plywood with a digital CNC machine.

The blocks are then connected using wooden “bow ties” which lock the separate blocks together, without the use of nails, screws or adhesives.
The central space in each block is filled with insulation to deliver high levels of energy efficiency.

“The insulation and energy efficiency of the building is far in excess of usual standards,” says director Nicola MacPhail.

“The air tightness is incredibly good in the building so air leaks and heat loss are considerably lower. Using CNC manufacture means the blocks have very precisely engineered surfaces that butt up against each other to form a flush surface.”

Let alone being carbon neutral, the structures can actually be carbon negative as they are made from wood which has already absorbed carbon from the atmosphere.

The wood which Digital Woodoo uses is currently imported from Scandinavia – as there are no UK producers of plywood, although they hope this will change in the future.

“The system has been designed so that anybody can put the buildings together. We’ve run workshops with people who have literally never held a hammer in their life,” says James.

“It’s a great way to get people together to build community. That sense of engagement and ownership in building something yourself is something that we don’t really have anywhere else in any other build methodology.”

The structures can also be erected without the need for heavy machinery or cranes, meaning it is possible to build on land which may not be feasible for other types of development.

They can be put in place on a variety of different types of ground structures, with the utilities already in place.

Although the buildings can be designed entirely from scratch to create something completely bespoke, Digital Woodoo offers a range of modular designs which act as starting points then people configure these to meet their own specific needs.

“That’s opening up conversations that we’re having with quite a lot of people in Cumbria and further afield,” says Nicola.

“A lot of people usually want to tweak that in some way to customise it for their individual needs. If you want a slightly bigger bedroom, for example, we can add a couple of extra sections. We felt that in order to make it accessible to more people we could create these versatile designs to act as a starting point for that discussion.”

So far the company has built a number of garden rooms, studios and cabins, as well as a house extension. Potential projects in the pipeline include building staff accommodation for the Lake District’s hospitality sector, affordable social housing, house extensions, buildings for community groups and a number of self build projects.

“We’re a Community Interest Company for a reason because we’re predominantly looking at that affordable housing issue in rural Cumbria and seeing how we can be a facilitator to that,” says Nicola.

“One of the benefits of WikiHouse is lowering that skill level required to be able to build it because a lot of the technical elements are engineered into the frame design, meaning the frame can be assembled incredibly quickly and that reduces the labour cost related to the build.”

Currently the business - which employs four people - is based in a small unit in Ulverston town centre, although it is looking to move to larger premises soon to accommodate the size and scope of the buildings being manufactured.

Ultimately its aim is to help people overcome some of the housing dilemmas they face, whether it is through providing structures such as garden rooms which can be used as offices to help them work more effectively from home or building new homes which are cheaper overall, more energy efficient and adaptable to a wide range of situations.

Nicola says although the upfront cost of building a WikiHouse may be comparable to a bricks and mortar house of the same size, it potentially offers much better value overall in terms of lower bills through increased energy efficiency and the speed and ease of the build process.

“We’ve looked at the issue from lots of different angles and how we can help in terms of providing homes but there are multiple co-benefits related to this build methodology in terms of modular self-build structures and easily built structures that are sustainable, net zero and energy efficient,” says Nicola.

“Our aim is to provide a solution to those who want to build sustainable and energy efficient homes and buildings, engaging people in the build process and helping them solve their own local housing issue.”