Climate Resilient Design

Resilient Design Advisory

Designing Resilient, Efficient and Regenerative Places

Pangolin provides independent, engineering-led advice that helps buildings, infrastructure, public realm and urban developments perform better today and stay fit for purpose in a changing climate.  

We work alongside developers, planners, architects and engineers to assess climate risk early and integrate adaptation, resource efficiency and nature into the design process, designing out risk from the start rather than retrofitting later.

What Is Resilient Design?

Ecologically Sustainable Design (ESD) asks how to reduce the impact of a development on nature (particularly emissions), while enabling socio-economic growth. Resilient Design moves beyond this, looking to increase the number of relationships or connections within a system so that functionality can be maintained even under extreme stressors where some of those connections break. 

Taking inspiration from nature, which is inherently resilient, and promoting nature-based responses and energy independence wherever possible, we consider how the parts of a development interrelate, including built assets, natural assets, and the people who use it, and how it can continue working under extreme conditions, such as those caused by climate change. 

For new developments, the aim is to embed sustainability and resilience in the design strategy rather than treating them as a box-ticking exercise after designs are locked. For existing assets and developments, we want to find the most cost-effective way of protecting value over time.

How We Can Help

Integral Design

Understanding a development as part of a wider socio-economic and socio-ecological system can lead to lower upfront and ongoing costs, improved resilience and higher perceived value. We provide independent advice and review throughout the design process.

Climate Risk and Vulnerability Assessments

Identifying physical climate risks early, including through workshops with project teams, allows them to be mitigated through design, if not designed out altogether.

Nature & Biodiversity

Identifying opportunities for biodiversity enhancement, nature-based solutions and regenerative outcomes that improve resilience and complement design.

Adaptation Planning

Advising on practical actions to reduce climate risks for new and existing assets, and identifying the thresholds that should trigger investment.

Climate Adaptation and Future-Proofing

Buildings and infrastructure designed today will face more extreme conditions over their lives than we see now. We help project teams understand what those changing conditions could mean for an asset and translate climate risk into practical design and adaptation decisions.

This can cover exposure to heat, flooding, extreme rainfall, drought and other physical climate risks, alongside opportunities to improve passive performance, water management, biodiversity and wider urban resilience. A resilient building also needs to stay comfortable when things go wrong, such as during a heatwave or power outage, which makes passive design a core consideration.

Rather than only asking whether a project meets today's requirements, we help clients test whether it will remain suitable, resilient and valuable in 2050 and beyond.

Who We Work With

Our resilient design advisory supports:

• Property companies and developers

• Urban planners, architects and design teams

• Infrastructure owners and operators

• Government and public-sector organisations

• Asset and portfolio managers

We can support on projects ranging in size from individual buildings to complex urban programmes. The result is actionable advice focused not only on meeting today's requirements, but on creating assets and places that are efficient, resilient, regenerative and fit for the future.