Treasurer’s House

On Wednesday 15th March in the spring sunshine, people from a whole range of  organisations gathered at the stunning National Trust setting of Treasurer’s House in York. Members came from all over the region to Fit for the Future’s networking afternoon for the North to discuss and share ideas around the topic of heritage and what a success it was!

Delegates networking over lunch

The day began with a series informative and interesting case studies from our members in the region.

Firstly, a talk from Dr Mairi Davies from Historic Environment Scotland on the subject of Energy Efficiency and behaviour change at the Palace of Holyroodhouse. Mairi explained how an impressive 44% reduction in carbon emissions was achieved, using retrofitting, behaviour change and innovative technologies – including heat mats for staff on cold welcome desks!

Secondly, Denise Loten from the National Trust presented on the exciting topic of renewing the renewable technology at Gibson Mill. Delegates were intrigued by the 12 years of experience in renewable technologies that Gibson Mill has and finding out about future plans for renewing some of these technologies.

Finally, Nicholas Heath from STBA (Sustainable Traditional Buildings Alliance) spoke on the topic of responsible retrofit, a popular Network topic. The talk focused on the problems that can arise from inappropriate retrofitting of heritage and traditional buildings. In addition Nicholas provided some invaluable resources for our members so that they do not run in to the same problems.

Speed Networking session in the gardens

Following the presentations the Network ran a “Speed Networking” session outside in the sun to get all of the delegates briefly talking and sharing the problems and solutions that they were facing within their organisations. From this session members were then able to go back and have a more detailed conversation and solidify the links with members that they thought were most useful to them.

Off the back of the afternoon delegates were able to take away some of the connections they had made s with other members . No doubt the conversations, collaboration and knowledge sharing will continue…

Networking over refreshments

Jon Hall from Community Energy England commented “Great speakers and lots of opportunities to meet and connect with a motivated bunch”.

To find out more about this event or upcoming Fit for the Future networking opportunities, get in touch with the Network team .