The Built Environment, Buildings and Materials

Building the built environment

The built environment is everything people construct around them: the homes, workplaces, roads and services that make up towns and cities. A construction project follows a recognised cycle, the RIBA Plan of Work, which runs from the first strategic idea and brief, through the design stages, into construction, then handover and finally the building in use. Buildings come in many types, such as residential homes, commercial shops and offices, industrial factories, and agricultural farm buildings. Homes themselves take forms like terraced, semi-detached and detached houses, apartments and bungalows. They are made from materials chosen for their properties: timber for roofs and joinery, and concrete and steel for walls and frames. The industry itself covers building, civil engineering and building services. This module covers all of these.

Construction words

Learn these before you match anything, and keep the idea of the construction cycle in mind.

Building against civil engineering

The construction industry does two broad kinds of work, and it helps to tell them apart.

How to classify a project

Faced with a construction project, sort it with a few quick questions. What is it for, which tells you the building type, whether residential, commercial, industrial or agricultural. If it is a home, what form does it take, from terraced to detached to a block of flats. What is it built from, since materials are chosen for their properties. And which part of the industry does the work, building, civil engineering or building services. Name each of these and the project is clearly placed.

Match the building type to an example

Which dwelling form is this?

Two houses are built joined together along one shared side wall, each with its own front and back garden. Which form of domestic dwelling is this?

• Semi-detached houses.
• Terraced houses.
• Detached houses.
• Bungalows.

Materials in domestic buildings

Select the TWO materials genuinely used in domestic buildings and their correct use.

• Softwood timber for roof structure and joinery
• Concrete and steel for wall construction and frames
• Solid gold for the walls of ordinary homes
• No materials, since homes build themselves

RIBA stages remaining

The RIBA Plan of Work has 8 stages. On one project 5 stages have been completed. Subtract to find how many stages remain.

Order the construction cycle

Put these stages of the RIBA Plan of Work in order, earliest first.

• Preparation and brief
• Concept design
• Technical design
• Construction
• Handover and close out

Complete the facts

Everything people construct, such as homes and roads, is the built _____. The recognised stages a construction project moves through are the RIBA Plan of _____. A building where people live is a domestic _____. Building large infrastructure such as roads and bridges is called _____ engineering.

Match the material to its main use

Spot the true construction facts

Tap the TWO statements that are true about the built environment.

• The RIBA Plan of Work sets out the stages of a project
• Civil engineering builds roads, bridges and water supplies
• A detached house shares a wall with its neighbour
• Domestic buildings use no materials at all

Classify the project

Read each case and choose the best response, with a reason.

• A team is building a new motorway bridge over a river. Which part of the construction industry is this?
• An architect is choosing a material for the roof structure and internal joinery of a house. Which material best fits?
• A student lists a project stages in a jumbled order, starting with construction before any design. How should this be corrected?

Explain the built environment

A student is introducing the built environment for a construction project. Explain what it involves.

• Explain what the built environment means
• Describe the RIBA Plan of Work as the stages of a project
• Give two types of building and two forms of domestic dwelling
• Give two main materials and what each is used for
• Finish by explaining the difference between building and civil engineering