About

Approach

We do this by designing with low-energy standards such as Passivhaus, by using natural materials, and by incorporating efficient building systems, helping to deliver year-round comfort and lower costs, bridging the performance gap and beyond. This helps lower the home's impact on the environment, while ensuring a high impact for its occupants.

Sparran are involved with various types of project, from the earliest stages of design and development, through planning application and building warrant stages, to construction and handover.

People

Sparran was established in 2025 by Robbie Bellshaw, Chartered Architectural Technologist and Certified Passivhaus Consultant, who has been working in architecture and building energy design since 2003.

Sparran acts primarily as a collaborator and is fortunate to be able to work with and call on additional architect and engineering expertise from other local built environment professionals.

Inspiration

The name Sparran is inspired by traditional Scottish houses and their sparran - the wooden components of the roof structure. Then, just as now, long-span timbers were a precious resource. The builders of the age developed methods to make the most of the scarce wood supply, often recycling the components of older buildings into new. There are echoes of clever design, resource efficiency, and an awareness of the environment we can still learn from today.

The National Trust for Scotland authentically reconstructed a 17th-century turf and creel house at Glencoe, showing how the sparran of the past can still inspire us now. You can read more about it here.