Advice for Self-Builders
– Video Series with Piers Taylor

In this series of videos presented by experienced architect, Piers Taylor, he shares his tips for self-builders and advises on some of the pitfalls to avoid and areas to consider when building your own home.

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Piers Taylor is a renowned award-winning architect and broadcaster. He is involved in numerous topical architectural issues and regularly contributes to architectural publications including the Architects’ Journal.

Piers co-presented the BBC Two show ‘The World’s Most Extraordinary Homes’ with Caroline Quentin as well as ‘The House that £100k Built’, a show dedicated to helping self-builders get the most from their budgets, alongside architectural journalist Kieran Long. He also presented BBC Two’s ‘Britain’s Most Spectacular Backyard Builds’, a show with Sara Cox, which challenged builders on a tight budget.

No stranger to building himself, Piers built ‘Moonshine’ a self-built home for him and his family to live in. He is known for his non-typical take on architecture and ‘thinking outside of the box’, working outside of conventional architectural practices to create unique builds. His built work, including ‘Moonshine’ has been widely published internationally.

Piers also has his own architectural practice – Invisible Studio Architects, which works both nationally and internationally to help larger scale builders realise their dreams using innovative, often ecologically sensitive, approaches. Within this practice he has worked on self-builders, schools and public buildings.

In 2017, Piers was awarded an anniversary scholarship to complete his PhD at the University of Reading, where he also leads workshops at the School of Architecture. In this series of videos, Piers talks about the pitfalls and considerations when embarking on your self-build project, the environment and sustainability, design elements to consider, and site management of your project.