ReBuilders

A six month learning programme for construction SME’s based in the West Midlands to explore shifts towards regenerative building practices. The programme is a co-hosted by Dark Matter Labs, CIVIC SQUARE, Material Cultures and Fircroft College, and funded by Innovate UK.

ReBuilders was a series of learning journeys produced in collaboration between Neighbourhood Futures at Dark Matter Labs, CIVIC SQUARE, Material Cultures, and Fircroft College, taking place between 2024 and 2026. The programme brought a vision of regenerative practice that goes beyond what’s deemed green, sustainable or restorative, to do not only less bad but to do more good across whole systems, into direct contact with the realities of construction practice in the West Midlands.

The programme’s first round, running from September 2024, brought together ten construction business leaders for site visits to leading-edge regenerative buildings across England and Wales, hands-on sessions with natural building materials, and collective thinking about organisational design. The second round widened the cohort and sharpened the focus: around twenty practitioners from across the retrofit ecosystem — builders, engineers, community energy specialists, design students, and DIY retrofit leaders — explored routes to regenerative retrofit through hands-on building demonstrations on a real Victorian terrace in Ladywood, learning visits to WeCanMake in Bristol and community land trusts in Liverpool, and organisational development work led by Dark Matter Labs.

ReBuilders reflects an ambition to reimagine what conventional green skills or construction skills training looks like.. Rather than treating retrofit as a pipeline of technical competencies to be matched to a future growth market, ReBuilders asks what it would mean to genuinely reimagine how we build, who builds, and what building is for — using skills training as a gateway to that bigger question, and construction practice as a vehicle for neighbourhood-scale regeneration.