Calm in the corridor: FIEGER louvre windows at The Didsbury, East Ham
At The Didsbury in East Ham, London, the façade is not only part of the building’s architectural expression. It also supports an essential safety strategy for the shared spaces residents use every day. Designed by dRMM Architects for Populo Homes on behalf of Newham Council, The Didsbury provides 148 apartments across a mix of private rental homes and homes for the London Affordable Rent scheme. The development includes one-, two-, and three-bedroom apartments, with private outdoor spaces and communal gardens helping create a more open residential environment in the heart of East Ham. For a multi-storey residential project of this kind, the smoke ventilation strategy had to be carefully integrated into the architecture. To meet the combined requirements of Approved Document B and Approved Document K, Vent Engineering selected FIEGER louvre windows for the main stairs and lobbies – creating a façade-integrated solution for ventilation and smoke control.
Visit a reference projectNew homes with a civic purpose
The Didsbury forms part of Newham Council’s wider ambition to deliver more high-quality homes for local people. Completed in spring 2022, the development provides 77 private rental homes and 71 affordable homes, helping support the borough’s housing delivery programme. Populo Living describes the project as a collection of one-, two-, and three-bedroom homes in East Ham, most with a private terrace or balcony, communal spaces, and a location close to East Ham tube station.
The development is also part of a broader urban setting. It sits to the south of the former East Ham Town Hall Annexe, with the two buildings helping form a larger residential environment around shared external space. dRMM describes the Town Hall Annexe and The Didsbury Centre as working together to create a cohesive assembly of buildings in East Ham.
Architecturally, the project combines a calm residential scale with a distinctive exterior. The development comprises two six-storey new-build blocks, with brick and gold-toned cladding giving the façades a strong but warm character.
The need: smoke control without visual compromise
In multi-storey residential buildings, smoke ventilation is a critical part of the safety concept. Stairs and lobbies are key circulation and escape areas, so they must be supported by reliable systems that can help remove smoke and heat in an emergency. At The Didsbury, this requirement had to be solved without compromising the façade. The smoke ventilation openings needed to be technically robust, compliant, and practical to operate, while also sitting comfortably within the development’s architectural language. This made louvre window technology a natural fit. Instead of treating smoke ventilation as a separate technical layer, the FIEGER solution allowed the required openings to become part of the building envelope itself.
FIEGER FLW 32 SmoTec: integrated into stairs and lobbies
A total of 72 FIEGER FLW 32 SmoTec vents were installed across the façades to the main stairs and lobbies. A further 12 FIEGER FLW 32 vents were installed at the top level, with the louvres fixed closed to provide a complementary architectural feature.
This combination of operable and fixed louvres helped support both function and façade consistency. The active vents provide the smoke control and ventilation performance required for the building, while the fixed top-level units help maintain a coherent vertical expression across the elevations.
The vent framework was polyester powder coated in RAL 7016 Anthracite Grey, creating a deliberate contrast with the adjacent cladding. This gives the louvre zones a crisp visual definition while allowing them to remain integrated within the wider façade composition.
Motorised openings for emergency response
Each operable vent comprises double-glazed louvres using toughened and laminated glass. The vents provide a minimum geometric free area of 1.5 m², meeting the free-area requirement identified in the project material. The vents were fitted with 24V DC motorised actuators, programmed for anti-trapping and wired to the smoke control system installed by Vent Engineering. Bespoke control panels were used, with the system interfaced with the building’s smoke detectors. This enables the vents to respond as part of the building’s fire safety strategy. In an emergency, the motorised louvre windows can open to support smoke and heat extraction from the stairs and lobbies, helping maintain safer conditions in the shared circulation areas. At the same time, anti-trapping programming supports safe operation in everyday building use – an important detail in residential environments where shared spaces are used by residents, visitors, families, and maintenance teams.
Performance built into the façade
The Didsbury’s smoke ventilation solution also contributes to the performance of the building envelope. The FLW 32 SmoTec vents achieved typical overall U-values of 1.90 W/m²K. Combined with low air leakage to Class 4 under EN 12207, the vents provide an energy-efficient feature within the façade installation.
The FLW 32 vent is tested to EN 12101-2 for natural smoke vents. It is also tested to BS 6180:2011 for barrier loading, providing an additional safety feature that is especially relevant in multi-storey residential buildings.
These details are central to the success of the installation. The system does not only need to open when required. It must also support thermal performance, limit air leakage, withstand everyday exposure, and meet relevant safety expectations within a residential façade.
A discreet but important layer of residential safety
The Didsbury shows how smoke ventilation can be integrated into a residential building without dominating the architecture. The FIEGER louvre vents are clearly part of the façade, yet they are coordinated with the rhythm, colour palette, and vertical emphasis of the building. For residents, the benefits are mostly experienced indirectly – through safer shared circulation areas, a more resilient smoke control strategy, and a building envelope designed with both appearance and performance in mind. For the project team, the solution helped bring several requirements together: compliance with fire safety and guarding principles, façade integration, thermal performance, low air leakage, and reliable motorised operation.
Fresh air and safer routes home
The Didsbury is a strong example of how louvre window technology can support the practical demands of modern residential design.
By integrating FIEGER FLW 32 SmoTec vents into the façades to the main stairs and lobbies, the project combines smoke control, ventilation, barrier-load performance, and architectural consistency in one carefully considered solution. The additional fixed louvres at the top level reinforce the façade expression, showing that life safety elements can also contribute positively to the overall design.
In a development created to provide better homes for East Ham, that balance matters. The result is a residential building where safety is built into the everyday architecture – quietly, reliably, and with room for the façade to breathe.