Date: Friday, 22 May 2026. 10am – 11.30am

Where: Online

Cost: Free

Description: Join us for this introductory webinar exploring building control and regulations in the context of adaptive reuse and retrofit. Covering the Building Safety and Fire Safety Acts and recent regulatory changes, this session will also draw on case studies exploring considerations and potential risks, before closing with a forward-looking discussion on managing retrofit and adaptive reuse for traditional and historic buildings within today’s evolving regulatory landscape.

About the Speakers:

Anthony Gwynne has over 34 years’ experience in local authority building control, working as a surveyor, team leader, and manager. A Chartered Building Surveyor for more than 30 years and a fire engineer for over 20, he earned a master’s with distinction in Sustainable Building Conservation from Cardiff University in 2020. Anthony has worked with a broad range of buildings—including residential, commercial, industrial, historic, and non-standard constructions such as straw bale houses. He is registered with the Building Safety Regulator as a Class 3 Specialist in non-standard construction and a Class 4 Technical Manager.

His career began in conservation with Cadw and English Heritage, and he continues to specialise in traditional buildings. He has authored a textbook on Building Regulations and is writing a second for Wiley Blackwell. He carries out interviews for registration of building inspectors with the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) and contributes technical articles for national publications.

Anthony also serves on the IHBC’s technical panel and is co-authoring the Code of Practice for BS7913: the Guide to the Conservation of Historic Buildings.

Professor John Edwards, formerly of Cadw and English Heritage, is both a practitioner as a Director of Edwards Hart Consultants and an educator that delivers training courses across the UK, Ireland and mainland Europe.  His specialisms include climate change, retrofit, building pathology and building conservation, in which he is certified and accredited.

John sits on the BSI’s Retrofit Standards Task Group and Cultural Heritage Committee and has authored and co-authored many publications, reports, training schemes and qualifications including guidance and standards. For example, leading on the development of BS 7913: 2013 and co-authoring the latest BSI standards on retrofit which includes the forthcoming new British Standard on retrofit assessment. He is also a Professor in Practice at University in Wales Trinity St.

Professor Edwards also delivers a 2-day course on energy efficiency and retrofit of traditional buildings that achieves the only recognised qualification in the subject, and a 1-day course on the new Joint Position Statement on dealing with moisture in traditional buildings.