Ashley House plc is now the majority partner of joint venture business, F1 Modular Limited (F1M), based in Newtown in Powys.    

F1M designs and constructs community buildings such as housing, student accommodation, fire stations, school classrooms, leisure facilities and hotels, as well as retail units and kiosks. 

A primary purpose of F1M is to provide significant levels of affordable housing to the public sector, through agreements with Local Authorities and Registered Providers to meet housing shortages. F1M is the only modular contractor to hold a place on Local Government’s LHC National Framework NH1 for housing

 The synergies with Ashley House are compelling. For the last few years Ashley House has diversified its business, expanding its proposition from primary healthcare and GP surgeries, to encapsulate this knowledge into supported living environments through Extra Care and other complementary sub-sectors, such as care/dementia homes and community centres. Utilising off-site construction through the F1M business, Ashley House’s scope of delivery activity can be further widened. Providing an integrated and accelerated delivery approach, involving a modular solution, was a key factor in Ashley House’s recent bid win in York of a 70-bedroom Care Home.

Much of Ashley House’s existing pipeline is capable of being built through modular methodologies, and in the future Ashley House will offer its clients the choice of off-site and traditional build methods for its schemes.

The Product Offering

F1M provides a full turnkey solution to its clients. Each project is uniquely designed and meets clients’ technical specifications, optimising the use of light-weight steel and timber fabrication. Buildings are delivered to site volumetrically benefitting from industry quality and environmental standards (ISO9001, ISO14001) including options to achieve BREEAM Excellent and EPC ratings of A+. All products meet or exceed 2016 Building Regulations and come with a choice of recognised construction warranties. Housing products are fully mortgageable, approved by the Council of Mortgage Lenders.

A typical house is a ‘two up two down’ set up consisting of two modules (one for each floor). Each house or flat leaves the factory fully finished internally with factory fitted external finishes available as an option. Internally the modules are delivered with all electrics and plumbing completed and tested, wall, floor and ceiling finishes, lighting, heating, internal and external doors, windows, kitchens and bathrooms installed ready for occupation and built to client specification. In line with Ashley House’s environmental impact targets, homes are designed to be high quality and to minimise maintenance and ongoing costs for residents by including energy efficient technology and materials. The houses achieve Building Regulations 2015 L1A Elemental values as standard and Zero Carbon and Scottish Gold Standards as an option.

F1M’s factory capacity is currently running at 250 modules per annum, with one shift and one line per day. Given the expanding pipeline, capacity and efficiency is expected to be increased by creating more production lines, by increasing the number of daily shifts and ultimately creating new regional assembly factories gearing up in line with orders over time.