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Our Team

The people behind
...as architecture

Core team
Andy Sutton
RIBA
Strategic Lead
Sero Co-Founder & CIO, 2019–present BRE Associate Director, 2009–2019 Gaunt Francis Architects Associate, 1998–2009

Andy is a RIBA Chartered Architect with nearly 30 years of experience at the intersection of architecture, sustainability, and housing policy. His career has always centred on one question: how do we make homes genuinely healthier, more affordable, and net zero in use — at a scale that actually matters?

That question has taken him from architectural practice and off-grid new builds, through a decade of national research and innovation programmes at BRE, to co-founding Sero — a Cardiff-based B-Corp now widely recognised as one of the UK’s leading net zero housing businesses. Along the way he has conceived and led programmes that have shaped Welsh Government policy, mobilised hundreds of millions in public investment, and helped reframe how the housing sector thinks about energy performance and mortgage affordability.

Alongside technical depth, Andy brings a systems-thinking approach rooted in architectural discipline: an ability to hold detail and whole together, to connect design, policy, finance and lived experience, and to build the evidence base that makes ambitious ideas deliverable.

Wider roles & affiliations

  • Co-Chair, Association of Retrofit Consultants (2026–present)
  • Advisory Board Member, Chartered Institute of Housing Cymru (2026–present)
  • Independent Sustainability Advisor, Welsh Government Place Division (2024–present)
  • Committee Member, Building Regulations Working Group Wales (2022–present)
  • President & other roles, Royal Society of Architects in Wales (2007–present)
Past roles
  • Bid Convener & Core Team, Wales Zero Carbon Hwb (2022–2024)
  • Committee Member, Welsh Government Decarbonisation Advisory Group & DIG (2017–2024)
  • Independent Advisor, Welsh Government Innovative Housing & Optimised Retrofit Programmes (2015–2018)
  • Council Member, Royal Institute of British Architects (2011–2013)

Selected projects

  • Cosmeston Farm Real Net Zero — 576 homes, the UK’s largest independently verified net zero housing development (Sero, 2025)
  • Optimised Retrofit Collaboration — conceived and led a 28-landlord Welsh programme delivering research, pilots and retrofit at scale (Sero, 2020–2024)
  • FLATLINE — feasibility study demonstrating 64% fuel bill reduction and domestic demand side response through renewables, storage and smart controls (BRE/Sero, 2020)
Further projects
  • Pathways to Zero — developed the step-based net zero transition framework now reflected in Welsh Housing Quality Standards 2023
  • HomeWorks — digitally-led collaborative platform to scale retrofit and supply chain skills (BRE, 2018–2019)
  • Maes-yr-Onn — RTPI Wales award-winning off-grid new build farmhouse (Gaunt Francis / BRE, 2012–2015)
  • LENDERS — conceived and delivered a cross-sector collaboration revising the home mortgage calculation to reflect energy performance; methodology adopted by Development Bank for Wales (BRE, 2011–2016)
  • Barratt Green House — national competition-winning Code for Sustainable Homes Level 6 “true zero carbon” prototype (Gaunt Francis, 2007–2009)

Qualifications: RIBA Chartered Architect · Post-Graduate Diploma in Architecture · BArch, Welsh School of Architecture (1998) · BSc Architecture (1996)

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