GoodGeist
A podcast on sustainability, hosted by Damla Özlüer and Steve Connor, brought to you by the DNS Network. Looking at sustainability issues, communications, and featuring global guests from a wide variety of sectors such as business, NGOs and government.
GoodGeist
Property Innovation, Sustainability & Design, with Kunle Barker
In this episode we chat with broadcaster and property expert Kunle Barker to unpack a practical, hopeful blueprint for net zero in the real world. From the state of decarbonisation to the retrofit reality, Kunle explains why we won’t build our way to 2050 targets and how policy, funding, and design can unlock action at scale.
We explore the power of “carbon budgets” for everyday life—clear, kilo-by-kilo guidance that helps people choose high-impact steps without the guilt spiral. Then we zoom out to neighbourhood scale with “zero-bill streets,” where fabric-first upgrades, rooftop solar, and shared systems bring costs down and comfort up when delivered across entire terraces.
Then nature takes centre stage as infrastructure, not ornament. Kunle shares how nature-based solutions cool overheated streets, manage stormwater, improve mental health, and even lift property values. We talk biophilic design plus CyanLines—a bold plan to connect Manchester’s green and blue assets into a citywide network you can actually walk.
If you care about sustainable cities, healthier homes, and practical climate action, this conversation will give you ideas you can use today—from personal carbon choices to street-by-street transformation.
Follow GoodGeist for more episodes on sustainability, communications and how creativity can help make the world a better place.
Goodgeist. A podcast series on sustainability. Hosted by Damla Eusler and Steve Connor. Brought to you by the DNS Network.
SPEAKER_03:Hello, hello everyone. You are listening to Good Guys, the message on sustainability, which is brought to you by the DNS Network, the global network of agencies dedicated to making the world a better place. This is Damlo from Mina Agency Istanbul, and this is Steve from Creative Concern in Manchester.
SPEAKER_01:This podcast series explores global sustainability issues, how they're communicated, and what creativity can do to make positive change happen.
SPEAKER_03:So in this episode, we're going to talk to Kunle Barker, a property guru and a broadcaster in the UK who is passionate about design, innovation, and sustainability. Kunley has appeared on ITV and Channel 4 in the UK, including as a presenter on Project Hall, which I love by the way.
SPEAKER_01:That's cool, man. Well, uh Kunley's broadcasting has been a showcase, I would say, of his passion for enhancing the aesthetic, functional, and environmental aspects of all sorts of living spaces. And you've consulted Kunley with government and industry on housing, sustainability, urban development. And it's worth saying, we'll give it a shameless plug. You and I were both at the launch of a major new environmental project called Cyan Lines last week. So Kunle, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to Tamara and myself.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you for inviting me. It's a real pleasure to be on this podcast. I'm a big fan, so it's uh it's brilliant.
SPEAKER_03:So the fandom part is mutual. Kunle, you have this amazing career, career, and you kicked off at university in Leeds. But does the story start there or earlier? What led you to be a leading practitioner, not just in property, but on sustainability too? Because I thought property was all about Ferraris and whatever.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, well, I started. I mean, I bought my first house as a student, and what you call now an HMO. I didn't know that at the time. Just called it a student house in Leeds and did it up. And I think, you know, when I think back on it, sustainability in a way was a seen even in that renovation. I had to do all the work myself. I didn't have a huge budget, so it was a lot of reuse and a lot of making the best of what we already had rather than you know ripping things out and starting again.
SPEAKER_01:Wow. Kenley, we're gonna have to have a side chat about renovation because we're on we're on house number three of renovation, and I've burned through a lot of power tools, let's just put it that way. Exactly. So tell Lisbon, let's let's start. We've got a number of different things that we want to chat about, but I think we should start on climate. It's a subject that we cover on the podcast all the time, can't I? And you were announced as the Unlock Net Zero Ambassador in 2023, and you've spoken a lot and and and and talked a lot about climate change and and the built environment in particular. So what's your what's your take, your assessment of the current state of decarbonisation for the built environment in particular, and and are we anywhere near being on track?
SPEAKER_02:Interestingly, are we anywhere near being on track? I mean, look, we've seen carbon emissions reducing since 2014, I think, quite quite a lot. And as everybody knows, there was a huge reduction over COVID for obvious reasons. We're on an interesting track. I don't think I think we need to do more. I think the government needs to do more to help us. I mean, I think it doesn't help that now with construction, with building, with creating the build environment, there's so many other pressures at the moment. There's so many other obstacles and issues to overcome. That there is a slight worry in my mind that sustainability and decarbonization, the net zero, is slipping down the priority list a bit. And I think that needs to just be readdressed by not just the government, but the industry as a whole.
SPEAKER_03:Talking about readdressing something, your life's work has been creating amazing home transformations, and very beautifully, I must say so. What's clear if you look at where our biggest challenges are for carbon emissions, it's retrofitting existing buildings that stands out, and yet low-carbon retrofit isn't just happening enough. So, what's going on? What's going wrong?
SPEAKER_02:You're absolutely right. You know, 80% of the buildings that exist now would exist in in 2050. So we're not going to build our way to net zero. The biggest challenge that we've got to face is retrofitting, and there needs to be effectively a government-led campaign to help mainly the people that have that stock, the housing stock. So that's your housing associations, local authorities, organizations like that that own lots of property, they need to understand what it is they need to do because the problem with decarbonisation, particularly when it comes to retrofitting, is it feels so complicated. It's so complex. You don't know where to start. Yeah. Should you be thinking about embodied carbon? Should you be thinking about operational carbon? Should you be thinking about you know what happens if you build new properties? You know, what should you do with your budget? Should you use that budget to to retrofit or should you build new carbon zero or carbon negative properties? And I think the government needs to put something together which helps people, guides them, shows them what they can do with the housing stock they've got and also with the budgets that they have. Because one of the big things that we've got to try and understand is that what we don't want to do is disincentivize people, that's either organizations or individuals, in doing something. Because every c every kilo of carbon that we say does help. And if we make it this huge complex metric, which is expensive, people say, Well, I can't meet that, so I'll just forget about it. And it's like, no, that's not the deal. You've just got to work out what you can do and do that. But they need help. People need help, they need guidance.
SPEAKER_01:And what just coming on that, I want to go that I want to address that, but also go back to your previous comments around you know, sustainability and climate and net zero sort of slipping down the priority scale a little bit and how we need to shove it back up a little bit. And you know, you're a broadcaster, you're on the telly box, people know your face, must stop you in the street. And do we need, I think, if you think about when we were going into COVID and climate was right at the top of the agenda, there were the school strikes, and Greta was berating everybody in the world to do better. Do you think would as well as governments getting on board and keeping business on track, we really need to inspire people in this space, don't we? And and reach out to the kind of big audiences that you reach. So, what would be your sort of recipe, if you like, for getting the world back in touch with how important this is?
SPEAKER_02:So we need to attack it on all the different levels. So the first thing is the individuals, you know, what can we do? What can I do as an individual, Steve? What can I what can you do as an individual? Right. And it struck me that carbon is, you know, reduction of carbon is in all of our hands, but we don't really know what to do. And I I likened it to almost like you're trying to go on a diet, but not understanding which foods cost uh or had the most calories. So it's come to like I mean, we've got no idea. People say things, oh, I'm not, I'm not going on holiday because of the carbon footprint. But then you say to them, well, but what should your carbon footprint print? What is your carbon footprint? What should it be if you want to help us get the country to get net zero? And nobody really knows these things. And I was, you know, doing something for a local council in London called Kilo by Kilo. And it was this idea that we would help people understand how to save even little bits of carbon by what does it mean if you go zero waste? What does it mean if you change your light goals? What if it means if you use your heating in a different way? And giving them a kind of carbon budget almost individually to say this is your carbon budget for the year. And if you do these things, you'll hit that. And if you do these things, you'll be below that. And it's almost like this idea that, you know, that's your carbon budget, that's where you need to be to help us get to net zero. And if you do better than that, you're helping people recon. And it just demystified the whole, you know, that the whole thing.
SPEAKER_01:Killay, you're basically painting a bit of a picture of Weight Watchers, but for climate.
SPEAKER_02:Exactly. That's exactly how I put it. That's exactly how I put it to something. I said, look, you know, imagine you know, you're trying to lose weight and then you were presented with a food of table, a table of food, and you had no idea whether a donut or a carrot had more calories. And how could you possibly announce it?
SPEAKER_01:I tell you what, and I heard the best thing on sustainable diets the other day. Well, I was reading an article and a sort of global world nutritionist who's really cool on sort of what should we be eating for a sustainable future and for health. And he said, actually it boils down to about six or seven words. Eat food, not too much, mostly plants. Isn't that cool? That's not easy.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it's not easy. And it's but you you know, you need to kind of, you know, you need to help, you know, you need to help people do that. So that's the individuals. So that's what we need to do. Individuals, because we can't be telling people that, and there was a, you know, just before COVID, or just around that time, there was this almost narrative that, oh, the way that you get to net zero, the way that you can help the world is by installing an air source heat bar, yeah, and solar panels. And that's kind of okay. I mean, I get that that works for some people, but for the majority of people, it doesn't. They don't have the finance, they live in flats, they don't own their place, they rent it. What can they do? And that's that's so that was the first thing. And then the other thing that I was working on was this it was called Zero Bill Streets, and it was this idea that the problem with retrofit, going back to the initial question, is retrofit per unit is actually quite expensive. Almost, you know, they estimate, you know, somewhere around 70,000 pounds per unit it would take. So if you multiplied that up by all the homes that exist and that we think need work on, you know, it's trillions of pounds, right? To to go around the country to do this. But it was the idea that what if you took a kind of a a terrace of streets and I did this mock-up, this this kind of example based on a real street in Leeds, where actually where I bought my first of a house that I was telling you about earlier, and I thought basically that you could retrofit that entire street if you did it all in one go, and it would be much lower than that£70,000. And actually, you might even be able to get them to be zero bills hopes.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Well then where they're not actually drawing on the grid, or they would draw from the grid, but there was ways of of them supplying the grid as well. And when you all balance out, they would have zero or next to zero bills. And the idea was it was a way to show local authorities, housing associations that if they want to tackle their zero, this is a really interesting way to do it on a street by street basis.
SPEAKER_01:That sounds tough.
SPEAKER_02:And it also, the beauty of it was the beauty of it was it also made the houses, the areas much prettier and much more beautiful. And nature played a part in that as well because obviously we put more trees in, we had a kind of areas of green, and we had sunken water stored in certain areas and and and green walls and stuff. So it was and it's made the area look look much better. And we did these renders of an example of before and after, took the exact street in in Leeds, and they said this is what it would look like afterwards. And they would beat pretty much zero bills as well.
SPEAKER_01:Brilliant. Well, Danla, I think you need to move on to nature, don't you?
SPEAKER_03:Now that's I just picked up that word there, nature, and let's go back to that one and switch the conversation. So you have been embracing nature-based solutions for a good few years now, and have a consultancy called Natural Places and have worked with the property sector on how to bring nature into the heart of development, which you gave just us just an example of. So tell us about that work and where it is taking you.
SPEAKER_02:That's really interesting. I mean, it started kind of really from the work that my wife was doing. She she left her job at the University of Arts London some years ago to set up forest schools in our local area. And she was running forest schools and nature connection activities for people, set gardening clubs, and doing events for families to come together with kids and read outside and play outside and learn outside. And I just saw the way that it affected people's relationships with their families, and I saw the way it was affecting how people were using the park, and also the way that we used our park. So, as an example, we just had two young kids around that time, and we our park was basically a thoroughfare for us to get to the playground. As soon as we started doing looking at nature in a different way, we didn't really go to the playground anymore. We used the cops and the trees and the bushes and all these other areas to play in. And quite by so she was doing that in the background, and I kept seeing the results, which was incredible. And then at the same time, I was asked by a company called Related Argent to look at nature in their£8 billion new master plan called Brent Cross Town. And I was asked by one of the directors specifically to try and help them figure out what it meant and what it would look like to integrate nature fully into that development. And I worked on that with them, which was incredibly exciting because obviously such a big development, and it was yeah, it was a kind of blank canvas for me. They said, I kept going back to them saying, Oh, or could I do this or could I do that? I said, Listen, you can do what you want, just tell us what you think. And it was it was brilliant. And I worked with the Eden project on a kind of on a kind of scheme that would be uh uh an urban version of what they did. What it what does it look like to engrossate nature into a really densely impact of an environment? Because my feeling was and I this this kind of feeling of my thought crisis evolved over the time I was working there was the the narrative at the moment is you can either live in the countryside and have a you know a really peaceful, nice life connected to nature, or you can live in the city, have a really busy, exciting life, but you're disconnected from nature. And I always thought, why do you have to choose? Why do why do we have to choose? Lots of us love living in busy urban environments, but we also want to be connected to nature. So let's think about it differently. And I remember the first question I asked, and it kind of and my my scope expanded to cover the entire development. One of the first questions I asked them was to try and imagine not that we have built a what would it look like if we built a town in a forest? So what to actually look like? And then let's work back from that. Rather than, you know, a really good architect friend of mine, Jerry Tate, said to me when I first got the job, we would I was trying to get my head around weren't men. And he said, Well, couldn't you? If you think about our history on evolution, when we began building settlements, we built in nature, amongst it, with it, okay. Then we decided we became technologically advanced, so we decided to clear nature, build our house, homes and our cities and our town. Then we thought, oh, that's a bit rubbish. Let's clear nature, build our cities and our towns, and let's put some nature back in. And when it was telling me that, I just thought, oh, yeah, you're right, but we should just go back to the beginning, right? And so, what would it look like to have a new city in a forest and then scale back from that?
SPEAKER_03:Well, that also triggers something in my mind. So let me try to wrap my head around it a bit. But at the moment, what we're doing globally is putting the same skyscrapers everywhere, the same houses, the same apartments, and the same architecture. But when you talk about bringing the nature as the prime element, that also gives us the opportunity to use the local nature so we can use the local elements. So you're talking about building a city in the forest, but also I have this example in Turkey in the southern eastern part, Mardin, I'm sure you know of it. But that's a very dry area, and the ancient city is built on this massive mountain, uh, which is only full of rocks, not very much greenery, but it is built in such a way that they have this natural wind corridors and cooling corridors inside the houses. So, in a very hot area, working with the nature and the elements there, they have this flowing life in those ancient homes. So I think we may also look at this too. So not just putting decoy elements of green buildings with some gardens on the balconies, but really looking what is there and what can be used. I just want to have your take on this.
SPEAKER_02:Well, first of all, I love that phrase of decoy elements. I've not heard that before, but you're absolutely right. I mean, I I love I may steal that. You're absolutely right. That's what we do. You know, we we build our cities and then we put in these, you know, we put five trees over there, bush over there, some plants over there. And you're right, it just feels like a you know, it feels like a decoy rather than trying to build with nature, have it fully integrated. And it requires a bit more thought and it requires a bit more time, perhaps. But if you get it right, you have something that is resilient, which is improves the outcomes for everybody in that environment. So children will learn quicker and better, not because of teaching methodology, but because of their environment. People will form closer bonds as as a community, families will be happier, people will be less have less physical health problems, less less mental health problems. And the key, I think, to getting developers and landowners and the and and the people who really make the decisions to understand that. The key is uh that it makes your end products, the build environment, more valuable in every way. And and I think that's the that's the thing we need to be talking about when we're talking about nature. And that and that brings it out of that little cul-de-sac where it's a box-ticking exercise, to puts it into them, you know, it puts it on the main street where everybody's thinking, yeah, actually, this is where I'm gonna get my value from. This is where I'm gonna make money. And if we that's it's just about changing the conversation, changing the narrative.
SPEAKER_01:Do you know? I love can I don't know whether you come across the um what's it called, biophilic cities? And there's a there's a sort of Europe-wide movement on how you how you really bring nature back into cities. And and they have a really good narrative on the uplift in property value if you achieve it. Yeah, because and and they have this lovely rule. It's a three, three, three hundred thirty rule, which is every property should be able to see at least three trees from its front door. Every city and urban area should be aiming for a 30% canopy cover, and you should be no more than 300 metres away from nature, which I think is lovely, don't you?
SPEAKER_02:That's fantastic, and really easy for people to go to to understand and and to get, but it makes perfect sense.
SPEAKER_01:And I know it's totally cool. Hey, come here. Should we give we should give a plug for sign lines at this point, shouldn't we? Really, given that we're talking about Matron City. So you were there, once at the launch, tell us all, tell us all about it.
SPEAKER_02:Well, sign lines is is is brilliant because much like I said about net zero, the problem with nature isn't going to be creating new green spaces. That's actually relatively easy. Problem's going to be what do we do with the cities and our towns and our developments that already exist but probably aren't as connected to nature as we want. Well, it's the retrofit question with nature that's going to be a problem. And Scion Line is a really clever way of answering that question because the idea is that what we will be doing is joining the existing green and blue spaces that already exist in the city of Manchester. We'll be renovating some of the correctness in new ones as well. But by joining the exist that what's already there and creating green and blue corridors to join them up, eventually there'll be a hundred kilometred mile nature walk, effectively. We had to walk a hundred miles if you wanted to, you know, w in nature, but within one of the country's biggest, most densely packed cities, which is just you know incredible. And I think it was one of those when I first saw the plan, when I first saw the idea for Sion Lion, but my first thought was damn, why didn't I think of that? Because like all the great and all the great ideas, there's an element of just complete simplicity about it. You know, it's almost obvious what something tells you, but you're not thought about it. I was like, that's absolutely genius. That's the way to do it. Because look, the way that the the world is now, the economics of building the economics of cities, we are not going to be knocking down tower blocks to build parks. It's just not going to happen. Right? It doesn't, you know, it doesn't make any sense in any way. But this is the way to to bring it together. And it's a lovely kind of story. You know, and because it's spread out across the city, and I use the phrase when the launch it democratizes nature. It doesn't matter where you live, everybody is gonna have access, is is gonna have access to this, you know, and and kids will be able to walk to school on these on these lines, whether it's only 100 metres or 200 metres, it doesn't, and again, that doesn't matter. They'll be able to walk along canals, walk through green spaces that are connecting. People who are having lunch will be able to go sit and go for a walk and sit and have lunch in green spaces. People traveling around the the city that we're visiting Manchester, where there's a great city, will be able to walk from place to place along green spaces, through nature, in nature, not just looking at it, but in it. And I think that's fantastic. It's a great, I mean, Sign Lines is a fantastic project, and can't wait to see to see what happens with it.
SPEAKER_03:Well, it's great to imagine it when you're talking about it and you're narrating it as if it's a dream, but I think it's not gonna be a dream, it's gonna be a reality. So kudos for that. But I want to ask you something else. We have been tracking some of your recent thoughts and speeches and spotted a very intriguing phrase, weaponizing nature. Would you like to explain that?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, so when we launched natural places, we were talking about well, what you know, what is gonna set us apart from the from from you know in in in the marketplace? What is gonna be what's our USP? What are we really about? In a way to kind of distinguish us from landscape architects and other consultants and nature consultants. And it can came from two sides, and we realized that there were two things that we two challenges we had, and it neatly fitting into my expertise and my wife's expertise. So I, my part of the business is about visioning, helping developers, but also funders and JV partners and landowners to understand that nature isn't just a cost of no spreadsheet, it's a cost, but also there's a huge value figure as well to account for. And that's what I meant by weaponising it. Because the point when I gave that speech, what I was talking about, all the challenges we have. You have challenges. We have challenges with biodiversity net game. Well, guess what? Nature fixes that for you. Nutrient neutrality, nature fixes that for you. Overheating, nature helps you out with that. For office tenants, you know, getting people to come into their office, getting people to be more resilient, getting people to be more efficient, to have less days of safe, to be healthier both mentally and physically. Nature helps you to do that. You want schools where kids are going to perform better, or nature will help me do that. You want to create areas where people want to come and hang out and and spend money in bars and restaurants and cafes. Well, guess what? Nature helps you to do that. So we should be, rather than thinking about nature as this oh god, we've got to do something home, right? Because they're making us do it. Right? Rather than making it this thing that we, a box you've got to tick, making it weaponizing it into the and the reason you use weaponizing, because I just thought it is actually a tool. So it's almost your greatest tool for generating long-term, resilient, sustainable value in the built environment. And that's where that came from. You know, and and that really seemed to hit a hit a chord really with people. And then after that, we've been, you know, we're talking to Natural England about different things, and because it they realize, because what what I'm really saying, it's about thinking about nature in a different way. You have to shift the way that people think about nature.
SPEAKER_01:Amazing. Well, if you I'll tell you what, and I'm not I can't really make this deal, but if you want to steal the decoy elements that Damler had a minute ago, we might nick weaponising nature a little bit as well, if that's right. Is that a deal? Are you up for that?
SPEAKER_02:That's a deal, and that's all good.
SPEAKER_01:Well, listen, couldn't I? We could carry on. I uh do you know if we had a bit longer, I would let us just stray into rewilding, but we will leave that for another day. And uh I didn't get the chance, but I was gonna have a bit of a giggle about passive house standards. But let's not go there because we're out of time. I would like to ask you our final question, if you don't mind. Yeah, perfect. Which is our network is ironically called Do Not Smile, because we know that we need to make sustainability a subject that brings happiness into the world. So what tell us what object, place, or person always makes you smile.
SPEAKER_02:Object, place or person always makes me smile. Actually, what always makes me smile is when I see my kids playing in a forest of trees, making you have to be a bit big for us, that they get this look on their face, and then and when they laugh, it's this unbridled, wild, cuttle kind of laugh that they have, and they're just so happy. And to see the effect that that has on you know on them is you know when they're really integrating nature, and it could be on the beach or in a park or in a forest, is is that's the thing that makes me smile. That's the thing that makes me happy.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, that's that is a beautiful finish to this conversation, because it's totally well, we're there, aren't we? We can see that lovely immersion in nature happening right now. Well, listen, it's been brilliant talking to you, Kunlay. Damla, I think it's time to wrap us up.
SPEAKER_03:So thanks to everyone who has listened to our good guys podcast brought to you by the Do Not Smile Network of Agencies.
SPEAKER_01:And make sure you listen to future episodes. We'll be talking to more amazing people about how we can work together to create a more sustainable future. So, Damla Kunlay, thanks very much and see you soon.
SPEAKER_00:Bye.
SPEAKER_01:Thanks. Bye-bye.
SPEAKER_00:Goodgeist, a podcast series on sustainability hosted by Damla Ozler and Steve Connor. Brought to you by the DNS Network.
