Social housing organisations involved in the SHE (Sustainable Housing Europe) project received international recognition for their achievements in terms of environmental and social sustainability, by winning important prizes at the European and national level . This was recently the case for the Danish and Italian SHE projects.

The Larch Garden project was presented on June 24 at the BEX (Building Exchange) Conference in Valencia, Spain.  Larch Garden was up against international heavy weight projects like The Bahrain World Trade Centre, the new European Council building in Strasburg, billion euro projects in Abu Dhabi and Singapore and around 25 other buildings, primarily huge office buildings in glass and enormous city developments. But it was the smallest and cheapest of all the projects, the Housing Association Ringgaarden’s sustainable housing project, the Larch Garden, which won the prize as the Best Overall Project. The social and human dimension of this "little project" was the crucial element that gained the overall prize.

The background for the many prizes of the Larch Garden is that respect for the environment and energy savings is a great part of the project’s concept. This is not only for the benefit of the tenants but also for fight against the climate changes. The Larch Garden will save more than 38 tons of CO2 each year compared with new standard projects.
This is not the first time that the Larch Garden wins an important prize. In 2005, the project received the Danish Energy Saving.

At the same time, Federabitazione, the Italian organisation which is the coordinator of the SHE project in Europe,  was recently awarded a special mention in a prize for "Environment and Innovation" organised by the Italian National Institute of Bio-architecture for its project "Quality and sustainability". The project, which includes the European project SHE as well as "Casa Ecologica" (network of cooperatives for sustainable housing) and "Servizi per l'Abitare Sostenibile" (services to sustainable living) aims at responding to the increasing demand for energy efficient housing combined with integrated services, to increase the dwellings' sustainability as well as confort and to strenghten social cohesion in the residential areas created by th efederation. Giuseppe Venturelli, President of Federabitazione, commented that the prize represents a recognition of the federation's commitment to innovation in the environmental field and its role as front runner in the struggle against cliamte change and fuel povery.

The European consortium SHE, Sustainable Housing in Europe, was awarded In February 2007 with the prestigious Energy Prize of the European Commission, in the context of the Sustainable Energy Europe Campaign 2005-2008, in the category “Public-Private Partnership”. Together with the other sustainable SHE projects the Larch Garden is also in the final of the prestigious World Habitat Award, which will be awarded in October this year.