This brief describes a novel approach to overcome the disadvantages of hemp fibres in cementitious composites. The authors describe how the new approach includes the combination of thermal pre-treatment of nanoclay (producing calcined nanoclay) and chemical pre-treatment of fibre surfaces to improve the microstructure, mechanical, physical and thermal properties and also durability of hemp fibre reinforced cement composites. In this work, the synthesis of several materials are studied: nanoclay-cement nanocomposite, calcined nanoclay-cement nanocomposite, untreated & treated hemp...