Walls in housing are usually made of masonry or reinforced concrete. These wall constructions are both labour- and material-intensive and therefore more expensive than walls made of plain concrete. The high wall-thickness required by the design rules of BS 8110-1 and Eurocode 2 is the most important restraint for the use of plain concrete walls. The different design approaches are discussed and a new design method is explained in this paper. The proposed model allows for a simple, standardised and economic design of plain concrete walls with a thickness less than that of masonry walls. A further increase in load-bearing capacity can be achieved by taking into account the concrete tensile strength. A comparison with a test database verifies that all relevant aspects of the load-bearing capacity, for example slenderness, eccentricity and concrete strength, are represented appropriately by the developed design method. Moreover, the safety level of EN 1990 can be achieved.