Urban outfitters

Situated in a neglected corner of north west London, penned in by a mainline railway and the busy north circular road, the Stonebridge Estate is a classic example of 1970s planning. Its concrete tower blocks have aged badly and a mixture of alleyways and neglected open spaces foster an atmosphere of crime rather than community.

In 1995 the Stonebridge Housing Action Trust was formed to initiate the regeneration of the 1775-unit estate. It appointed architect Shepheard Epstein Hunter and planner Terence O’Rourke as masterplanners and their brief was to replace the discredited concrete blocks with housing that was not only sustainable but would also establish a contemporary urban vernacular.

The first of five phases has now been completed and around 320 tenants are being moved into their new homes. Their response has been enthusiastic and the first tenants are happy to live in modern homes rather than reinterpretations of traditional housing. “People work in modern offices, drink in modern bars, so why shouldn’t they live in modern flats?” says SEH architect John Curran.

Although Stonebridge is the last of the HATs, the lessons being learnt here can be applied to today’s urban regeneration schemes. SEH’s mixture of sustainable terraces and apartment blocks fits in with the Government’s guidelines for good urban design and planning outlined in its new publication, By Design.

From the start of the project the architects and planners have been in close consultation with tenants. After tenant meetings and workshops SEH came up with three alternative designs for the site. The tenants chose the lowest density option containing 1400 houses and flats. “They wanted to get rid of the tower blocks and live in ordinary streets again,” says Alain Head, director at SEH.

But at a density of 95/100 habitable rooms per acre the scheme is still thoroughly urban, and as development progresses density will increase to up to 140 habitable rooms per acre. “We have achieved this by decreasing the number of car parking places available,” says Head. It is an approach that is in line with the Government’s aim of increasing the density of brownfield development and discouraging car use.

“The mix is changing. Originally all the flats were one or two-bed but we are building many more family homes, including larger houses for families of up to ten people,” says Head. During consultation tenants expressed a desire for gardens and private spaces. By sacrificing large areas of open space, the architects plan to provide every house with a garden.

Tenant choice extends to interiors. Prior to moving in tenants choose wall colours, carpets, tiles and the configuration of living areas. On the ground floor a tenant may pick a combined kitchen/dining area with a small living room, a separate kitchen and living/dining area or leave it open plan. Upstairs, the fenestration allows bedrooms to be split into singles or doubles.

In some respects SEH architect John Curran says choices are too wide and need to be rationalised. “There is too big a selection of sanitary fittings. Getting hold of the parts and integrating them has been difficult, and there’s the problem of maintenance.”

Consultation with tenants is ongoing and their comments on the first phase have been taken on board by the masterplanners. For example, some tenants having seen steel roofs on some of the first-stage housing expressed a preference for traditional pitched roofs - SEH has responded by promising to build more in the next phase. Interiors are also being updated. “We are hoping to offer timber laminate flooring in future phases,” says Curran.

The individuality of housing reflects the HAT’s desire to give tenants a sense of their own place. For this reason the HAT asked SEH to sub-contract some of the design to other architects. “The HAT wanted something distinctive. It wanted to break up the monotony of having one type of design throughout,” says Curran. As the masterplanners oversaw the designs of each architect during the first stage there are basic similarities in the design - every home is of brick and block construction and no buildings are over four storeys high, for example. Beyond these constraints architects had more or less free rein and choice in building materials.

Head is keen to incorporate the latest building techniques into Stonebridge. “There was no such thing as the Egan report two and a half years ago when the first phase of housing was designed. For phase two we are putting a lot of the Egan principles into practice,” he says. For instance, SEH is keen to establish closer partnerships with contractors. “I’m tired of fighting with contractors. I don’t see why relationships have to be confrontational,” says Head. With closer collaboration during building and open-book accounting Head believes cost savings can be made.

Another Egan element Head is keen to adopt is prefabrication and the next phase of housing will feature factory-built timber frame, speeding up build times and reducing on-site labour. “By using prefabrication we should be less affected by the current skills shortage. We’ve had people poached by other firms while working on site,” he says.

The second phase of building at Stonebridge will start at the end of the year. By 2007 a community of modern homes will have been built in a variety of styles using a range of sustainable materials. The look of the finished product is not yet clear. “The plans for the estate aren’t set - it’s an ongoing process. Stonebridge is a testbed for new technology and as we move into different phases we can introduce new building techniques,” says Curran.