The Harriet Hardy Extra Care Centre by Mæ

فوریه 2, 2024دسامبر 15, 2023 از داریوش بوربور

Project data

While it was not possible to see inside the flats, they are all designed to be 10 per cent larger than the Parker Morris Standards and access is planned to Part M(4), with generous circulation and open-plan layouts for ease of movement of wheelchairs. Low window ledges in the living spaces further help residents feel connected to the city outside, even when seated. All flats have been designed as ‘care-ready’, with technologies such as tele-care and assistive technology that can be tailored to residents’ specific needs.

This common current trope for indicating a ‘civic’ frontage, with its whisper of de Chirico and empty Italian piazzas, does here add a welcome accent to the whole ensemble. It faces onto a new pocket park, Westmoreland Park, one of a range of still somewhat dismal-looking and slightly amorphous green spaces across the development. In contrast, the inner court is the making of the block. Already bulked-out vertically by a couple of mature retained trees, it has the feel of a peaceful, green inner world with, at ground level, a series of sheds and raised beds encouraging more than just quiet contemplation.

The building delivers high-density housing intended to optimise the use of the site. Arranged in a horseshoe shape, it forms a south-facing courtyard to maximise solar gain. The compact plan has gallery-access, dual-aspect apartments, which aid cross-ventilation and help mitigate any overheating. The energy strategy includes district heating and renewables. A district heating system is housed within Sub-Plot 5 of the larger development. The scheme reduces carbon emissions in line with the London Plan policies 5.1 (Climate Change Mitigation), 5.2 (Minimising CO2 Emissions), 5.3 (Sustainable Design and Construction) and 5.5 (Decentralised Energy Networks).

Facing the street, the ground floor level has a series of shared rooms – a café, lounge and community centre – supporting both active and sociable use by residents, and supporting exchange with the wider community. The building steps up from five to seven storeys, with a taller building at the south-east corner. Its architecture is characterised by deeply articulated façades with arched balconies and a brick colonnade at ground floor level which adds interest and positive aspect to the streetscape.

Glancing views through to the courtyard are already visible on entering the extra care home reception, where a generous lobby leads off to lifts and stairs as well as through to the connected series of communal rooms, which open through to the inner garden, too. While this latter is formed of a fairly narrow canyon of space, on sunny days slants of sunlight enter and animate the spaces. This same sense of gentle focus is also found on the upper access decks, which are left open to the courtyard and the elements, enabling good cross-ventilation to the flats.

The nature and layout of the new Block S01 were well suited to reinforced concrete flat slab construction. New piled foundations were placed to navigate the remains of the existing foundations and protected trees, including the two mature trees in the semi-enclosed courtyard.

This careful calibration of spaces and thresholds comes from what Mæ calls the ‘progressive privacy’ built into the layout of this council-run scheme, which is designed for older residents with various care needs. It allows for different levels of sociability and privacy, independence and support, from the interconnected communal rooms on the ground floor – lounge, kitchen and café – to the balcony of each flat. The latter, allowing residents the chance to watch street life below, are halfway set back into the façade, giving people the choice to be more exposed or hidden from view.

Above, the floors of extra care dwellings wrap around, rising up to seven storeys. Meanwhile, to the south, the open arms of the U contain general needs housing for individuals, couples and families, which form bookends to the block. Two-storey townhouses occupy the ground floor podiums here, with a range of studio to four-bedroom flats above. The eastern bookend is taller at 10 storeys and has been shifted on its axis and expressed as a distinct tower-like form. Of the 119 units in all, 95 are for social rent, 22 for intermediate rent and two maisonettes are for private sale, with, in addition, one guest room for visitors to Harriet Hardy residents.

Ely says the overall design and layout was influenced by that of the traditional almshouse – the pre-Welfare State housing model for the old and infirm of a parish, often paid for through the endowment of some local worthy. Their typical horseshoe shape was similarly focused on an inner shared court, with a gradation of spaces from the communal to the individual: chapel and dining room to simple, often one-room, dwellings. But this ‘21st century almshouse’, as Ely refers to it, is no bucolic cottage-like terrace around a village green.

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Phase 1B, developed with Notting Hill Genesis, gained planning consent in April 2015 and is only now completing. It consists of six blocks: four HTA-designed, plus one apiece by HawkinsBrown and Mæ.

Walking along the access deck outside the front doors of the Harriet Hardy extra care flats, Alex Ely, director of Mæ Architects, points to the adjacent windows. ‘They’re the bedrooms. We placed them to this side so that more infirm residents can still see neighbours pass, perhaps even chat to them through the window and feel connected.’

This plan attracted opposition from the start, with accusations of ‘social cleansing’ of council tenants as well as a failure to properly consider renovation as an option. Several residents who had originally bought their flats under the Right to Buy scheme refused to sell up and move out. Protests flared up in 2015-17, when there was a series of marches led by residents and outside campaign groups and several of the emptied blocks were squatted. Even now there is an active court case involving a resident still determined to stay in their flat.

This multi-generational block brings together general needs accommodation for individuals and families alongside specialist care housing. Our design aims to make extra care housing a seamless part of the housing provision. The building has a civic quality and offers the benefits of independent but collective living in the city. We have imagined a new community that will be both cohesive and outward-looking.

Thermal line considerations were a key aspect of the balcony design. 3D modelling and co-ordination was used to create the complex geometry of the balconies and to ensure that the thermal breaks were installed correctly at the joints where the slabs or columns transition from internal to external. The concrete profile was stepped to allow for insulation and falls were provided to drainage points to maintain positive drainage.