ASH Press Release: St Raphael’s Estate Saved from Demolition

ASH is happy to announce that, a month after we published and delivered to Brent Council our report on the design alternative to the demolition of St. Raphael’s estate — which demonstrated among other things the financial unviability of demolishing and redeveloping the 760 homes — Brent Council has agreed with us and called off …

Saving West Kensington and Gibbs Green Estates: An Open Letter to Labour Activists

Yesterday it was announced that the West Kensington and Gibbs Green estates, whose residents have been living under the threat of the demolition of their homes since 2012, will be sold back to Hammersmith and Fulham council at the price they sold it. Since the estates were sold to Capital & Counties Properties PLC — …

Saving Northwold Estate: The Design Alternatives to Demolition

The Northwold estate in Hackney has around 580 homes. Built in the 1930s, it was extended in the 1950s, and in 2009 the estate stock-transferred to the Guinness Partnership housing association. In 2016 Guinness announced it was going to regenerate the estate, and subsequently planned to demolish and redevelop half the estate. In September 2016 residents …

Knight’s Walk: The Good Practice Guide to Gentrification

Prior to the launch of the ASH report on Central Hill, which we’re holding in the Residents’ Hall of Cotton Gardens estate in Kennington on 26 April, we thought we’d catch up with what’s happening on Knight’s Walk, the low-rise component of Cotton Gardens that was specifically designed by London County Council architect George Finch …

The Castle: Freedom of Information and Commercial Confidentiality at Lambeth Co-operative Council

‘Ultimately, I think it’s better to be as transparent and as open as possible, but that does slow things down. But it also means that as we start the consultation residents know that we have looked at all options, that they’ve been robustly tested and scrutinised, and that’s why we can say with confidence that …

The Consultation Game: TM Architects on Northwold Estate

Last October, on the invitation of the residents of Northwold Estate in Hackney, ASH visited an exhibition held in the estate’s community hall by TM Architects, the purpose of which was to help the architects ‘consult’ with residents about the options they had been commissioned to draw up for the future of the estate by …

Embodied Carbon Estimation for Central Hill Estate: Report by Model Environments

‘A conservative estimate for the embodied carbon of Central Hill Estate would be around 7,000 tonnes of CO2e, similar emissions to those from heating 600 detached homes for a year using electric heating, or the emissions savings made by the London Mayor’s RE:NEW retrofitting scheme in a year and a quarter. Annual domestic emissions per …

The Guinness Partnership: Letter from a resident of Northwold Estate

‘Everyone has the right to respect for her private and family life, her home and her correspondence.’ – Article 8, European Convention on Human Rights, Human Rights Act 1998 Adrian Mitchell Senior Development Manager The Guinness Partnership Bower House 1 Stable Street Hollinwood Oldham OL9 7LH 8 August 2016 Dear Adrian, It was good to meet …

Deliverability of the ASH proposal on Central Hill: ASH response to Lambeth Labour Council

Fiona Cliffe Capital Programme Manager 24 June 2016 Introduction ‘Following the February 2016 Resident Engagement Panel (REP) meeting the Council has sort to establish a constructive dialogue with Architects for Social Housing (ASH) so their proposals for Central Hill could be considered.’ ‘The Council has now had the chance to review the ASH proposal and …

ASH design proposals for West Kensington and Gibbs Green Estates

In response to the question addressed to ASH by the Architect’s Journal, there are many ways in ASH’s design proposals for the West Kensington & Gibbs Green People’s Plan are better than Capco’s masterplan, the primary and overriding one being that the residents, many of whom have lived here all their lives, will be able to remain …