Stoneways
Sector
Residential - 7 unit
Location
Finchley, London
Year
2018
The site at Stoneways has dense vegetation and an extensive rear garden. The previous structure was an Arts and Crafts period house that has undergone various stages of rectification and extension and did not keep a coherent architectural style throughout.
The relationship with the neighbouring properties and the close proximities to windows, made it a very challenging site for redevelopment.
Normally keeping a straight forward approach by extending the footprint as much as possible up to the building lines of the context area, a development of maximum 700sqm could be achieved. These numbers along with the prices in the area did not make it an enticing project for a future developer.
We were contacted by the owner to try to maximise the floor-space provision so that a new development would be financially viable. Working closely with the clients and a real estate agent we managed to accurately describe the future buyers of the flats of the development.
Working on the interior layouts, we managed to arrange sizes and layouts of the flats. Along with some viability assessments we reached to the conclusion that we would need 6 or more luxury flats of more than 130sqm each (to a minimum of 780sqm). This brought us well above the projected maximum achievable floorspace.
Thinking creatively and outside of the normal application outlines we tried to include the extent of the rear garden into our calculations and initial approach, along with underground facilities and creative analysis of the building lines and context area. We managed to include Lower Ground Floor (LGF) accommodation which is normally very difficult to design to comply with all daylight/sunlight and outlook regulations in Barnet. By projecting much further than the main building and the building line, and by carefully designing the rear garden and stepping gradually from the actual garden level to the LGF level we created a very attractive LGF unit that blends in naturally in the landscape. Above it we introduced an intensive green roof to make sure that there would be no loss of real landscaped area.
Using 3D models and CG images of the proposal we managed to reassure the officers of the validity of our design and convince them of the high quality level of accommodation that would be provided on site.
The result was a building that extends beyond the building lines but in a way that is not visible by the other properties and the public highway, nor is harmful to the neighbouring amenities; a building that has 4 levels but resembles a two storey house with a pitched roof; a building that blends in the character of the area in style and scale although it has more than 900sqm of sellable floorspace, more than 200sqm above the initially projected size.
During the pre-application and the planning process, and continuous fruitful discussion with the planning officers, the size fell from an initial 980sqm to 960sqm GIA addressing all concerns with regards to landscaping, parking, scale, amenities and architectural style.
This all led to added property value, substantially more than originally projected and made the scheme a viable and very profitable development.
