Colony Court
Colony Court comprises 15 luxury apartments for families and professionals in Stoke Newington. With a selection of two-beds, three-beds or four in the stunning penthouse, each home is built with light and space at the heart of the design. Unlike most London developments, the design also taps into the trend of Scandinavian co-housing – private living but with the shared area of the 65ft communal garden to enhance a sense of community and belonging. A space to relax in the sunshine, chat to neighbours and for kids to play.
Bagel factory
A mixed-use development that will offer 55 apartments above two storeys of flexible workspace for small and medium creative businesses. A central café and terrace is a bustling hub for both residents and creatives, and a commercial yard at the rear is a cool, behind-the-scenes space where business tenants can meet, socialise and hold events. The building’s design takes its cue from the area’s historic warehouses, and features simple elevations of pale brick and tall windows, with the occasional gleam of a perforated metal screen.
The Woodland Barn
The Barn is a 21st-century version of the classic rural building, crafted from local Cotswold stone and green oak, with double-height volumes and extensive glazing. Modernity also means sustainability. This house gave HWO Architects opportunity to break with traditional materials and construction methods, and trial an innovative and more sustainable type of timber frame. The result is a building which has sustainability built into its very fabric. The frame is made from cross-laminated timber panels. This creates a very dense and structurally robust engineered timber – as strong as concrete, in fact.
Timber is the only truly renewable building material, and it also has the lowest energy consumption of any building material throughout its lifecycle. Each cubic metre of cross-laminated timber panels will remove approximately 0.8 tonnes of CO2. Use enough timber in the construction of buildings and you could, theoretically, achieve negative CO2 emissions. This home meets level 4 of the Code for Sustainable Homes because of its frame, but its design can be adapted for further sustainability, via, for example, photovoltaic panels, an air-to-air heat pump or geothermal pump, and connection to a green energy source.
Old Smokehouse
A project for Aitch Group. The scheme is delivering 45 high-quality homes – many of which will be family-sized units – over 6,000 sqf of workspace for small creative businesses and new public realm in the form of a café and outdoor terrace.
