Project: Brentworks, Colindale
The site lies on Colindale Avenue in the London Borough of Barnet and is part of an area outlined for intensification in the London Plan. John Pardey Architects working with Fairview New Homes developed the design for this 0.66 HA site replacing some large industrial units to provide 105 low cost apartments in three separate blocks. The two blocks facing the Avenue are courtyard in form while the third block straddles the rear of the site. Each block is in a different brick colour above a common brick base to make a vibrant sense of place with the minimum of means.
The architectural approach seeks to retain a memory of the former brick industrial units that occupied the site by the use basic building materials to create architectural expression.
Courtyard facades are softer in buff brick with timber-faced balconies and have green wire systems to the facades and timber pergolas within a simple grassed landscape.
The overall design combines a matter of fact approach, with an architectural expression derived from the use of different coloured bricks that lend identity to each block, while the zig zag forms, oriels windows and cut-outs offer a distinctive richness. The facades are abstracted into coloured brick planes – Tetris-like in their zig zag, interconnecting form. Cut-out elements reveal an inner, more domestic layer of timber and glazing – that floats above a lighter brick base. The buildings are further animated by the addition of a number of zinc-clad oriel windows that step across the facades to echo and counterpoint the stepping of the brick facades themselves. Corner balconies are expressed as cutouts, lined in a metal-edged timber cladding. To the southern corner of the development onto Colindale Avenue, an angular block, clad in zinc, sits above a commercial unit.
PROJECT DETAILS Client: Status: Contract value:
Fairview New Homes Ltd. Completion 2012 c. ÂŁ10,000,000.00
Structural Engineer: M+E Engineers:
Scott Wilson Scott Wilson