Cotton Field Wharf: Build-to-Invest
Image: (Hydrock, 2020:online) Previous chapters have investigated novel legislative identification of BtR projects. This final section focuses upon the building, where all previously discussed knowledge is condensed upon a single scheme for the connection of global theory to a supposedly discrete sociotechnical object, which is revealed as a confluence of invisible infrastructures vampirically extracting value through provision of ‘sufficient’ accommodation. The development in focus is Cotton Field Wharf, a Manchester Life project in the heart of Ancoats. The inclusion of a self-proclaimed BtR project (Manchester Life, 2020) is used to connect global theories of neo-marxist urbanism and political ecologies to specific typologies, providing another lens in which to critically analyse material architectures to identify, and problematise, the immaterial architectures required to construct and sustain post-crisis ‘solutions’ to housing. With this in mind, Cotton Field Wharf is selected due to its use by Manchester Life as a ‘flagship’ canal-side development. (Manchester Life, 2020) Aligned with
