Ely Court
Number/street name:
37 Chichester Road
Address line 2:
North Maida Vale
City:
London
Postcode:
NW6 5QW
Architect:
Alison Brooks Architects
Architect contact number:
Developer:
Catalyst Housing.
Contractor:
Wilmott Dixon Housing
Planning Authority:
Brent Council
Planning Reference:
MP/12/09573
Date of Completion:
Schedule of Accommodation:
11x1 Bed flats, 7x2 Bed flats , 6x3 Bed flats, 2x4Bed flats, Maison: 13x2B, 4x3B
Tenure Mix:
60% private, 40% affordable
Total number of homes:
Site size (hectares):
0.65
Net Density (homes per hectare):
66
Size of principal unit (sq m):
89
Smallest Unit (sq m):
54
Largest unit (sq m):
120
No of parking spaces:
46
Scheme PDF DownloadPlanning History
Design/team/fee bid: May 2010
Stage A-D+:July-December 2010
Planning application submitted: 21 December 2010
Planning was granted: 22 March 2011
Developer/contractor tender: March 2011 - April 2012
Construction commenced: October 2012
Construction completed: December 2015
The Design Process
Ely Court is a 44-dwelling mixed-tenure regeneration scheme in
London’s South Kilburn Estate. The scheme demonstrates the ability
of a Local Authority to lead the process of enlightened city building, by
commissioning and delivering housing of the highest calibre to integrate
previously segregated communities.
Ely Court forms part of Phase 1b of the South Kilburn Estate
Regeneration masterplan, a result of Brent’s rolling programme of invited
design competitions for each phase. The scheme is the product of a
collaboration for two sites within Phase 1b. ABA was invited by Lifschutz
Davidson Sandilands to design 44 dwellings on the Ely Court site, while
LDS designed 144 units on the Cambridge and Wells site to the north
east.
The context of ABA’s Ely Court site is mixed, representing 150 years
of London’s urban evolution. On the border of the South Kilburn
Conservation Area, the site has a primary south frontage to Chichester
Road with characterful, locally listed mid 19th C semi-detached villas and
1950’s Chichester House. Two cranked 1960s flat blocks form a northern
edge to the site. The site also abuts a 19th three storey former pub, the
Brondesbury Arms, also Locally Listed. The site has a small frontage to
Canterbury Road, and on its northeastern boundary is a Salvation Army
Centre.
LDS and ABA’s joint masterplan for the Phase 1a and 1b site reinstates
the block and street pattern that characterised this archetypal 19th
C London ‘suburb’ before its post-war redevelopment with a mews
street in the middle of the shared block, Alpha Mews. This mews draws
pedestrians and vehicles into what was previously an isolated and under used ‘green space’ between slab blocks and acts as a spine connecting
the two new developments. The mews is made up of shared surfaces,
play areas, parking and connects newly defined garden squares.
Ely Court was conceived as four building types, each of a different scale
and organisation tailored to its specific locale: Terrace, Flatiron, Link and
Mews. These have been designed to provide exceptionally high quality,
bright and spacious units. Areas generally exceed the LHDG. The floor
to ceiling height is exceptionally generous at 2.6m and all windows are
full height French doors, with their accompanying sense of light, space
and generosity. The three buildings share a common brick with particular
features such as porches, porticoes and balconies articulated in metal.
The Terrace, a long block facing Chichester Road, is an interpretation
of neighbouring Maida Vale’s 19th C mansion blocks, but with two storey
maisonettes (family homes) on the ground floor. Between the maisonettes
double height communal entrances provide access to apartments above.
The Terrace animates the street with perforated brick screens, two
storey porticoes and recessed balconies. These elements help shade
south facing windows, offer privacy, conceal bins and generate highly
articulated, rhythmic facades.
The Link Block is a four storey building of two flats per floor that ‘turns
the corner’ into the Mews and offers an entrance to the north The link
block has a canted footprint that helps to frame and terminate the garden
spaces between facing buildings, and offers oblique views of the garden
square.
The Mews consists of eight two and three bed houses that introduce a
finer grain of development to the scheme. These are the only terraced
houses to be built in South Kilburn in several decades. The mews houses
have a serrated, articulated roofscape that allows sunlight into the mews.
Each house has a recessed entrance porch and secure bin store, a wide
south facing garden, and two roof terraces.
The Flatiron building completes the Brondesbury Arms terrace, to provide
four affordable 4-bedroom flats, one per floor. This building frames the
south edge of the new garden square, acting as a sentinel overlooking
the park
