Tuesday, October 14, 2008

And the Sterling goes to.... Accordia!

The Stirling prize was announced, and yes, it was awarded to the Accordia housing project by Feilden Clegg Bradley ! Some people might be surprised that a housing project got the coveted award, instead of more flamboyant modern architecture (remember Zaha Hadid was nominated along with other venerable architects), but it seems that RIBA is following the times and gives the prize to something sensible, sustainable and much closer to every day life than space-age mono rail stations or glass towering courts.

Accordia is a major new housing scheme which demonstrates that it is possible for a volume house-builder to support high quality architecture, setting out to create a new relationship between private and public external space - a new model for outside-inside life with interior rooftop spaces, internal courtyards and large semi-public community gardens - ‘living in a large garden’. Accordia has set new standards for large-scale housing in the UK.

The development of 212 houses and 166 apartments is on a 9.5 hectare site adjacent to the Botanic Garden on the southern edge of Cambridge. This is a strategically important new residential quarter, sited between the city and open landscape.

Feilden Clegg Bradley were the master-plan architects and designers of approximately two thirds of the dwellings. To increase variety across the development, they appointed MacCreanor Lavington Architects and Alison Brooks Architects to design the remaining units - 25% and 10% respectively. Grant Associates were appointed as landscape architects.

The site is located within easy reach of the city centre and the train station, and the master-plan is designed for pedestrian and cycle demands, with landscaped pedestrian “streets” - mews streets with shared surfaces, discreet car parking and integrated cycle parking for all dwellings. The buildings and landscape have been designed with sustainability principles in mind.

The scheme includes a variety of innovative house and apartment types in the form of terraces and courts, along with ‘set-piece’ buildings, all composed within public landscaped gardens. The buildings are arranged in three dense groups of up to 65 dwellings per hectare, separated by mature landscape, with houses ranging from two to five bedrooms and apartments of one or two bedrooms. The development includes 30% affordable dwellings of mixed tenure, integrated in scale and materials with the private housing.


1 comment:

  1. It's look really good, I feel I live in it before and have memory with it even now when I see it for first time. Like those combination and traces with long windows and green land around it.

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