Tria (Gosset Street), London E2
Type residential
Size 51 apartments and duplexes
Client Barratt East London
Status under construction
This is evidence of how specialised residential development is, with the apparently simple actually difficult to get right, unless developed or designed by those with great skill.
Richard Hastilow RIBA Chief Executive
We are absolutely delighted to win to two such prestigious awards. Our approach is to use the very best architects to create design-led schemes that we can be proud of in years to come.
Alastair Baird Managing Director of Barratt London
The Jesus Hospital Estate conservation area, containing Columbia Road flower market in London's East End, survives to remind us of the comforting domestic scale of Victorian 2-storey terraces and narrow highways. This site is where it abuts the large blocks and open space planning of the 1960's, complete with buildings such as the 11 storey Yates House set back from the road behind a thin green strip to the immediate edge of the site.
Someone walking the pavement edging the new block would see six storeys stepping down to two storeys, all finished in yellow stock flecked brick evoking that of houses in the conservation area behind and above the brickwork are a series of inventions which give this scheme a level of private amenity the Victorians would have grabbed at.
The middle section of five floors has sixth-floor set back, allowing a communal roof terrace to span across most of the top floor. This stops short of the northern edge of the block, so as not to overlook the same roof terrace device on top of a similar but smaller set back spanning the houses. These houses, apparently two storey from the street, are 4-5 and 6-bedroom 3-storey townhouses with their gardens on their roofs.
The 5 and 6 storey brick facade gives some easier to read signs of the development's other uncommon feature, 13 duplex apartments whose two storeys are announced with double-height apertures to the flying brickwork screen. The lower level of these have terraces, juliet balconies to the upper level offering full-height ventilation to bedrooms, and the facade is faced with a medium dark oak so that spaces have a warmth and texture that makes the outdoor space more like a study.
All ground floor dwellings are accessed from a patio garden which gives the scheme the active frontage admired in local Victorian streets, but with a privacy strip which all those back-of-pavement terraces would have been much improved by.
From the booklet Housing Design Awards 2009
