95 Peckham Road is a striking new residential building, located in a prominent position on Peckham Road in the London Borough of Southwark. The building comprises 33 homes, with a policy compliant mix & quantity of social housing; and takes the form of a mansion block style apartment building with a communal tree lined courtyard at the rear, surrounded by courtyard dwellings.
The design was developed following careful analysis of the site and context to ensure that it enhanced and complimented the character of the local area whilst reintroducing a confident, coherent edge to the street in a part of Peckham Road less coherent than its High Street end to the east, or the more formal, civic end to the west. We sought for the building to be a vibrant, attractive and delightful addition to the local area, optimising the site’s potential whilst providing high quality homes for new residents, and improving the environment for existing neighbours.
The building’s construction is an insitu reinforced-concrete frame clad in facing brick. The rustic brick sits harmoniously within the surrounding area and enhances the natural light within the communal courtyards and terraces, giving a softness to the elevation. The core materials carry through to the communal interiors with feature exposed concrete curved stairwells and brick lined corridors.
A ziggurat form articulates the massing and steps the building back in respect of its context. South facing terraces cascade down the front façade, reinforcing the resident’s and building’s relationship with the street below. The building’s character will continue to evolve as residents fill the spaces - use and occupation of the courtyards, terraces and balconies will enliven the façades, giving personality to the building, enriching the connection between the building and it’s setting.
The architecture has a picturesque quality with the facades activated by numerous front doors, balconies, courtyards, roof terraces, balconies and large feature picture windows. The alternating height of the massing creates a notched profile that softens the building while the gradual stepping of the façade and roof profile means that the homes benefit from the use of a good sized roof terrace or courtyard garden.
The pedestrianised courtyard square at the rear provides a quiet, tree lined space with concrete benches for residents to enjoy; while also providing access to the courtyard homes surrounding the square. A raised ‘picnic folly’ on the far side of the square ensures active frontage on all sides (this part of the site is too narrow for a house) and provides an informal external space for neighbours to congregate and meet.
We envisage the balconies, terraces and courtyards ‘planted up’ with growies and pot plants and populated by their inhabitants on sunny days. We envisage buildings enlivened by the activity of their occupants, their lives played out on the roofs and facades.
Material Used :
1. Wienerberger – brick – St Ives Cream Rustica
2. Velfac – windows – composite system
3. Aluprof – oriel windows - bespoke
4. Kingspan – insulation - various
5. Topseal – roofing – GRP
