The new building stands at the summit of Highgate High Street at a prominent point signalling a historic route descending into London. The narrow tapering site completed a terrace of listed buildings opposite the magnificent Highgate School Chapel.  The resulting building creates a focal point of civic quality at the confluence of North Hill, Highgate High Street and West Hill. It echoes the High Street typology of a shop with dwelling above.  Its sculptural composition creates new juxtapositions and vistas with the historic neighbouring buildings and landscape setting.

At the apex the reintegrated flower stall enjoys a display plinth with a glazed canopy above to create a colourful focal point - and connect the High Street retail to the existing shops on West Hill and thus increase the village’s commercial vitality.  The florist’s canopy aligns with the adjacent building on West Hill to create the ‘gateway’ to Snow Hill, a pedestrianised alley, that descends to the public garden in Pond Square. 

Off Snow Hill steps lead to a covered entrance to the physiotherapist’s studio. On the corner facing Pond Square the residential entrance accesses the staircase ascending to a 3 bedroom maisonette above the retail. 

The composition reflects the incremental historic growth along Highgate High Street and the rendered elevation simultaneously reads as three small shop units or one larger building. The Snow Hill façade responds to the ad hoc vernacular of Pond Square and features a two storey London Stock brick base with an array of oversailing oak boarded fins above which facilitate a bedroom layout on this complex tapered site. At the apex the two distinct elevations curve towards each other but remain bifurcated by the projecting bay window and the flower shop canopy. These elements are fabricated with a fretted floral pattern of bronzed aluminium to create an extraordinary and delicate contextual focal point at the climax to the High Street.