The Malings contains a variety of different house types arranged in terraces. They range from one bedroom apartments to four bedroom houses.
Homes are arranged in terraces, where a three storey town house with both a garden and roof terrace alternates with a variant of the popular and time-honoured Tyneside flat, where one maisonette is stacked over the other to create four storey units. The lower flat has a garden, the upper flat has a terrace. Each has its own front door to the street.
Other house types include tower houses and courtyard houses, used appropriately in different parts of the layout. We believe these house types, perhaps particularly the revival of the Tyneside flat, will give the scheme the ability to attract families into the Ouseburn Valley, something that more conventional apartment types have not achieved in the north of England.
Every home has its own front door. There are no ‘common parts’.
There is considerable variation from the ‘standard’ house type, particularly at the ends of each terrace, so that very few homes are completely identical.
The main house types can be summarized as follows:
1. Town Houses - Generally three storey with living spaces on the ground floor, and bedroom floors above. Front door to the street. Some have small gardens, others have roof terraces, some have both.
2. Tyneside flats - Four storey consisting of two stacked duplex apartments, each with its own front door to the street. The lower flat has living spaces on the ground floor opening to a garden, with a bedroom floor above. The upper flat has living spaces and a terrace on the top floor with bedrooms below.
3. Courtyard flats - Four storey, consisting of two 1-bedroom flats on the two lower floors, and a larger duplex apartment above. Each home has its own front door opening from the street. Built around a courtyard which widens as it rises, providing each home with outdoor space.
4. Tower houses - Four or five storey detached homes, of which there are just three in the scheme. Two have open plan ground floors surrounded by a garden with a stack of bedroom floors above, one bedroom per floor, and a roof terrace. These two houses are entered at quay level where each has a large store. The third house rises above one of the quayside commercial units, with its own front door to the street, and has a terrace instead of a garden at living room level, as well as a roof terrace.
5. Podium homes Three or four storey built on the podium over the undercroft car parks, consisting of a 1-bedroom flat with a small garden terrace on the lower floor, and a larger apartment above with a roof terrace. Each home has its own front door opening either from the street or the platform. Some of the lower flats are Lifetime Homes compliant.
The Malingsis a ground-breaking mixed-use redevelopment located on the banks of the Ouseburn, a small river valley that runs into the River Tyne about a half mile downstream from Newcastle-upon-Tyne’s city centre.
The former industrial site, once home to Malings Pottery, now houses 76 new units comprised primarily of terraced houses and ‘Tyneside’ flats arranged up and down the contours of the steeply sloping site, emphasizing the syncopated roofline and allowing all homes to be perfectly positioned for optimum mid-afternoon sun.
Taking its cue from the traditional life of terraced streets, ever home its own front door opening directly onto a proper street, the layout of which creates a triangular-shaped communal gathering space at its centre. Other, less formal, community magnets have been included such as rain gardens, hanging micro allotments, and shared cycle hubs. Non-residential units at quayside level for community and social enterprise uses leaven the mix and connects to the lively pub music scene of the Ouseburn Valley.
Conservation Statement
The site of The Malings lies within the Lower Ouseburn Valley Conservation Area, which was designated by Newcastle City Council in October 2000. At its northern end, the conservation area is within the World Heritage Site of Hadrian’s Wall.
Significant nearby features of the conservation area include:
The former Ouseburn School (now the Quayside Business Development Centre). It is grade II* listed. It was built in 1893, by FW Rich, and has very distinctive Dutch gables and even more-extraordinary pagoda-type turrets reminiscent of Nepalese or Burmese prototypes.
Almost adjacent to the site, on the other side of Ford Street, is Ballast Hill, which was laid out as a park in the 1930s. It is sometimes also known as Plaguey Fields after plague victims buried there in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Across the River Ouseburn is the former Maynards Toffee Factory, its tall chimney once serving a molasses boiler. Burnt out in the 1990s, it has recently been restored and converted into a creative business centre.
Above the Toffee Factory is Allan House, a red brick warehouse which has become the Hotel du Vin.
Alongside it, on Ouse Street is one of the entrances to the 1839 Victoria Tunnel, listed grade 2, built to transport coal from the colliery at Spital Tongue on the other side of Newcastle.
The grey steel and concrete Ouseburn Barrage has recently been built under the red brick Roman-scale arches of Glasshouse Bridge, built in 1878. It serves to prevent the tidal rise and fall of the Ouseburn’s water level, hiding the low tide mud and thereby intended to beautify the valley and encourage development.
The Tyne Bar is an 1850s building, seemingly a cottage dwarfed by the imposing arches of Glasshouse Bridge. It is one of the key live music venues in the Valley, with a large and loyal audience.
The Ince Building, on a sliver of land between Ford Street and Hume Street is immediately adjacent to the Malings, a strong yet modest building of pink fletton brick.
Lastly, Shepherd’s scrap metal site’s giant yellow crane in the background of many views provides an unmistakable reminder of the area’s industrial past.
The Valley’s character has been defined as ‘perpetually evolving’. Its history from rural settlement on edge of Byker township, to early industrial development, to heavy industry, to an emphasis on arts and crafts industries, to post-industrial decline to, currently, a vibrant and sustainable mélange of creative industries, centred around live music, illustrates this evolution.
Meanwhile Ouseburn’s traditional layout and street pattern is largely retained, as are a palette of materials including brick with stone dressings, slate roofs and stone boundary walls. Views up, down and across the valley are important aspects of its character, and of wayfinding through a complex topography.
On the Malings site itself were, until recently, two building complexes. The first, the Ice factory, was demolished in 2001. It was an undistinguished building, but its scale and location at this river hinge point was appreciated. It is thought to have been built on the site of the Maling Pottery of 1859, whose exact location is unknown. The second was Heaney’s, a series of undistinguished twentieth century sheds.
Newcastle City Council’s Character Statement for the Conservation Area highlights a number of issues for future development which include linking wildlife habitats, retaining green spaces and retaining historic structures and routes. It also identifies opportunities, including improvement of wildlife habitats, improving the riverside, enhancing surfaces and street furniture, and improving links to Quayside. We have sought to address many of these issues in our proposals.
The Character Statement also notes that:
“A key view within the conservation area is that looking north through the arches of Glasshouse Bridge to Lower Steenberg’s Yard. This is typical of the industrial character and appearance of the Valley and contributes positively to the character and appearance of the conservation area.”
In that the site of the Malings is centre-stage in this view, we are aware that its form and appearance is of the utmost importance to the future character of the Ouseburn Valley.
On the following pages are a series of maps showing the development of the Conservation Area between 1770 and 1898.
River frontage
Consideration of amenity space, sunlight and views The central triangular Maling Place provides an important new public space. By laying out terraces down the slope of the site, all the units share views down to the river. The site layout provides an open aspect to the south, south west and west, where the sun is for most of the day.
Relationship with river and walkway The site layout opens towards the river and is contiguous with the proposed riverside walk to maximize utilization of routes both across and up and down the Valley.
Security and access at lower level For reasons of flood risk, privacy and security, residential entrances are raised above quay level. The riverside walk is enlivened by four commercial units (possibly shops, a mini-garden centre, a café), and by cycle storage, bringing activity to the waterside.
Street frontage
Active street frontage and entrances All the streets within the scheme, plus the existing Maling and Hume Streets, have front doors to individual units opening at regular intervals all along them. On-street parking for vehicles in both Maling and Hume Street will encourage activity within and beyond the development area. The riverside walk has commercial frontages.
Entrances and defensible space All new open spaces within the scheme, as well as all surrounding spaces are overlooked by windows providing ‘eyes on the street’. The pedestrian pathways that follow the contours allow clear sightlines from end to end, avoiding corners and dark spots to enhance security.
Proposed use/mix of units
Optimum number of units The proposal provides 76 units.
Appropriate mix of house and apartment types The proposal provides 71 homes, a mix of 25 houses and 51 flats. There is a range of different layouts. 18 homes are affordable. Innovative typologies have been developed, including a house-type inspired by the traditional Tyneside flat, and tall, thin tower houses. All units have generous private outdoor areas, either in the form of small gardens or large terraces.
Appropriate mix of dwelling size A range of unit sizes is provided, ranging from 1 bedroom flats to 4 bedroom houses.
Relationship to context All units whether houses or flats have their own front doors opening directly onto the public pavement. Units have views out onto streets, open public spaces, and gardens, and most catch views of the river.
Dual aspect There are no single aspect units. All units are at least dual aspect, and some are triple or quadruple aspect.
Other suggested uses and appropriateness We have suggested a number of quayside commercial units, a central, iconic cycle store with games area on top, a communal, front-staged refuse and recycling area, and community micro-allotments.
Access and movement
Clear pedestrian and vehicular routes The proposal seeks to extend in a natural way the existing street and pedestrian route layout on the east side of the Ouseburn.
Access and permeability across the site The vehicular routes down the slope combine with pedestrian routes following the site contour to provide a very permeable and accessible layout.
Pedestrian priority positive streetscape It is proposed that the entire public realm within the site, and including parts of the riverside walkway, should be shared surface with traffic calming measures included through good design, as opposed to speed bumps and the like. This will give strong pedestrian priority and create flexible space that can be used by all. Barrier benches something like giant flints will prevent runaway vehicles ending up in the river.
Communal amenity spaces
Provision of appropriate amenity space Amenity spaces include allotments and a public square in the form of Maling Place.
Orientation of amenity space The site layout gives all these spaces an ideal orientation sloping to the southwest.
Primary and secondary entry and exits There is a clear hierarchy of vehicular and pedestrian routes with traffic calming and pedestrian priority throughout the site.
Surveillance of amenity areas All amenity areas are overlooked by many windows.
Traffic free amenity space The site layout, combined with careful design to enable traffic calming without highway clutter and paraphernalia will create a safe yet easily serviced environment.
Landscaping
Defined public and private areas Internal ‘common parts’ and semi-public spaces have been eliminated entirely. All spaces are either definitively public or definitively private.
Considered design of amenity space The amenity spaces draw on the site’s advantages, capturing sunny wind-still locations where chance encounters, the stuff of community, can occur.
Communal facilities
Discrete/integrated refuse and recycling stores. We have arranged recycling areas to be a bit like the village well, centrally located and front staged, so as to be a natural community focus and meeting space, and a source of pride to residents.
Discrete integrated cycle stores We are proposing a mix of individual and shared stores combining security with community responsibility.
Overlooked entries and exits Facilities have been carefully located to provide safety and security.
Parking
On site parking provision We have a 1:1 parking provision, partly on streets on and around the site, partly in two small, secure undercroft garages, half-buried by the site’s slope and naturally ventilated.
Discrete/integrated parking In line with our overall strategy of extending the ‘normal’ city, parking is on street in front of people’s houses.
Car club parking In addition to 76 spaces for the 76 homes, there are two additional spaces which will house a car club car and van.
Surveillance/security
Blank elevations – designed out There are no blank elevations in the proposal.
Maximise window openings The proposal has the form of streets with houses in them, with regularly arrayed, vertically proportioned windows overlooking streets and gardens.
Overlooking of courts, streets and routes The layout aims to design out blind alleys, uncertain spaces and dodgy corners.
Form, material and colour
Limited palette of principal materials We propose to use traditional, locally sourced red brick, with white-painted timber-framed high-performance windows, mainly as pierced masonry openings, vertically proportioned. Front doors will be painted timber, simple and dignified, and themed with typical colours used in their pottery ware by the former Maling Pottery. Streets will be paved with a mix of tarmac and grey granite, both cropped and flame textured.
Appropriateness of materials The principal material, brick, will be carefully selected to harmonize with local practice. We will source bricks, joinery and other building materials locally, in keeping with Igloo’s Footprint SI policy.
Appropriateness of form and massing The proposal can be read as an informal grouping of hillside terraces, laid out in a non-rigid layout naturally arising from the site’s topography and orientation. We hope it will be seen as simultaneously traditional and radically contemporary.
Interiors
Flexible layouts, views and aspect Interior layouts are designed to maximize the advantages of each individual plot, and to provide flexible accommodation with scope for future adaptability.
High specification of fittings and finishes Igloo’s Footprint policy demands a sustainable approach to all aspects of design and this leads naturally to designing for quality, user-friendliness and longevity.
Design quality
Considered design approach to site The design is specifically tailored to this particular site. It enjoys what is special and distinct about Ouseburn and aims to extend and enhance that particularity.
Appropriateness of scale of buildings The buildings take their lead from the existing scale of Ouseburn, conscious of their location within the valley profile, and aiming to create a sense of place as one passes up and down the valley or across it.
Considered design of buildings The houses which make up the proposal are architecturally quite simple in concept, based on traditional terrace prototypes, but sophisticated in their composition and their attitude to urbanism and place making.
Contemporary architecture We are aiming for an exemplary urbanism of exceptional quality.
High quality public realm We envisage a high quality and robust public realm which enjoys its ‘ordinariness’, with details that help anchor this development with its surroundings, rather than trying to be distinct from them.
SUSTAINABILITY STANDARDS
We are aiming for a scheme with high levels of environmental sustainability. As a baseline, the residential units are designed to achieve Code for Sustainable Homes level 4, as well as to meet Lifetime Homes criteria wherever possible and to hit all twenty Building for Life criteria.
Specifically, the houses will be built to very high levels of insulation, using locally sourced brick and high performance timber framed windows. Roofs will be green and brown, many of them providing outdoor amenity space for inhabitants as well as diverse habitats for wildlife. Low energy fittings and appliances, and low water-use taps and WC cisterns will be specified. Rainwater butts will reduce water waste. Sustainable drainage will be used in the public realm incorporating rills which will take surface water directly into the river.
We want the scheme to help promote more sustainable ways of living. So we are proposing shared allotment plots, a gardening club, outdoor clothes drying, a car club, easy storage of cycles, shared recycling areas, eco manuals for new residents, and broadband connectivity (encouraging home delivery, thus cutting down on car journeys).
The construction techniques and materials proposed for the development scheme are all traditional and easily accessible. This will permit them to be locally sourced and constructed using local resources, built by the people of the Northeast for the people of the Northeast.
In addition, Igloo require all their projects to conform to their SI (sustainable investment) Footprint policy: indeed the United Nations have called Igloo “The World’s first responsible real estate fund.” Igloo has defined four SI themes:
— Health, happiness and wellbeing – Investing in people and communities in order to change lives and realise potential; — Regeneration – Investing not just in physical regeneration but in the social and economic lifeblood of urban neighbourhoods; — Environmental Sustainability – Investing in more environmentally sustainable forms of urban development, and associated infrastructure and services; — Urban Design – Investing in placemaking to create distinctive, vibrant and mixed use neighbourhoods that are urban in character.
These themes are based on the belief that Igloo’s investments will perform better if they contribute to the regeneration of the area they are in (and therefore benefit from that regeneration), if they are environmentally sustainable (and therefore ‘future-proofed’, against higher energy costs for example), and if they are well designed (and therefore more attractive to occupiers). But above all Igloo believes that investment in the health, happiness and wellbeing of people and communities should form the basis for successful regeneration projects.
RESPONSE TO PLANNING ISSUES
We have carefully studied the planning context for this site, have regularly discussed key issues with Newcastle City Planners, Highways and Environmental Health, and can make the following observations:
Conservation Area The site is in the Lower Ouseburn Valley Conservation Area. Our response to this as has been to be meticulous in researching and understanding the history, the topography, the urban grain and the materiality of the Ouseburn Valley and our design proposals seek to set an exemplary benchmark for a calm, cohesive new urban realm in what is currently a ‘fragmented and disjointed townscape’.
Flood risk The site’s topography will be sculpted so that all residential units are above the flood risk line. This means that their ground floors remain significantly above quayside level, and this creates the opportunity to tuck in under the units nearest the river a line of simple commercial and social enterprise units.
Affordable housing It is our intention to provide approximately 25% affordable housing, that is 18 units out of 76. Our aim is to make the development tenure blind, and the affordable housing is pepperpotted around the site.
Car Parking Parking is on street, both within the scheme, as part of a high quality shared surface public realm with clear pedestrian priority, and along the kerbsides of the streets around the scheme, Maling Street and Hume Street. We are achieving 1to 1 parking provision, as well as providing spaces for car club provision. In addition a number of cars are houses in naturally ventilated undercroft car parks, secure and discretely hidden by the slope of the site.
Cycle provision and storage We are providing cycle storage facilities for 147 cycles.
Privacy and overlooking In a high density scheme like the one proposed, we have discussed with Newcastle planners the fact that normal suburban standards will not necessarily always be achieved. We will support our planning application with case studies showing examples with similar arrangements of density, windows, roof terraces, etc.
CONCEPT DESIGN
Ouseburn Ouseburn is unique, and we want our development to enhance its distinctiveness. The scheme aims to make a cohesive community which takes cues from the traditional life of terraced streets. With this in mind, we have given every residential unit its own front door which opens directly onto a proper street. We have made these streets relate directly to the river, running down the contours of the site to the quayside. The south westerly slope of the site means that it is perfectly oriented for mid afternoon sun.
We think these tight-knit terraces will help to create a genuine sense of community in the lower Ouseburn, providing community facilities, eyes on the street and chance encounters, as well as commercial opportunities, perhaps small shops and cafés that will be used by and benefit residents. Bridges and the riverside walk will connect this new community to the Toffee Factory, and the surrounding community in other parts of the Valley.
Health happiness and wellbeing Igloo’s Footprint SI policy, to which all its projects must adhere, has a number of key themes of which the first, and arguably the most important, is Health, Happiness and Wellbeing. By investing in places and communities, and designing these places so that people feel good about them, we create places where people want to be, and add to the vitality and success of Ouseburn’s future.
House types There are two main residential types: the terraced house, generally three storeys high with a small garden behind; and a variant of the popular and time-honoured Tyneside flat, where one maisonette is stacked over the other to create four storey units. The lower flat has a garden, the upper flat has a large terrace over the roof of the adjoining three storey house.
Other house types include tower houses and courtyard houses, used appropriately in different parts of the layout. We believe these house types, perhaps particularly the revival of the Tyneside flat, will give the scheme the ability to attract families into the Ouseburn Valley, something that more normal apartment types have not achieved in the north of England.
Layout The terraces run up and down the contours rather than along them. This creates a drama of inclined streets with a syncopated roofline whose rhythms are emphasized by avoiding running the terraces in completely straight lines.
We have aimed to create some clear foci to the layout, primarily with East Bank Place, a triangular-shaped space in the centre of the scheme running down to a bridge over the river, and also with some less formal community magnets such as small allotment plots, and shared recycling spaces.
We aim to encourage mixed uses within the scheme, for commercial and social enterprise uses, which leaven the mix and enliven the waterside.
We have avoided repetition. Each house is different, each open space within the project has a different character, in terms of its slope, its sense of enclosure, and the vistas it provides. As well as the shared surface vehicular streets running down to the river, we have provided pedestrian-only paths along the contours running across the development.
Building structures Our intention is to enable robust detailing with relatively light weight materials allowing modern methods of construction to be explored while limiting the self weight of the buildings to avoid the need for major substructure works in what are challenging ground conditions. Current thinking is that the construction will be of PassiveHaus standard insulation within a timber-panelled inner skin with a brick outer skin. Foundations and earthworks By using relatively light weight superstructures, the aim is to use shallow foundations across the site. The benefit this brings include reduced earthworks, which can be expensive; less excavated material, that is potentially contaminated; and mitigation of risks in the ground through less activity in this area. Options being currently considered include 1. Individual rafts to each property with edge thickening to support walls. This option would include rockers to all services to allow predicted settlement to occur without damage to the services. 2. Vibro-stone columns with either option (1) or a simple strip foundations solution. This includes vibro-stone piles across the site, to a depth of circa 5m to increase the allowable bearing strength of the ground at shallow depths. A sheet pile arrangement is proposed at the bottom edge of the site to avoid any damage to the river wall. This will permit safe working during the construction period and protection during the life of the project. Where possible excavation will be avoided to limit exposure to potentially contaminated material. We intend containing the materials, cleaning it and capping it on site. Creating a series of terraced gardens and community spaces will be achieved through simple yet very effective construction through reinforced masonry dwarf walls to permit micro management of levels and cut and fill exercises to create a series of tiered gardens between residential blocks. Drainage Sustainable drainage will be introduced where possible.. If needed, attenuation will be included within the surface water drainage.
Discussions continue with the Environment Agency to explore if there is scope to direct surface water run-off directly into the River Ouseburn, providing a truly sustainable drainage solution for the site.
Movement and transport Movement throughout the site places pedestrians at its heart. All areas will be designated for pedestrian use and the site will be designed to allow access to vehicles where needed and appropriate, but in manner that will be safe and civilised. Streets and pathways are orientated to complement and connect to the wider street network, green spaces and public realm of the area. The proposed footbridges not only relate to the history and culture of the area but also provide important connections. The streetscape will be designed to accommodate private car parking without compromising the space for pedestrians and families. Where possible, parking bays will be visible from the properties to which they relate.
