Alex Ely and his team at Mæ Architects make good buildings. Thoughtful buildings. Buildings that actually believe in the people who use them. Curiously, in their ecosystem, that’s rare. They won the Stirling Prize for another project, the John Morden Centre, which proved buildings for later life don’t have to look like hospitals or storage units.
This is Daventry House in Westminster, Mae were commissioned to replace a crumbling pile of bedsits called Penn House. The new site? Quite tricky, beside a major road, a few awkward changes in levels. A wedge of land near Lisson Grove. Mae turned it into a 13-story tower with a four-story base. Shops and startups go below. Tennants live above. Light brick. Big balconies, and not those bolt-on windy ones, sweeping views from deep recesses, protected from the elements. The corridors are wide enough for wheelchairs, and there’s a lounge and a terrace where residents actually talk to each other, they’re all pretty friendly, relaxed, might be something to do with the place they live.
The UK’s housing crisis isn’t just about young people crammed into overpriced shoeboxes. It’s also about old people stuck in too much space, often alone, living on pause because there’s nowhere else to go. If they had good places to move to, families could get the bigger homes they need. Westminster City Council understands this well.
Everyone at Daventry house were a delight (don’t let the absence of people in the shots fool you, we were constrained by GDPR) and Westminster’s proud. They should be. It’s a rare thing: public housing that doesn’t treat people like a problem to be managed. The future’ holds many challenges, but at least in this little corner of London, growing old doesn’t have to be.
