Donnybrook Quarter, Hackney, London Peter Barber Architects

摘要

I was first intrigued by this project (AJ 31.08.06) when I saw it at the Royal Academy and the reality has fulfilled the promise. This is a very clever design which, while building at high density, gives every apartment privacy, private external space, and at the same time makes a delightful, car-free pedestrian street, well supervised by all the residents. Unlike in our projects, the staircases are more private but the logic of placing a maisonette on top of a flat makes for a very generous roof terrace that also acts as the entrance to these apartments. The surrounding area of undistinguished, mostly post-war housing now has this almost Aegean village as a landmark at its crossroads.