Agar Grove: A rare example of what councils can do for housing

 

Though through the rose-tinted spectacles of the post-war housing boom, the former estate may have been envisioned as an ‘urban village’ but had become dangerously insular. The head-high railing bordering the estate made a clear, almost aggressive mark of separation from the surrounding quintessential Edwardian townhouses.

 

“The estate looked inwards, there were no active frontages, no passive surveillance and it turned its back on the road,” remarks Alex Ely, Founding Director at Mae. While the site itself was intimidating to navigate, many of the houses were undersized and awkward – “Well below standards we would accept today,” Ely continues. 

 

 

With a long history of typically working-class communities being uprooted to make way for the relentless march of development and redevelopment, there’s a notable trend of local authorities simply ‘forgetting’ about long-term residents in developing new patches of the city. With that in mind, Camden Council undertook extensive community consultation, with potentialities ranging from ‘do nothing’ to ‘full-scale redevelopment’. Eventually, landing on something towards the latter with the approval of residents.

 

The new estate layout features amenity spaces and play spaces, including a multi-use games area and new tree and plant provision within new communal gardens interspersed by resident blocks, following the tried and tested traditional concept of ‘streets and squares’ which hark back to key characteristics of municipal building typologies.

 

From street level, the blocks are expressive in form and deceptively ‘non-monolithic’. Considered brickwork quietly punctuates the underlying building structure and celebrates ground-floor openings, animating space from the pedestrian plane. Meanwhile, balconies and setbacks strike a rhythm that references the typical mansion blocks and townhouse typologies that populate the surrounding area.

 

Tapping into the long history of state-owned municipal housing, Ely notes, “We were looking to the likes of the Millbank estate, which has a sort of consistency in terms of its brick treatment and an amazing richness of detail and variety which ends up constituting a localised character.”

 

 

Community engagement was key to the success of the project:  “The brief and principle of development were established in open dialogue with all residents, to ensure as many people as possible had their opinions heard,” says Phil Catcheside, architect at Hawkins\Brown.

 

Among the most pressing concerns that emerged from this consultation was energy efficiency – a reflection of the mounting pressure on household bills which has seen energy prices having risen by over 240% in the last decade. What was once a secondary design consideration has become a deal-breaker for many, as the cost of running a home increasingly erodes disposable income.

 

In a remarkable show of responsiveness, Camden Council retrospectively upgraded the scheme to meet Passivhaus standards, after gaining planning consent in 2013, an ambitious move driven by residents, many of whom were living in fuel poverty.

 

As the name suggests, Passivhaus aims to maximize passive gains from the surrounding environment, reducing energy consumption by up to 90%. At its core, the building standard revolves around five key principles: High-quality insulation, airtight construction, thermal bridge-free design, high-performance windows, and mechanical ventilation with heat recovery (MVHR) – translating into homes that are warmer, quieter, and significantly cheaper to run.

 

This performance-driven philosophy extends into the design process itself, adopting a ‘fabric first’ approach, using the relationship between energy efficiency and building envelope as a key design driver. Catcheside comments, “There’s often a preconception that a Passivhaus scheme will be essentially one block form and orientation multiplied across the site, but we’ve proved with this project that that doesn’t need to be the case, a building can have setbacks, external balconies, vary orientation and the architectural characteristics which we’ve come to expect. And meet Passivhaus standards.”

 

 

Adopting a “move once” policy, residents were able to remain in their existing homes until their new ones were ready, avoiding the disruption of temporary relocation with the added benefit that they could watch their houses being built on their doorstep. “Freeing up space for the initial 38 houses allowed us to start this kind of rolling program, almost like a jigsaw. Create the gap, fill the gap, and so on,” says Ely.

 

With Mae and Hawkins/Brown brown each designing their blocks individually, Catcheside remarks, “We were able to create a natural heterogeneity across the site, but we took care to maintain a consistent architectural language.” Influenced by Camden’s impactful history in creating experimental municipal architecture, Ely notes, “We were inspired by the likes of Alexandra Road, Brunswick Center, and Branch Hill, each of which explores this idea of ideas, split levels, duplexes. Homes internally exercise a variation of microcosms within an otherwise open area, allowing for light to filter through communal spaces. You get something that feels like it’s a lot more generous and dynamic,” notes Ely.

 

In contrast, Hawkings/Brown favoured a more lateral approach, keeping rooms on a consistent plane yet demarcating various space types using screening and material changes. Most notably in the indoor/balconies, creating a subtle take on a solarium, adapted to meet Passivhaus standards and maintain airtightness. Catcheside comments, “On a sunny day, you can open the windows and you get a sort of Juliet balcony. The rest of the year it’s a space inside the flat, turning the external into amenity space.”

 

As one of the few council housing schemes currently under construction, Agar Grove is a rarity in today’s housing landscape. The long-standing stagnation in public housing dates back to reforms introduced in the 1980s, which significantly restricted local authorities’ ability to build. “Councils now have the right to build again,” says Ely. “But it’s on a small scale, and they’re heavily reliant on government or Greater London Authority grants.”

 

 

To make the project viable, Camden took a calculated risk with 50% of the homes at Agar Grove being sold privately to fund the delivery of new council housing. “It’s a brave move,” Ely admits. “The council only gets to see a financial return at the very end of the project. That said, the houses have sold incredibly reassuringly well.”

 

Given that much of London’s post-war council housing stock is becoming increasingly obsolete, Agar Grove indicates a healthy opportunity to not only learn from its shortfalls of the past but also address social and environmental reform in the process.

 

In a city grappling with both a housing shortage and a climate emergency, Agar Grove offers more than just new homes. It’s an example of what can happen when local authorities resist short-term fixes in favour of long-term vision; when architecture is informed by technical performance as well as community voices, which are not just heard, but actively shape the outcome.

 

While it won’t single-handedly solve London’s housing crisis, Agar Grove stands as a reminder that housing can be beautiful, sustainable and fair – if we choose to make it so.

 

Teshome Douglas Campbell is a London based architectural designer, alumnus of the New Architecture Writers (NAW) programme and founding member of PATCH Collective