Green Street Hill

We were appointed by Greenstreet Housing Co-operative to design 10 self build houses on a site in Lewisham. The scheme was developed through “CHISEL”, a local specialist self-build Housing Association, (Co-operative Housing in South East London), and the houses were of timber framed construction, to allow the self-builders to develop carpentry skills sufficient to carry out the majority of the construction work themselves.

We worked closely with Greenstreet to develop house designs and site layouts and applied these to a number of sites before this site in the Telegraph Hill Conservation Officer was offered by Lewisham Council; it was previously populated with prefabs after the 2nd World War.

The houses were laid out as a terrace to the street with a configuration to create a number of courtyards at the rear, the largest providing a communal garden area and parking.

The design of the houses was based on a series of parallel structural frames which provided outriggers to support walkways and balconies over, protected by a deeply overhanging roof. This created high loft spaces which gave future expansion space, although many were fitted out during the construction period.

The houses were clad in stained ply or boarding with a corrugated mineral cement roof with velux rooflights.