Listening is an important part of the development process something Lend Lease learned quickly on in the early stages of planning the £1.5bn Elephant & Castle development.
In an interview in this week’s EG Lend Lease talks openly about listening to locals early on in the process and how Lend Lease learned this in south London.
Kevin Chapman, UK head of offices at the firm, says: “It is too easy to go and talk to all the usual agencies and the council, when you should be getting a handle on what the community wants.
“We discovered the importance of the large number of mature trees on the Heygate Estate, SE1. People really cared about that. Lend Lease didn’t realise how important the trees were at the beginning. Now those trees are integral to the development. All the apartments in the 235-unit Trafalgar Place phase have a view of a tree, and that is a powerful reference point for the rest of the development. So it is really important to understand local preferences before you get into planning.”
With residential capital values soaring up to and beyond £5,000 per sq ft and high fit-out costs squeezing margins, mixed-use is increasingly looking to be the answer to shrinking capital costs.
Getting a London mixed-use development to stack up has never been easier – and, simultaneously, never been harder. It is a paradox that is all thanks to money.
High residential capital values make all other uses look slightly tarnished. That office rents are looking strong, and prime retail is impregnable, is beside the point. Yet residential comes with risks and high fit-out costs, and squeezing its supersize numbers into a successful financial model produces enormous strain.
