Commendation for best apartment building
Showing initiative
The city centre of war-torn Coventry has undergone a second renaissance in recent years as a result of the Phoenix Initiative, the £50-million project funded jointly by the city council and the Millennium Commission. This has regenerated the area around the two cathedrals – the burned-out shell of St Michael’s, bombed in 1940, and the new St Michael’s designed by Sir Basil Spence and consecrated in 1962 – linking the cathedral precinct to the Coventry Transport Museum by way of two new public squares (Millennium Place and Priory Place) and two new public gardens (Priory Garden and the Garden of International Friendship).
In 1997, architects and urban designers MacCormac Jamieson Prichard won a limited competition for the master-planning of this ambitious project, which involved a unprecedented collaboration between archaeologists, architects, artists, consulting engineers, contractors, developers, homebuilders, landscape designers, lighting architects, management consultants, quantity surveyors and structural engineers.
Now complete, the Phoenix Initiative won the RTPI Planning Award for City Regeneration, sponsored by English Partnerships, and was shortlisted for the RIBA Stirling Prize last year. As part of the Phoenix Initiative, Complex Development Projects undertook the £10-million development of Priory Place, which has 85 apartments and eight commercial units let as shops, restaurants and bars, as well as
offices for the new BBC local radio station for Coventry and Warwickshire.
The 85 one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments were sold in shell form by Commercial Development Projects to KingsOak Homes, who fitted them out using PCPT Architects, with Claude Hooper Interiors designing the show apartment.
The apartments were sold at prices from £150,000 to £262,500. All the apartments have open-plan living/dining areas, fully integrated kitchens, audio entry systems and secure undercroft parking.
Coventry is all the better for having the initiative to tackle the regeneration of its historic
city centre.
HomeBuilders:
COMPLEX DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS LIMITED
89 Turnmill Street, London EC1M 5QU
Tel 020 7490 5387 Fax 020 7608 1855
Contact: John J C Moss, Director
Email: jjcm@complexdevelopmentprojects.co.uk
Website: www.complexdevelopmentprojects.co.uk
in partnership with
KINGSOAK HOMES LIMITED
Wingrove House, Ponteland Road, Newcastle upon Tyne E5 3DP
Tel 0191 286 6811 Fax 0191 271 2242
Contact: David Simpson, Group Press Officer
Email: sales@barratt-group.co.uk
Website: www.kingsoakhomes.com
Architects:
Master planning and urban design: MacCORMAC JAMIESON PRICHARD
9 Heneage Street, Spitalfields, London E1 5LJ
Tel 020 7377 9262 Fax 020 7247 7854
Contact: Richard Robinson, Marketing Manager
Email: richard.robinson@mjparchitects.co.uk
Website: www.mjparchitects.co.uk
Fitting-out: PCPT ARCHITECTS
10 Vyse Street, Hockley, Birmingham B18 6LT
Tel 0121 236 7070 Fax 0121 236 7717
Contact: David Mahony, Director
Email: design@pcptarchitects.co.uk
Website: www.pcptarchitects.co.uk