Truro based architects and urban designers, csa-architects, have been commended on their designs that secured planning permission for a new development at St George’s Hill, Perranporth. This project will create 16 new homes, half of which will be affordable.
It’s the integration of the affordable and open market homes that drew particularly high praise from the planning committee for csa-architects. Managing Director Justin Dodge commented:
“csa’s landscape and urban designer worked together with the design team to create a scheme that’s sensitive to it’s environment. It’s equally as important to us that the affordable housing utilises the same materials and high quality of design as the open market housing. We feel privileged to have been commended by the planning committee for our plans. Perranporth has an acute need for affordable housing and we’re pleased to be involved in a sensitive, creative solution.”
The proposed development sees an inverted layout making it less visible from the road and creates an active, internal street scene with a strong ‘sense of character’. The natural slate roofed houses will have lower ground floors built from local stone; integrating the buildings into the surrounding landscape, and will feature a palette of pale coloured render with contemporary glazing and timber elements. ‘Sun tunnels’ housed in cowls on the roofs of the semi-detached properties will provide natural light to internal circulation areas and articulation to the roofscape of the scheme.
The permission will allow the development of just over half a hectare of a site that is extremely challenging due to the steepness and ecological restraints of the land. The proposed site layout utilises the natural contours of the site and maximises on the south facing orientation with views over the Perrancombe Valley. The especially steep area at the bottom of the site will be landscaped to create an informal public open space that links to Perrancombe Valley and onto Perranporth via a new public footpath linking the existing paths.
The land was originally identified by Cornwall Council’s Affordable Housing Team in 2009 and after two years of consultation with both the public and Cornwall Council, csa-architects secured the planning permission on the site.
This small scale, high quality development of homes will fit well with the local schools and services in Perranporth and deliver much needed affordable housing for the town.
For more information on csa-architects please visit:
www.csa-architects.co.uk
