Accordia

Accordia, winner of the RIBA Stirling Prize 2008 and the Housing Design Awards 2006, is an inspirational scheme of high-density housing.

We worked with acting masterplanners Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios to create a distinctive and high-quality landscape environment which forms 3.5 hectares of the 9.6 hectare site, and is integral to the project’s success.The public landscape offers a hierarchy of spaces and uses across the site, providing a sequence of quite different environments, characters and functions to encourage use and enjoyment by residents.

Large open spaces offer opportunities for recreation and play, and the landscape concept ‘Living in a Garden’ has inspired different gardens, each with a function or theme: the ‘Kitchen Garden’, the ‘Long Walk’ and the ‘Central Lawn’. All spaces are linked by a network of paths and clearly defined by walls, hedges and boundaries, featuring mature trees and new planting.

Circulation through the scheme is via a series of ‘mews’ streets for shared use by pedestrians, cyclists and car drivers. These are designed with coloured or textured surface treatments to complement the architectural materials, street tree planting and climbing plants on building façades.