Islington Kings Cross: Urban Design Framework

Strategy for variety
Variety should be addressed on three levels of design:
and understood to support:
adaptability and personalisation
Tubingen’s Baugruppen model
Great efforts should be put into involving future tenants in the design
of spaces and buildings.
As it is not possible to engage all future tenants, ground floor units
should be always freely adapted by those who occupy them and at
minimum for rented residential accommodation the right to one’s
window should be established. Existing houses should be renovated
together with those who live in them.
Framework masterplan
Rather than large developments plots should be divided small
enough to be affordable to buy and build for individuals or small
groups. Inspired by Tubingen’s Baugruppen model (see above)
groups should be able apply to develop parcels and receive
support from the council if they need it.
A variety of building typologies for a variety of tenures should
be built by the council itself in order to minimise the risk of
investment and provide space for small businesses or those
who cannot afford to buy. A number of bare ground floor units
should be established with (electricity connection but nothing
else - see to the right) and let cheaply. The price will allow small
enterprises to invest in opening and the design will allow for
personalisation.
“Man must have the freedom to lean out of his window and to
change his outside wall as far as his arm can reach
dwelling is a human right and and dwelling means the freedom
to change and recreate the outside walls to your human needs
which are different from the architects’ prefabricated formal
dictatorship
it is not only our right but duty to enforce individual creativity in
unifromed sterilised prefabricated housing
man has three skins: his body outsides, his clothing and his
house”
Hundertwasser 1985 Das Haus
Bemerton Estate re-imagined. Inspiration from Hundertwasser, house-doctor
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