Create Streets’ senior architectural designer, Robert Kwolek, considers how important a strong character and identity is to beautiful places with which residents and visitors can fall in love. We tend to like places with a unique identity, those places with a strong, easily recognisable character. Think about the most beautiful places in the world. Usually […]
Create Streets Fellow, Sofie Pringle, asks if user happiness can create a more successful neighbourhood. Creating the successful neighbourhood is important, especially in an increasingly urbanising environment. Happiness is a critical component of this. If we could distil the ‘happiness’ feeling that a person experiences in a given space, irrespective of the social activities and […]
Frothy coffees. Funky spaces. Great neighbours. Green rooves. Walking to everything. Watching the sun go down from your exclusive eyrie. To read the PR patter of a hundred sales brochures right now is to realise that high-rise heaven is round the corner and up the lift-shaft. We have learnt, proclaim sleek developers and confident architects, […]
Beauty remains a problem for many in design, something that is very difficult to talk about. We have heard esteemed colleagues saying they would not pronounce publicly the word “beauty” because that would damage their reputations as academics and scientists. The same could be said of the word “feeling”. Engaging with these basic, fundamental human […]
This blog by Neil Parish MP first appeared on Politics Home here Britain needs more homes. But there’s a problem. The evidence shows that people don’t want to live in new homes. They don’t like the design or street layout. They prefer older properties in traditional streetscapes. A whopping 81% of the British public are […]