Plans submitted for 525 new homes and college in Clapham Common

Proposals for the redevelopment of the land known as “Lambeth College Clapham Common Campus”, which is part of the London Southbank Universities (LSBU).

Plans submitted by the Brixton headquartered Squire & Partners on behalf of client developer Thornton Park (Southside), appointed the architects to design plans for the phased redevelopment of the site.

Proposals lodged with Lambeth Council propose six residential buildings ranging in height from 6 to 13 storeys as well as a new college building at 8 storeys on the same 1.43-hectare site.

During the pre-application process, it was initially proposed to have a taller building of in excess of 20 floors at the centre of the scheme. This was removed in subsequent design iterations, and the number of smaller homes was increased to compensate for those in the scrapped taller element without increasing the heights of the surrounding proposed mansion block-type buildings elsewhere within the development.

The site is around 200 meters south of Clapham Common Underground station, served by the Northern Line in addition to a range of a number of high-frequency bus routes.

As the site is evidently well-served by public transport, which means that aside from 30 disabled blue-badge spaces below ground via car lifts. It will overall generally speaking be a car-free scheme.

Included within the six new residential buildings across the site, it also includes a Replacement Educational facility consisting of 6000 sq/m of re-provided high-quality educational floor space.

Situated at the southern end of the application site, the re-provided building is set to be compromised, of ground and five upper floors of educational floorspace accessible directly from the main proposed new central plaza.

Across the six new residential buildings for the site, 375 homes are set for private sale of which 73% are one-bed homes and an additional 46 for intermediate which is better known as Shared Ownership.

Finally, on income-restricted housing, 104 of these homes are for so-called “Low-Cost Rent”, which can either mean social rent or more likely London Affordable Rent or London Living Rent assuming those homes are acquired by a housing association rather than the cash-strapped local council.

The proposed scheme as viewed from Clapham Common, image credit RMA Heritage.