West Indian Cultural Centre revamp

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Permalink Reply by Mavic Starfish on March 28, 2021 at 12:14

Thanks, last paragraph - 

He and his business partners, the developers Paul Simon and Magic Homes, have already spent £1m in planning and architects’ fees, and the whole scheme will cost tens of millions, he said. “It’s an ambitious scheme. What is important is for young people – I’m 51 and I’ve got four children under 25 – to see that people who look like them can be as ambitious as they get. What I believe we need to do is brave things.”

i get the impression that Paul Simon get first dibs on any spare land in and around the ladder, they're certainly getting more and more ambitious with the size of their projects.

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Permalink Reply by Don on March 28, 2021 at 13:19

This story reads like a re-written press release. Magic Homes are part of the Paul Simon Group (though identified separately in the article) and, as usual, there’s the promise of “affordable homes” to make the project look worthy. Is this a community-based initiative to be part-funded by commercial development, or a property developer wanting to sweeten a potentially ambitious planning application by including a community resource as icing on the cake (cf the “health centre” proposed in the plans for the redeveloped Hawes & Curtis site in Green Lanes)? 

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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on March 28, 2021 at 18:23

What this article misses completely is that the development they seem to be championing, although it does include 30 homes, offers the bulk of the new dwellings as 100 co-living rooms.  These are single rooms without their own kitchens (they will be shared with other rooms). If that’s what people want, fine, but it’s lazy at best and disingenuous at worst to not even mention that in the article. A typical co-living room plan by the developer below

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on March 28, 2021 at 19:10

More about this proposed development here. 

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Permalink Reply by Alison on April 2, 2021 at 15:59

14 STORIES  seems wholly inappropriate given the surrounding buildings.

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on April 2, 2021 at 17:48

It's in an area currently exempted from height restrictions. The area just to the north of this plot will soon be a cluster of towers of the same height. Just to its south is the Hampden Road development which is a little taller and sitting on higher ground. 

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