Design Quality

Metropolitan Open Land ‘Very Special Circumstances’
Paul Finch writing in the Architects’ Journal on The Power of Architecture about the recent planning success of the Dylon Scheme for Relta.

The power of architecture

You might think, given almost every planning policy going, that it would be impossible to build a significant housing development in London on Metropolitan Open Land, the capital’s version of Green Belt. Yet a scheme in Bromley, designed by Ian Ritchie Architects, has just been approved on appeal, in what must be some sort of speed record for the planning inspectorate: a decision was issued two weeks after the end of the inquiry.

The inspector made the point that ‘the finesse of the design and detailing, particularly the extensive use of glazing, combine to create a development of exceptional architectural placemaking quality that has a lightness of touch and appearance’.

You can only build on MOL in what planning law describes as ‘Very Special Circumstances’. Quality of architecture can be part of that story.