We enter 2022 with another installment of our ongoing Architecture Project of the Week, this time for London School of Architecture student Aanisah Chowdhury who completed her final year project titled Haberdasher Nation. This article explores the inspiration behind Haberdasher Nation and discusses how this proposed development can positively impact British communities with sustainable housing, restoration of post-war architecture, with a focus on the well-being of residences through agriculture and gardening practices.
The goal of Haberdasher Nation is to use nature to form a lasting relationship between social housing tenants and the wider city as a whole. Similar to another students final year project Urban Farm, which incorporates rural farming into urban planning, this proposal would also offer gardening and garden education into the community but on a much larger scale. The site location for the proposed development would be the Haberdasher Estate in the London Borough of Hackney, utilizing up to 3,340 square metres of suburban land.
The first objective of Haberdasher Nation would be to greatly improve and repurpose the existing postwar social housing estate and integrating the estates back into community ownership. Secondly, development would focus on enabling intercity neighbourhoods access to said nature through the use of gardening and then opening the estate up to the city. This would allow the community to be self-sufficient, sustainable, and would greatly improve the living conditions and well-being of its residence.
Haberdasher Nation would be the host a variety of stores, events, educational centres and more. This would include places like the Haberdasher Grocery, along with fresh vegetable and flower markets that will be open during the day, followed by live music performances in the evenings. An integrated playground will allow children to play as they explore their neighbourhood. There would also be small workshops close to community cafes which educate residents in cooking and gardening practises. Streets and in-between spaces would be redesigned to allow vegetable growing on a large scale, all located in short distance of irrigation. Finally, a round-about would be transformed to a flourishing orchid island which would grow apples, pears, lemons, and plums.
Haberdasher Nation would have a big impact on the quality of life and health of it’s residents. It would be seen as a place of “bringing humans closer to nature for health benefits and sustainable food resources.” It would also encourage the estate to be “self-sufficient, improving the existing condition and inserting programmes of education to aid the ambitions.”
Be sure to check out some of our previous architecture projects of the week including the aforementioned Urban Farm, FireLand and Area 10: The Last Nuclear Bomb Memorial.