Jigneys Meadow Housing

Chrishall is a quintessential English village, characterized by its numerous historical buildings, its pub and its village green. To address the acute shortage of good quality affordable housing in the village a terrace of four new build low energy affordable homes has been designed for Hastoe Housing Association, complemented by a detached ‘passivhaus’. The vision is to develop a sustainable community of new homes for local people at a scale appropriate and complimentary to the rural setting and it’s special character.

The unmanaged site next to the village green has been allowed to develop naturally over the years and has an inherent ecological value. The juxtaposition of the new buildings and their immediate landscape setting will create an exciting exchange between the village and countryside. The visual boundaries between the two are blurred resulting in a richer more valuable environment than either could attain on their own.

The building forms are compact to minimise the building envelope. The building fabric is designed to minimize energy load in construction and in use. The materiality of the new buildings reference existing historical buildings within the village, which incorporate traditional materials, such as timber and render, transcending their age.

Planning permission was granted in 2014. The proposals represent the culmination of discussions with the Parish Council over a number of years.

Model Photos: Ben Tynegate