Green triumphs: Cambridge housing schemes to feature in national showcase of Britain’s best architecture
01-05-2015
Accordia housing development, Brooklands Avenue Cambridge
Pioneering building schemes in Cambridge are to feature in a national showcase of Britain's best environment-friendly architecture.
A new exhibition in London curated by The Building Centre and the Landscape Institute will focus on projects that make intelligent use of the land where construction takes place.
Cambridge's Accordia housing development in Brooklands Avenue will be featured, as will Cambridge University's North West Cambridge site, the biggest single building scheme the university has undertaken in its 800-year-history. The £1 billion project will provide new homes, academic facilities and public amenities, including extensive green space.
The exhibition, which starts next Thursday at The Building Centre, will "exemplify how landscape architecture can offer sustainable
solutions to the big challenges facing contemporary urban society including flooding and public health."
It is called Rethinking the Urban Landscape, and as well as the Cambridge schemes, projects such as King's Cross and the Olympic Park will be highlighted, as well as small, community-led schemes including pocket parks and community allotments.
Noel Farrer, president of the Landscape Institute, told the News: "Proper land use is now becoming a matter of urgency, with concerns such as the housing crisis, flooding, public health and even food shortages coming to the fore. Lives are being threatened and billions of pounds are being wasted for want of earlier stage investment in the landscape.
"This exhibition is about highlighting the urgent need for a landscape-led approach to our towns and cities. Landscape architects are able to find
solutions from within the natural landscape, avoiding highly engineered responses and ultimately creating schemes that are more sustainable, better designed – and nicer to live in."
It will run for six weeks from January 8 to February 10.