We are so proud to have provided a first-class architectural service in the transformation and implementation of this major addition to the Watford skyline.

Nearing completion, and looking spectacular, developer / contractor client, Jaysam Contractors Ltd, has built nearly 300 flats, located in two large-scale buildings which step-up to 12 storeys high, on a brownfield site alongside the future Metropolitan line extension with views across the greenery of Moor Park and Rickmansworth.

Starting with an un-viable planning consent, Method Architects completely re-worked the scheme, achieving not one, but two, Section 73 consents as works progressed on site. We worked closely with the client and planning consultants Woolf Bond to secure the revised permissions and with the whole design team to coordinate the approval of all planning conditions and other S106 obligations.

RIBA Stages 4 and 5 information has been prepared clearly, efficiently and in a timely fashion, responding always to the changing demands of site conditions and commercial considerations, to de-risk, as far as possible, our client’s position, insofar as design issues can assist.

The project incorporated over 400 pod bathroom and shower rooms, with Method Architects being instrumental in the scheduling of two standard pod-types, cleverly adapting the layouts to permit such a high degree of standardisation. The manufacturing, identification, batch delivery and installation centred around Method Architect’s scheduling information and we are pleased to report a faultless delivery.

A final challenge for the project was to incorporate three new, ten-storey internal alternative escape stairs, to future-proof the development in response to the changing climate surrounding the Building Safety Act (2022).

Together with the Jaysam team the project was steered through the Building Safety Act emerging legislation and will complete on site in early 2026.

This is the sixth project with client Jaysam with whom we have forged a successful and mutually-beneficial relationship.

Hilldrop Road extends four flats to the rear of a pair of existing four-storey Victorian villas in Camden.

Method Architects gained planning consent for a brick-built extension to flats on the upper ground and lower ground floors of this communal apartment block.

Caledonian House is a new development of 93 flats in the heart of Watford- just a stone’s throw from the International Railway Station. 

Method Architects worked with developer / contractor Jaysam Ltd (Signia Living) and the project team (Pindoria Associates, Bannerman Consulting, Exova, GTA Civils) on the construction phases of the project which completed in July 2020.

A great deal of re-design of the consented scheme, by Method Architects, was required: re-planning of 75% of the flats which did not comply with Approved Document B for means of escape, whilst still delivering exactly the same accommodation mix. In addition, the external flank wall had to be completely redesigned after the consequences of the fire at Grenfell Tower had been absorbed. A consented vertical green living-wall was no longer permitted and the lost foliage was re-interpreted as a screen of three-dimensional shimmering green glazed bricks.

The basement car park was another challenge that drew on all of our experience. The new concrete frame structure was to be built (partly) over an existing basement car park in order to re-use a perfectly sound construction. This meant that we could also avoid creating multiple new boundary conditions and thereby save around 30 party wall awards in the process.

Planning consent for this significant new apartment building was won through planning appeal and the project has now completed on site. It replaced a pair of badly dilapidated semi-detached Victorian villas with twelve shiny new flats, all spacious and light-filled.

The opportunity for a substantial new building was created because of the presence of a neighbouring six-storey storage building. However, the scale of the storage building needed to be married to the rest of the street, and a TPO tree in the rear garden was a further limiting factor.

But, gratifyingly for Method Architects, the planning inspector's decision was primarily based upon his opinion that the scheme would "enhance the character and appearance of the street scene", and he praised our proposal as "having considerable merit...and a high standard of design"

And what is more - this success has created an additional 200% net internal floorspace compared to the existing villas, adding huge value to a very tricky inner-urban site.

The block was completed in April 2019. 

Method architects was asked by go-ahead property developer Carrain Ltd to look at its portfolio of properties in North and West London.

The first project to get the green light was the conversion of the roof space, on top of an existing 1990s block, into six self-contained flats. With three one-bed and three two-bed flats the project extends the lift to the fourth floor and creates a new floor of accommodation.

The flats are arranged along a central corridor and lit by a line of dormer windows along the front and rear elevations and rooflights in the hallways and kitchen areas. By careful specification of materials by Method the interiors have been finished to a high standard within the client's budget.

This scheme maximises the rental value from the existing property and allow improvements to the street elevation at the same time. All flats are for the rental market and letting agents described the interiors as at the premium end of the market and finished to a very high standard. Half of the flats were let within two days of marketing.

Rather strangely, this unprepossessing property was left as the centre-piece in a new wider redevelopment by Barratt of East London. It was acquired in 2000 as a grim two bedroom maisonette above a garage workshop

The project initially entailed the complete re-planning and refurbishment of the maisonette to become a light and airy family home with a fabulous west facing top floor terrace

Thanks to a fortuitous change in the surrounding parking restrictions in 2004, it became possible to convert the workshop from domestic garages into a delightful one bedroom flat, raised slightly above street level to create a sense of privacy

The introduction of a controlled parking zone in the surrounding streets meant that the ground floor one bedroom flat could be offered as a car-free development, thereby overcoming the only legitimate planning objection. Thanks to convenient public transport options the fact that a purchaser was not entitled to a parking permit seemed to have no effect upon the final value

Using its particular skills in feasibility testing and enabling the development of difficult sites, Method Architects has produced a viable scheme for nine new apartments and office space above a still-operating vehicle repair-shop in Islington, London.

The single-storey, L-shaped coachworks is within the Hillmarton Conservation Area. The site was constrained further by factors including an adjacent Victorian pub and the need to avoid prejudicing on-going workshop operations including paint spraying.

Method succeeded in unlocking the potential of the site and won planning permission for the £ XXXXXX million project on appeal. The residential element is, in-effect, an air-rights scheme.

By expediting the permission, Method Architects beat the deadline for the introduction of the Community Infrastructure Levy [correct?] that would have seen a tax of 50 – 60k payable on each new flat. This was significant saving to the client (the coachworks’ owner, rather than a professional developer) who Method guided through the complex process.

Nine new residential properties are proposed above garage workshop and office accommodation on an existing site in Camden. This scheme redevelops part of the site of a garage coachworks to provide new staff and workshop accommodation below apartments located in a leafy conservation area and well-connected part of the borough

This project received planning permission, won on appeal, in late 2013

Method architects were asked to look at the refurbishment of a London townhouse to create four new flats for client The Span Group

Two studio apartments on the ground floor were created by inserting a bright kitchen pod into the space which incorporated space-saving ideas: a pull-out bed under the units and a flip-up table for dining. The design is specifically aimed at young people using high quality and robust materials: 3D ceramic wall tiles, quartz worktops and ceramic floor tiles warmed by under-floor heating

On a backland site in the leafy suburbs of Friern Barnet Method Architects was commissioned to prepare two simultaneous planning applications for schemes of four and five new family homes respectively

The design of the houses takes full advantage of the falling levels across the site by introducing a generous 10m wide family room at a lower ground The planning designation of backland sites has changed from brownfield to greenfield land. Consent for such schemes may become increasingly difficult to achieve in future, making superb design and value-added thinking all the more important

The scheme received planning consent at appeal despite vociferous opposition from the local community and was completed on site in 2015.

As one of five flats in an Edwardian villa, the project reconfigures and extends this garden flat to help the client enjoy more fully their potentially gorgeous green back garden.

The design cleverly allows the proposed garden room and the existing rear bedroom to fully interconnect via a central lobby to create a generous study/lounge/dayroom lit by overhead natural daylight. But, when guest come to stay, the screens are closed and it reverts to two separate rooms.

A new minimal shower room is tucked away within the bedroom suite and a re-worked entrance lobby and new kitchen completes the transformation.

CDS Housing Solutions (Housing Cooperative) appointed Method Architects to deliver planning consent and production information for a new residential unit in the roofspace of one of their previously converted Edwardian blocks

The conversion was completed in October 2011