DSDHA gets go-ahead for super-thin Fitzrovia scheme

DSDHA has won Camden Council’s backing to redevelop a five-storey townhouse in Fitzrovia with an 11-storey mixed-use scheme – on a site that is only 5m wide.

Its proposals for 52 Tottenham Street will see the demolition of the current building on the site, which has four one-bed flats and disused ground-level office and retail space. It will be replaced with a scheme featuring ground-floor affordable workspace, three one-bedroom duplex flats and a quadruplex with three bedrooms across the new buildings top four floors.

Members of Camden’s planning committee last week gave their unanimous approval to the proposals, created for RE Capital, which will almost treble the floorspace delivered on the site – from the current 250sq m to 702sq m.

The consented scheme will have 21sq m of affordable workspace. The current building has 79sq m allocated for retail, but which was previously used as office space. It will be a stone’s throw from the head office of Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios.

Councillors’ backing came despite the objection of the Charlotte Street Conservation Area Advisory Committee, which said DSDHA’s proposals did not pay sufficient regard to the historic context of Tottenham Street and the wider conservation area.

CSCAAC acknowledged that the current building on the site – which planning officers said dated from the late 18^th century or early 19^th century – was suitable for redevelopment, but only to make way for a building of “exceptional quality” that enhanced the area.

Recommending the scheme for approval, Camden planning officers recognised that the current building on the site made a positive contribution to the conservation area and described the proposed demolition as “regrettable in design and heritage terms”.

But they said the structure, which is unlisted, had been substantially altered and was not a true representation of the original building and its loss would be outweighed by the benefits of the new scheme, which they described as exceeding sustainability targets.

DSDHA co-founder Deborah Saunt said the practice was delighted to have received Camden’s backing for its plans.

She said: “Responding to the challenge of a site a mere five metres in width and caught between two much larger commercial buildings, our proposal maximises the potential for natural daylight and ventilation and provides generous external spaces, whilst the articulation of the new façade compliments the surrounding streetscape.