Welsh Streets in Liverpool. The houses were in poor condition and the Council purchased them for demolition (L). After much controversy it was decided to restore them instead (R). The work was delivered by a company called Placefirst. Note (still young) trees on build outs, well maintained facades, greenery worked into the hardscaping. Some plots have been merged to create more generous homes or to allow more green space at the back: note the arched doors turned into arched windows. YIMBYs should not be discomfited: merging plots is right in some housing markets, just as subdividing them is right in others. As in many English neighbourhoods, these houses originally had walled yards linked by a back alley. This worked well in the nineteenth century but is less popular today. The blocks have been restructured with small private yards and larger shared gardens. This seems to me to be interesting model for rehabilitating dilapidated nineteenth-century housing. What do others think? Interested in other case studies and success stories people have encountered.
I’m delighted to see that they haven’t installed external wall insulation here - so many terraces in Liverpool have been ruined by hideous piecemeal EWI.
this is great to see. It’s these kinds of concrete examples of value creation (and I mean that in the sociocultural context) that are instructive and inspiring! Thanks.
The houses look beautiful back to their former glory! Well done to everyone involved.
It was a long fight against the de-densification and demolition of this neighbourhood. So many other innner-city neighbourhoods in Liverpool saw terraced housing being replaced by low-density suburban-style schemes in the 1980s and 1990s, often inside little walled areas dominated by cul-de-sacs reducing walkability. The Welsh Streets regeneration now reminds me of a similar scheme in Moss Side, Manchester.
This is heartwarming to see, my Nan and most of her extended family lived in houses like this in a different area of Liverpool. I have fond memories of 7 cousins, their parents, a few neighbours and several dogs squeezing into the house every holiday. It’s part of our family history and restores my faith in the approach to house building, they have not all been flattered and made into a Bovis-esque (other modern builds are available) rabbit warren of a housing estate.
This is so very inspiring for so many reasons, great work from everybody involved 🎉🎉🎉
I always despair when beautiful homes become neglected and often later bulldozed This is a great example of what can be achieved with the right vision and mindset
Fantastic! I remember writing to the mayor of Liverpool protesting the sheer waste around the Welsh streets demolition. So happy to see this result. Although I see country Durham are now trying to demolish more solid terrace houses even today! Baffling!
This looks great! Take a look at Creswell Model Village in Derbyshire as well, it's a pit village built in 1895 and was in a similar state before the regeneration project I worked on many years ago.
Barrister specialising in planning, environmental, public and heritage law
1moWorth remembering that the Council only managed to purchase most of them, and the change to refurbishment came after: (I) a campaign by locals and Save Britain’s Heritage; (II) Save buying one of the houses; (III) the government stopping demolition under permitted development rights by ruling that Environmental Impact Assessment was required (in 2011) (IV) ministers calling in the planning application for demolition; (VI) ministers refusing the planning application and declining to confirm the Council’s compulsory purchase order (in 2015); (VII) the Council abandoning its High Court challenges to those decisions