Blue House Yard
Just around the corner from Wood Green High Road, Blue House Yard is a collection of new creative workspaces which will soon be home to a tailor, toy maker and a brewer among other local entrepreneurs. Framed by a bright blue studio complex, nine tall, slender standalone worksheds and a double-decker bus café, the Yard itself will become a much-needed social space in the town centre, hosting markets and evening events.
Realised by Jan Kattein Architects and Meanwhile Space (together, High Street Works), the project has transformed a defunct Council office building and adjacent car park with the aim of nurturing talent and boosting local businesses over the next five years, as the site awaits comprehensive redevelopment.
In order to achieve an innovative design that establishes a distinctive character for Blue House Yard and is adaptable to the individual needs of a broad range of creative tenants, High Street Works embraced a self-build process. Here, construction is not just a means to an end; it provides an opportunity to test and prototype sustainable timber frame construction, helps to train eight local carpentry apprentices and allows for the discovery of new design opportunities at every joint and junction.
Each space has been devised to give its tenant the operational framework they need to grow. Homeworkers will have their first public facing space, new businesses will be able to do market testing and more established business can take on new staff. The public space means there are opportunities for all to benefit from tenants’ activities, or be inspired to plan and deliver their own.
The first tenants have already started moving into studios in the Blue House, with work on the Yard set to finish in May. As construction draws toward completion, and tenants begin to customise their workspaces and animate the Yard, the project is only just beginning the next phase of its creative development.
