Housing secretary approves huge Vauxhall towers

Housing secretary Robert Jenrick has given the thumbs-up to a pair of mixed use towers designed by Zaha Hadid Architects for developer VCI Property Holdings.

The towers – one 185m tall and its northern neighbour 151m – will deliver 257 homes and a £30m contribution for off-site affordable housing, but breach Lambeth council’s local plan which identifies the location as suitable for towers but restricts heights in the location to 150m.

Jenrick said he took into account inspector John Braithwaite’s view that the quality of the architecture was “undeniable” and the scheme “outstanding” in townscape terms, as well as the number of homes that would be provided and improvements to the public realm.

A letter from his department said: “He agrees with the inspector that, while there is a technical conflict with the height limit, a number of other buildings taller than 150m have been either built or approved in this area, and that taken as a whole the proposal complies with the [local plan].”

The northernmost tower will contain 257 flats, including 23 “affordable” homes. The inspector said a section 106 payment of £30m would equate to a further 54 homes off site, making a total of 30% “affordable”. The secretary of state concluded that the scheme ”would contribute towards meeting Lambeth’s need for market and affordable housing […] and would be consistent with Government policies for delivering a sufficient supply of homes”, and therefore that the delivery of housing “should carry significant weight in favour of the proposal.”

Its taller southern twin will contain a 619-room hotel and office space. The pair will be linked by a 10-storey podium building at ground level. 

Thhe towers will sit alongside the 56-storey One Nine Elms project, which will be slightly taller than the Vauxhall Cross scheme. Prior to the coronavirus outbreak, that scheme had been due to complete this spring.

The scheme replaces two previous proposals for roughly the same 0.57ha site designed by Squire & Partners dating back to 2005 and 2010. The first of these foundered on the affordable housing issue while the second went to public inquiry and was approved by then secretary of state Eric Pickles in 2012. At that inquiry Terry Farrell was called as a witness by Lambeth council to back its case that Squires’ 41- and 32-storey towers did nothing for the hostile public realm which it wanted to improve. Michael Squire likened the inquiry to a “prize fight between two architects”.

After winning the fight, landowner Kylun sold the site to Channel Islands-based developer VCI Property Holding which initially intended to build Squires’ consented scheme. But after discussions with Lambeth and TfL, Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) was appointed to come up with a new design addressing some of the council’s concerns. The ZHA scheme went in for planning in November 2017, was approved a year later but was then called in by secretary of state James Brokenshire after local objections to its scale.

A ZHA spokesman said: “The design responds to Lambeth council’s aspirations for a district centre for Vauxhall by creating a vibrant new public square adjacent to the busy rail, underground and bus interchange. The proposal also accommodates TfL’s existing plans to upgrade the traffic gyratory and bus station to provide greater accessibility and safety for all.”

The scheme was ZHA’s largest scheme by area in the UK to date, he added. It would be resourced by the practice’s existing staff, he said. Yesterday the firm said it had put 15 of its non-architectural staff on furlough.