Gentle density

Float the idea of increased housing density to the average UK citizen and you might send a shiver down their spine. To some, denser means damp slum tenements with a distinctively soviet era aesthetic. Obviously, the truth is somewhat different. You need only look across the English Channel to see how our European neighbours make a success of so-called gentle density.

In this blog, we’re going to look at this idea of gentle density, examine some of the ways we can make it work in the UK and outline a vision for the future.

Far from densification becoming a negative, there are massive opportunities to be capitalised on.

Dutch density - Utrecht (Cameron Gregory, 2022)

What does gentle density mean?

Gentle density is a form of residential development which sits between high-rise, urban, apartment-style developments and low-rise, suburban housing.

This is a common form of development in many European towns and cities – think of the avenues of Parisian apartments at four to seven storeys in height, or the narrow Dutch five-storey townhouses which typically contain five or six apartments each.

Thinking of these European typologies, we see strong urban forms, thriving streets, and an exciting cosmopolitan lifestyle, all without the intensity of city-centre living. Sure, in our UK cities, larger townhouses are often converted into two or three flats, but it’s an ad hoc  light touch densification of a largely suburban context.

The concept of gentle density, (at least, as proposed by think tanks such as Create Streets), promotes densifying the built form in both existing and new streets, creating opportunities to improve the quality of the streetscape and build more dynamic neighbourhoods.

Why is it suddenly important?

The new government has a fresh agenda to tackle the housing crisis. Land supply calculations are being revised upwards by a substantial percentage, and they are once again going to be mandatory. Those numbers are being redistributed so that the burden lies less on London and more on regional towns and cities. A lot of those places have no opportunity or precedent for tall buildings in their centres; accommodating housing needs on brownfield sites is slow and has limited potential; and the idea of limitless greenfield suburban extensions is both unpalatable and unsustainable.

The inevitable (but far from universally accepted) conclusion must be that new developments need to be denser. It’s a simple equation – build more houses on every site, and we’ll need to concrete over less of the countryside. This is going to be a brain mincer for all the NIMBYs out there – they don’t want to build on the countryside, but they also hate density – look out for some existential angst from places like the CPRE.

Obviously, there’s a limit to this – we don’t have the appetite for high-rise living anywhere other than the city centre anymore, so we’re not going to be seeing loads of tall apartment developments everywhere we look – the post-war solution will no longer work. We can anticipate more of the PPG3 style of denser suburban development that became common in the late 20th and early 21st century, but that alone isn’t going to uplift numbers by the degree the country needs.

And that leads us to the idea of gentle density…

What does gentle density look like?

In this country, we don’t really know! So far, the main idea that’s been circulated to fill the gap between suburban densities (30-40 dwellings per hectare) and city centre densities (usually 70 dwellings per hectare and above) is… “mansion blocks”.

Is that a Mansion Block? Large, pricey apartments at Accordia, Cambridge (Phil Cooper, 2021)

So, what’s a mansion block? Well, that’s tricky to define. Wikipedia goes with “a block of flats or apartments designed for the appearance of grandeur”, and they seem to have originated as suburban apartment blocks on what was then the fringes of London. If you investigate London mansion flats, you’ll find they are often in well-to-do areas and were often designed for bachelors or couples “of means” to have a place “in town” that was accompanied by a main house in the country.

Albany Courtyard - the appearance of grandeur (Ian Mansfield, 2022 - https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/londons-alleys-albany-court-yard-w1-55620/)

Is this what Create Streets and others have in mind when they talk about mansion blocks being at the core of a gentle density approach? It seems unlikely…

So when we talk about gentle density in the UK, what’s it actually going to look like?

It seems obvious to me.

The volume builders are going to introduce more blocks of flats into their sites. They might only be three storeys tall because the lift is a big expense to overcome if you go taller. They might end up largely being for social tenures because most people don’t want to buy a pokey flat in a suburb. The blocks are going to be surrounded by acres of parking because we won’t manage to get them in the right places, and we won’t get them connected to infrastructure properly. The flats will all be drawn to minimum dimensions per the Nationally Described Space Standards because the developers know they’re all going to end up being run and managed by Housing Associations.

We’ll do what we’ve always done – we’ll fail to meet housing targets, and what homes we do build will be the wrong ones, in the wrong places, and we’ll get nowhere.

Which is a shame, because this is a massive opportunity. A really, really massive one…

Missed opportunities

Imagine you’re in your twenties - I’m sure some of you are, and I can vaguely recall it myself if I close my eyes and think really hard. Now imagine you’re in your twenties in 2024 – it’s not the same as it used to be. You’ve got a good job, you might have a partner, you might be earning £50 to £60k per year between you. You can buy a home, maybe your first.

What choices do you have? Your good job and salary don’t get you a 3-bed semi like they used to, it turns out. You’re not guaranteed a step up to a detached house in a nice suburb if you’re a doctor, lawyer or (yes, I went there) architect.

Instead, you can have a 550sqft city centre apartment or a 700sqft 2-bedroom house on a suburban estate. The apartment keeps you close to the heart of the city and all that good stuff, but you have to rely on public transport for everything, and you’ve not got much space for a friend to stay, or to have a dinner party, or for an office for home working.

Buy the house, and it gives you an extra bedroom for guests, a home office or even a baby, and you’ve got somewhere to park. But you’ve got a small garden to look after and if you go out at night, you need an Uber home. To top it off, no one wants to come and stay because you’re not in the city anymore.

It isn’t making my socks roll up and down.

A pair of Northstone 2-bed houses - not a bad option, if we're honest! (Phil Cooper, 2023)

The opportunity of the missing middle.

Gentle Density should be something to help us fill that middle, and it can be whatever we want. Let’s think about some ideas. Maybe a “mansion flat” is a bit bigger than a standard flat, so there’s a working-from-home space that can double as a guest area, or a room to entertain friends in the evening? Perhaps it has a big balcony or terrace so you can have some outside space that works for you and your lifestyle rather than a 10m garden that’s more of a burden than an asset?

What about unusual typologies like duplexes, coach houses, or roof-top bungalows? For sure, the mansion block shouldn’t be one-size-fits-all – there could be single-level units on the ground floor for wheelchair users, smaller flats for first-time buyers in the middle, and larger apartments for families higher up. Could there be shared indoor/outdoor spaces where kids can play close to front doors but away from traffic? Could there be communal facilities like a rentable guest suite? Perhaps the ground floor needs other uses, like a coffee bar, or a salon?

When you start to think about complex, vibrant buildings like this, you start to see how this sort of development could be the secret to rejuvenating our towns and cities. Imagine a development like this on that empty site that’s been stalled in the town centre – you all know one. Think about these sorts of schemes filling the smaller urban centres around the main centre of our cities. Imagine them at the heart of large, edge-of-town housing estates.

Habitat 67, Quebec, by Moshe Safdie - a complex vibrant building? (Thomas Ledl, 2017 -  https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=61578410)

Bringing a variety of different people into these places cements them, it helps enliven the urban fabric – shops and bars are more viable, places cease to be dormitories to the city centre, people are always in the streets and parks, places come alive. People live there now…

This is the sort of revolution a clever approach to gentle density and our current housing crisis could bring. We need our industry to see the opportunities and be confident. For too long, we’ve built the same thing because it sells. Meanwhile we’ve neglected the opportunity to make great new places and rejuvenate tired old ones. Great homes in great places will always sell, and creating great neighbourhoods grows sales values over time. A fresh approach to development density is a chance to make lasting change in this country, and we need to seize it.