Waterman's Place, Granary Wharf

Leeds

Highly commended for the WAN Residential Awards 2009.

Leeds Canal Basin is being regenerated through a masterplanned sequence of public spaces along side the canal and the River Aire, each defined by a series of buildings containing apartments, hotel and commercial spaces. From the east, this new quarter is now accessed via a replacement footbridge spanning the river where it emerges from the vaults beneath City railway station. Here, raised above a publicly permeable ground floor of commercial units, is CZWG’s apartment building. Like an eroded geological mass surmounted by a ‘hill town’ of stepping blocks, and riven by a seam of polished copper, it’s a rigorously planned assembly of forms governed by its own architectural logic, but which is responsive to its canal-side location: indigenous brick walls deeply punctured by repetitive windows, and timber cladding which will weather to a warm beige-grey.

Client: ISIS Waterside Regeneration