Nicholas Grimshaw was one of the leading exponents of the High Tech school of architecture that emerged in Britain in the 1970s and 1980s. This row of ten houses in north London was built as part of a mixed-use development with a large supermarket at its centre. On the rear elevations to the south, the houses confront the store parking lot with blank, corrugated metal walls to block out the noise and pollution.
On the front elevations to the north, however, they cantilever out and open up with large windows, doors, and balconies to make the most of their position overlooking the Grand Union Canal. Outside, the houses are clad in aluminum panels punched with windows like those in the Airstream trailer.
The overall impression is of attempting to conform to Le Corbusier’s famous diktat that a house should be ‘a machine for living in.’ Inside, however, the dwellings are more conventional, with wooden floors and paltered walls. In plan, they are arranged with a bedroom and bathroom on the ground floor, a double-height kitchen and living room on the middle floor, and a further two bedrooms and bathrooms on the top floor.
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- Grand Union Canal Architect Grimshaw Nicholas & Partners
