Holloway Park
- Apr 27
- 1 min read
Holloway Park is being developed by the Peabody Housing Association on a site which had housed Holloway Women’s Prison for over a century. A Women’s Building, providing space for charities and community work for women, was already part of the masterplan for the mixed development which provided 985 homes – 60% of which will be social rent or shared ownership – as well as retail space and a park.
For the second part of the development, Peabody asked In Her Place and Social Place to engage with local women in order to understand issues in the local area and provide input to the design team for both landscape and architecture.
A group of women and non-binary people were engaged as paid community researchers; ranging in age from seventeen to early sixties, they represented a broad range of family and housing situations and diverse backgrounds.
Working both online and in person - including a site visit - they learned mapping techniques and the principles of gender mainstreaming. From this, they analysed their own lives and the barriers they faced - from poor lighting to cycle infrastructure which didn't meet their needs.
Collaborating closely with the architects, they then focused on specific aspects of the development which could be shaped at this stage of the project, including active travel links, the design of shared spaces and bike and bin stores. This latter work was found to be particularly useful, and so we worked with Peabody to produce a short leaflet so that it could be shared across all of their sites.
The full report on the project can be downloaded below.
