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Community garden housing, Cley-next-the-sea, Norfolk

Part 1 Project 2005
Frances Balaam
University of East London London | UK
North Norfolk has an ethereal quality, with low land and huge skies there is an overwhelming feeling of space and marks reveal themselves effortlessly on the landscape. From a stone on the beach to the structure of a village, marks shift, delineate, fracture and enrich the landscape.

The housing at Cley has a particular relationship with the landscape that draws on the exploration of marks. Systems of paths, routes, poles and walls
interlace across the site. A new relationship between garden and house and village and landscape is established, creating a series of thresholds and challenging issues of privacy.



Our students explored the distinctive landscape of coast; marsh; village; field. They were asked to find programmes to help integrate new housing with existing. This student displayed a strong sensitivity to the landscape: its horizontality, materials and structure. She researched how people live, and how land is divided, cultivated, settled. Her brief included a system of land settlement that responds to the needs of local people. The architecture clearly has a human scale. It uses light, material and view to generate meaningful spaces. This is a plausible and exciting project: a way forward for future village expansion.

2005
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