SHINE

Why Harehills?

This is the question that crops up most when talking to people about the Harehills development. Why take the time and resources to create a building with a high-spec finish? Is there the demand to sustain a destination restaurant? Is this a place people will want to go for conferences?  These questions reveal the inbuilt preconceptions people carry with them about the area and addressing them is vital to the success of the project.

The key point is that the Harehills scheme is not simply about the development of a building. It aims to change the opportunities available to those living in the local community, and in the process change their expectations and ambitions. This means that the success of the Harehills project is not just dependent on Harehills CIC, or the architects, or the builders, or the tenants but on the people living in Harehills.

The Harehills project is about regeneration, but with a different emphasis from most traditional programmes. Rather than dictating from the outside how people can improve their lives and neighbourhoods, it gives them opportunities to do that for themselves. Harehills is by most standard measures a deprived area in economic terms but it is also one of the most vibrant and entrepreneurial places in the city of Leeds. Developing the middle school will give some of those people with amazing ideas and skills the chance to realise their dreams. Of course, not all will be successful, but the hope is that many will be and that their successes will inspire others and change perceptions.

Aspiration is a huge part of the project and that is why we are determined to ensure that everything is done to the highest possible standards. A corporate firm in the city centre would expect an office of high quality. Why should the people of Harehills expect or receive anything different? The principle that quality should not be compromised, or that the substandard is as unacceptable in Harehills as it is in Harrogate, is central to making the project a success. Aspiration is a buzzword that is often used but actions change far more than words. Creating a high-spec, attractive business and enterprise centre will not solve all Harehills problems but it will hopefully start to shake-up people’s assumptions.

Aim low and you achieve low. Shoot for the stars … and you might hit the clouds.

More Harehills Success!

Spirits are high in the Camberwell office as another hurdle in our Harehills project is left behind. The news from the European Regional Development Fund confirming their grant towards the capital costs of the project means that all the finance for the development is now in place. We still need to finalise all the contracts, the legal teams of all the parties need to be satisfied, but in principle everything is going ahead.

The finance for Harehills is coming from a variety of sources, including the public, private and third sector sectors. A substantial amount is funded via a bank loan from a private sector bank with gap funding from Charity Bank and venturesome, in the third sector. The rest of the finance comes from the Local Enterprise Growth Initiative (LEGI) and ERDF.

Getting finance in place is the first objective that must be achieved to get a project like this off the ground. The difficulty with getting this in place is that all the funding is dependent on all the rest. Even once the finance is provisionally in place the work is not over. Public funding, particularly ERDF, can only be released once stringent criteria have been met. Quite rightly given the importance of ensuring taxpayers money is well spent.

This has led to a couple of nervous weeks in the office as the team has toiled to answer all the questions ERDF had for us. Much credit must go to Dawn who has worked flat-out to ensure that the little, and not so little, snags were sorted out.

So, another milestone down, and it’s full-speed ahead.

Tying up the loose ends ...

Many of the posts in this blog will be about big-ticket ‘vision’ issues, but this one is about anything but. To complete any major, transformational project you need to have a vision, a big idea, but you also need to get the nuts and bolts right. In a development this size there are hundreds of little problems you have to resolve. In fact it is scary to think about the number of ways that a project this magnitude can go wrong. Success is not just about having that killer idea, it’s also about attention to detail and successfully juggling several balls at once. In other words it is about perspiration as well as inspiration.

The complexity in a project of this size is caused by the level of interaction between different decisions and people. The building is like a huge 3D jigsaw, one change can have a whole series of ramifications meaning a lot of thought and coordination is needed to achieve the optimal solution. An example of this is the decision about whether to have dropped ceilings. As well as considering aesthetics there are also practical consequences for the cost of heating and lighting. Issues that need resolving stretch past construction into a whole host of  topics, most notably finance, that I will return to in a later posts.

The Harehills project is now entering the end of the design stage, and will soon be going out to tender. This has meant frantic activity to finish all the designs, and sorting out issues such as layout and levels. This highlights another feature of these large-scale projects, bottlenecks, and is especially true given the ambitious timescales of the development. It means all the partners involved in the process have to work flat out, and with each other to meet the deadlines.

This process inevitably leads to compromises. No project has limitless time or resources so tough decisions have to be made to ensure that things stay to budget and on schedule. Higher spec lighting means lower spec floor finish. More heating means fewer features. Some of these trade-offs are easy to make, the facts and figures make them for you. Others are much harder, where the options are finely balanced. This is where the ‘vision’ thing is very important, it informs the trade-offs that can be made, and ensures that the project continues to be guided by a coherent concept. Vision is thus vital and integral but alone it is never enough to be successful. To achieve that you need to be realistic and make sure you tie up all the loose ends.

Exciting Harehills Development On the Way!

Welcome to this new blog which will be detailing the exciting development of the building that formerly housed Harehills Middle School. This is a huge £4.5 million project that seeks to transform a derelict building into a hub of activity that will boost the local community, and spur enterprise in the area.

Our vision, at the Camberwell Project, of the development is for a high quality location for business and enterprise that will help regenerate the area as well as providing services for the benefit of the local community. As well as containing high spec office space the building will also house conferencing facilities, a catalyst centre and facilities for the community such as a restaurant and a crèche.

The project is currently in the design stage with construction due to start in October with completion scheduled for July 2008 ready for a launch in the Autumn. Any development of this size will have hurdles to overcome and obstacles to avoid. This blog will hopefully provide an insight into some of these challenges and how they are overcome. As well as examining the practicalities of the project it will also take a more esoteric look at the rationale behind the development and the thinking that has gone into it.