FORMER NESTLÉ FACTORY
A factory in a garden
Located to the south of Hayes and Harlington Crossrail Station with the Grand Union Canal to the north, our masterplan for the former Nestlé factory site is an exemplar urban renewal project of heritage-led regeneration and industrial intensification. It makes strong connections with the surrounding community, both physically and in terms of its history and identity.
The first factory on the site was opened in 1914 when Eugen Sandow chose it to produce his ‘Health and Strength Cocoa’ due to its connection to the canal and railway. We adaptively re-used Eugen Sandow’s original chocolate factory to create a residential-led, mixed-use neighbourhood combining over 1,300 new homes, extensive new public realm and a state of the art logistics hub for SEGRO.
Art & Nature
Public art can foster a powerful civic experience of connection to a place, engaging the popular imagination and a sense of wonder and discovery through common references to history and culture. The rich themes of the site - for instance: manufacture and trade in the 19th century; the story of Hayes’ developing infrastructure: road, rail and canal; the factory community - have inspired the creation of a site-wide art strategy responding to and celebrating the collective memory of this unique place. There is also a wealth of physical opportunities to develop art pieces – 2D and 3D, large and small, physical and temporal – which will integrate naturally with the buildings and landscape, facilitate place making and expand storytelling opportunities for the locals.
One major intervention is the creation of a large format wall-mural on the brick of the end-gable inspired by Eugen Sandow, the original founder of the site’s factory, Sandow’s Cocoa Works, he was also a circus strongman and Hollywood actor considered to be the father of bodybuilding; he attributed his strength to drinking cocoa.
The retained art-deco facade of the factory maintains a strong sense of character.
The memory of a community
The 12 hectare site of the former Nestlé factory, has played a major role in local community life since 1914. The older locals can still remember the smell of chocolate coming from the factory. Although present in their daily lives, those locals not employed by the factory were not given access to the factory’s amenities. Our masterplan radically changes this by opening up access to the Wallis Garden, the canal side alongside the creation of new parks and squares so that the community will benefit from this major regeneration project.
The identity of the place is retained by the retention of locally-listed railings and gates, the Canteen Hall (1954) which will become the ‘community hub’ and the art deco facade (1960s) of the factory. The street pattern and frontages are in keeping with the factory layout and character and the context of Nestles Avenue, giving an order and coherence to the site.
What makes this development distinctive is the scale of its spaces and the robust character of its built fabric, both new and old, in response to the former industrial nature of the site.
Early sketch of the street life.
A lively new neighbourhood
The overall masterplan concept is to interlock residential uses with employment, and contemporary buildings with heritage. We have divided the site into five, well-proportioned urban blocks, that are subdivided to create a street geometry aligned to the old factory layout whilst adapting to fit the non-parallel geometries of canal and railway. This rigid layout is softened by a series of angles and misalignments that create a rich and articulated townscape.
Stretching across all plots is a central spine, linking the historic green spaces of the factory to the station, and acting as a primary gathering space and pedestrian route. The plot structure and main movement network creates a series of smaller pocket parks, playgrounds and linear gardens; and the entire site is wrapped by a 1.3km running trail.
An active street frontage of double height entrance lobbies draw residents up to first floor level to large raised courtyard gardens over the centralised parking.
Facilities such as a public gym, nursery, café, community spaces and communal workspaces, together with the mix of residential and employment uses, ensure that this will be a lively place, daytime and evening, weekdays and weekends, offering a long-term benefit both to residents and the surrounding community.
The 200m edge of the Grand Union Canal forms the northeast boundary from 1807; it will be regenerated and opened to the community.
Location:
Hayes, London
Use:
Residential, Commercial, Nursery
Status:
In Construction
Size:
1,477 homes; 3,270 sqm
Client:
Barratt London, Segro
Project Date:
2018-2019
Collaborators:
Gillespies, Cameo & Partners, Hawkins Brown, dMFK
