Within the creation of urban housing in the UK, there is a frequently misunderstood and neglected space, the residential entrance lobby.
From its prominent location between the street and the interior spaces of a building and beyond, the lobby is a spatial manifestation of the negotiations that characterise the urban environment and the movement between city and home. It is not merely a physical space, but one that is socially alluring and, in many instances, the only shared space where we meet our neighbours and encounter strangers. Despite this inherent social and architectural value, in too many recently completed blocks of flats in British cities, the lobby is often regarded only in functional terms, and investment and care in its design is often absent.
Uncommon space
In Europe, most people live in flats. In Paris, thousands of residential lobbies sit door-to-door with cafes along the boulevards, and in Berlin and Vienna residents typically walk through a communal Hof – a shared courtyard – to reach their home. These long-standing traditions of urban accommodation are perhaps why some of the finest examples of lobbies in the UK are by émigré architects, or by those purposefully referencing European traditions. In London, Berthold Lubetkin’s Bevin Court (1954), with its cantilevered spiralling staircase, and Stanley Gordon Jeeves’ Dolphin Square (1937) with its grandiose entry sequence, are just two examples. However, in a country where more than three-quarters of the population live in houses with their own front doors to the street, it is perhaps unsurprising that blocks of flats, and in turn lobbies, are misunderstood. Maybe they are not recognised as British enough?
The UK began to develop purpose-built blocks of flats towards the end of the 19th century and with them communal space. Mansion blocks with grand entrances and detailed lobbies were created for the middle or upper classes, with concierge and other amenities to convince the wealthy that flat living was as luxurious as living in a house. For the working classes, tenements were built. Although far more basic, these types still had well-defined and detailed entrances, lobbies and landings. In its early estates, the housing branch of the London County Council embraced Arts and Crafts style and materials such as glazed bricks and patterned tiling for communal entrances, providing them with the same distinction as private homes, and affording all inhabitants a new level of dignity.
In Residential Flats of All Classes: A Practical Treatise on their Planning and Arrangement, a 1905 publication by Sydney Perks, distinct cultural attitudes to communal areas are highlighted in the planning of homes. Plainly speaking, Perks states that ‘the entrance to a block of flats abroad is considered of more importance than it is in England.’ On shared facilities, he goes on to opine that it is far better, ‘that the tenants should remain strangers’, adding that ‘ordinary flats where there is little chance of social intercourse are much easier to manage’.
By the 1930s, private developers pitching modern flats to affluent renters took a different view. In a new generation of apartment blocks, there were lavish entrances, decorated lobby spaces with linked communal lounges and other facilities. Despite the boom in modern flat construction during this era, they accounted for a fraction of new homes in the UK. In the post-war years, however, this would change as ideals for communal living inspired by egalitarian ambitions re-shaped housing design.
Misunderstood space
Two of the post-war era’s most enduring figures were architects Alison and Peter Smithson. From their Golden Lane Estate competition entry (1952) to the Robin Hood Gardens Estate (1972), ‘The Smithsons’ promoted ‘streets in the sky’ as future ideal for communal space. Robin Hood Gardens (now demolished) was their only built example, but their theories were hugely influential. Sheffield’s Park Hill (1962) by Jack Lynn and Ivor Smith and Bethnal Green’s Keeling House (1957–59) by Denys Lasdun both owe a debt to the Smithsons. Although much admired, all of these and many more like them, were later widely viewed as flawed.
The inherent problem with the Smithsons’ theory was that they considered the street – an urban artefact – as directly equivalent and interchangeable with communal space. Communal space can behave like a street, but it is not the same space. The flaws arise when one element of the procession from city to dwelling is removed. If the communal space is removed, the thresholds between public and private become blurred and any filtering between the urban scale of the city and the personal scale of the home is lost.
Cherished Space
When considering communal space at Karakusevic Carson Architects, we are interested in the concept of the ‘deep threshold’, which sets out a layered approach to the journey to home. The concept mimics how a traditional house on a street is laid out, with its front garden, path, steps, porch, front door and entrance hallway. A deep threshold acts as a device to transcend and filter public to private. Arriving home in an urban block of flats in this concept, becomes an architectural procession that negotiates change, yet also allows for inhabitation and encounter.
Our Nightingale Estate project in Hackney Downs is a great example of a deep threshold. Created for Hackney Council, it features a connected sequence in which the entrance lobby and communal space are layered. The sequence adopts the principle of the Berlin Hof with open and closed hallways and courts. For a block of stacked maisonettes at the Ledbury Estate in Southwark, a deep threshold is realised by connecting galleries of a block to the core of an adjacent tower and its own street facing lobby. This hybrid strategy maximises the efficiency of the structure, but also brings neighbours together.
Acknowledging that communal lobbies must also withstand the everyday knocks of mixed daily life and its maintenance, all of the lobbies on our buildings at the Kings Cross Estate at Stoke Newington include hardwearing interior materials, that includes timber, ceramic and terrazzo. The choices underscore the practical requirements of these places, but also their potential as spaces whose colour and palette choices may engender identity and warmth for their users. At Kings Crescent and more recently at our Barking Riverside and St Ann’s neighbourhood projects, lobbies open through the depth of buildings – banishing dark corners and ensuring light-filled spaces with clear views and connections between inside and out.
Added Value
In cities across the UK, more apartment buildings are now being built and there are more mixed developments. Policy makers recognise the societal benefits of cohesive neighbourhoods, advocating a tenure-blind design approaches that avoid segregation. As part of this equitable goal, architects are again turning to the significance of shared residential lobbies as a space to foster ownership and pride, designing generous spaces and specifying robust materials that will endure.
A well-designed lobby can become a beautiful architectural manifestation of living together – something we must do a lot more of in the future. Once we have understood this, a once strange and un-British space may become familiar, intimate even and we can embrace and amplify its potential.
This commentary is based on an essay by architect Karl Eriksson that originally appeared in Public Housing Works, Lund Humphries, 2021.
IMAGE CAPTION
Lobby at Bevin Court, Finsbury 1954
Entrances at Dolphin Square, Pimlico 1937
Entrances at the LCC’s Boundary Estate, Shoreditch 1897
Plan of the Strathcona Mansions, Marylebone 1890s showing a lobby sequence encompassing a carriage drive, hallway and lounge leading to smoking and billiards rooms.
Axonometric showing extended lobby sequence at the Nightingale Estate, Hackney
View of completed lobbies at the Kings Crescent estate, Stoke Newington 2017
Examples of lobbies at Barking Riverside and St Anns Neighbourhood, Haringey