Developers are reaching for the skies in their drive to expand Croydon’s cultural and lifestyle offering as public demand for change gathers pace.
At the Develop Croydon Conference this week, plans to construct the highest bar in Europe, a “flying” swimming pool and a theatre/concert venue paralleling London’s Southbank, were all outlined alongside plans for Boxpark and Westfield.
It came as a survey revealed 15 per cent of delegates believed improved cultural and lifestyle facilities were key priorities in transforming Croydon, compared to 5 per cent four years ago.
An improved cultural/lifestyle offering would encourage more people to live and work in Croydon – a vital factor in the success of all the game-changing projects, according to Roger Wade, chief executive of shipping container pop-up malls Boxpark due to open in Croydon in summer 2016.
He said: “I think we need to wake up and really realise the situation about Croydon. We tend to romanticise but the reality is a lot of people that live and work here are just passing through and we have got to create a reason for them to stay.”
Mr Wade, whose offering to Croydon would be food and drink, added: “It’s not just building that’s going to regenerate Croydon, it’s going to be the people.”
David Hudson, chief executive of Guildhouse Properties, architects of the 220 metre-high, 65-storey One Lansdowne Road, told the conference: “We are going to have probably the highest bar in Europe, open to the public, and a swimming pool flying between two buildings, open to the public. And because we are going to be so high, with views of London and views of the South, we are going to have a viewing gallery, to become an attraction. We’re trying to be a mini-Shard if you like.”
Mr Hudson is also spearheading regeneration of the Surrey Street Pump House for offices, a restaurant, retail units and event space.
“It’s about making Croydon a destination and we see this as a destination, addressing the people passing through Croydon, it’s somewhere to go, something to do,” he said.
Neil Meredith, head of UK business space, Schroders, explained how he viewed the cultural offering.
“People are really forensic in the way they look at Croydon,’ he said. “The people coming from outside Croydon are only interested in public realm, retail, what’s good in terms of entertainment, what their own staff want, that’s absolutely crucial, above everything else what their own staff will think of Croydon.”
The regeneration of Fairfield Halls has led to the “mini-Southbank” tag and Stuart Cade, partner of Rick Mather Architects which is designing the scheme, explained that London’s Southbank had also seen a major transformation, in the last 10-15 years, for example, shops had replaced a service road.
And as Southbank captured the millions of people coming through Central London, Fairfield could entice the millions coming through East Croydon station, who don’t at the minute because it’s separated from the town centre.
Mr Cade said: “The new Fairfield proposal will reinforce its setting and reinforce what’s happening inside, as a multi-venue. The setting and the connectivity and the variety of offers will see people arriving to stay around a lot longer before a performance and a lot longer afterwards.”
Accessibility would be radically improved, he explained, with new North-South routes into the green and making the George Street area two-sided rather than one.
And Westfield’s development director Steve Yewman, whose iconic shopping mall is hailed as leading regeneration in Croydon, added: “What we do at Westfield is very much about entertainment, sense of place. In Croydon, we are knitting into an existing commercial town centre [unlike Westfield’s other London malls] and, we’ve got to respond to that. Matthew’s Yard, Surrey Street have all got to play their part. It’s an integrated future.”
Westfield’s construction will begin next year.