Residents of the City’s Barbican complex say proposals to transform a gatehouse on the estate into a self-contained flat amount to vandalism.
Architects at Mackay + Partners plan to convert the turret, used as a street entrance and lift lobby for the car park, into a two-bedroom apartment, pictured. It would mean putting new windows, walls and a mezzanine level into the three-storey structure — known as the John Wesley turret — and the loss of 130 sq ft of public walkway.
Caroline Reed, a resident of the Grade II listed brutalist complex of tower blocks and squares, built in the Seventies, wrote: “If the City of London is willing to compromise even such a landmark structure as the turret in the name of ‘asset realisation’, what other spaces across the estate might it not find to be in sudden, lucrative, need of ‘reinvigoration and re-animation’ with similar shanty town-style infilling?”
Hilary Sunman, who chairs the Willoughby House Group of residents, said: “It is a disgraceful proposal which amounts essentially to vandalism. We are all against it.”
Tess Pinto, conservation adviser for the Twentieth Century Society, said: “The Society considers that the application will cause substantial harm to a Grade II listed building.”
City of London officers have recommended the plans for approval, saying: “It is considered that the proposed alterations to accommodate a residential unit would not be detrimental to its special architectural or historic interest.
"The proposals would make effective use of the empty upper sections of the building.”
The planning and transportation committee is expected to make its decision next Tuesday.
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