Buckingham Court, Hendon NW4

Buckingham Court is a residential block in Hendon, in the London Borough of Barnet. The whole building was redeveloped: two new storeys, containing ten new flats, were added on top, and the entire block, old and new, was brought up to new-build specification, build quality and environmental standard. The work took twelve months, and the flats are now let.

The brief

The aim was to make far more of an existing building than a refurbishment could: to add homes above the existing roofline, and to bring the whole block up to the standard of a new building rather than leave new floors sitting on old ones.

The approach

Because the building was empty throughout the works, it could be redeveloped as a single project, without working around residents. Before the scheme went ahead, the directors tested the structure, the planning position, cost and programme, and set the specification for the whole building, not just the new storeys.

The result is one coherent building: the existing floors and the two added storeys finished to the same new-build standard, with private terraces where the roof allowed.

The build

The redevelopment took twelve months. Every flat was finished to new-build specification, with its own kitchen, bathroom or shower room, and living space, and the building's fabric and environmental performance were brought up to the standard expected of a new building. The photographs on this page show the finished interiors and the completed block from the entrance and the rear lawn.

The result

A block in Hendon that is, in quality and performance, a new building, with ten more homes than it had before, on a site that needed no new land. The block is complete and the flats are let. It is the kind of work Abbasi Holdings now sponsors: homes London needs, added floor by floor.

Own a block that could take more storeys? Read how airspace development works for freeholders, or see how we work with landowners.