In 2016 HemingwayDesign embarked on a project to produce a Vision for Lowestoft South Beach, with aim to rejuvenate the seafront and help enliven the town’s leisure and tourist attractions. Labelled ‘rundown and dirty’ in a recent article, Wayne Hemingway spoke to BBC Radio Suffolk’s Sarah Lilley about ‘click bait’ culture, the reality of this […]

In 2020, working with NEW Masterplanning, HemingwayDesign completed a Vision and masterplan for Andover town centre. Our team worked closely with Test Valley Borough Council, with extensive consultation with Town Council officers and members, key employers, local retailers, and the local community to secure widespread support for a comprehensive redevelopment focused on four key proposals: […]

In 2016 HemingwayDesign embarked on a project to produce a Vision for Lowestoft South Beach, with aim to rejuvenate the seafront and help enliven the town’s leisure and tourist attractions. With its extensive sandy beach, two levels of promenade, seafront parks and gardens, all flanked by handsome period buildings, it quickly became apparent that Lowestoft […]

I am not an expert on skateboarding, none of my children ever got into it, and if I were to try it I would, for certain, do myself a mischief. But I do love watching skateboarding and recognise it as an important part of youth culture and urban sport; one that’s totally durable. Now it’s […]

On Covid and the future of cities When I moved to London in 1979 the population was 6.75 million. England’s capital city had experienced a decline from 8.9 million over 4 decades (see graph here). A heady cocktail of air pollution (there was even a song called A Foggy Day (In London Town), by Gershwin […]

Did you know that twice as much land in the UK is given to golf courses as to housing? Wayne went on Wake Up To Money on BBC Radio 5 Live in July 2019 to talk about the state of housing in Britain, and what we can do to improve communities in the future. You […]

Brexit and building the right kind of homes get an airing here. Its 7 am and I have just come back from running with my dog Minnie in my local London park and am feeling conflicted. Over the past few months the numbers of rough sleepers in the park has increased substantially. They are not […]

Our appreciation of the history of council housing and its value to society. In 2014 I was reminded of my first Blackburn home by Sarah Thompson who emailed me with her proposal for an interiors book about ex-council houses. When someone emails you with an idea for a book about how a new generation are […]

Crap architects get a mouthful in this blog from 2015. When it comes to working out the value of the creative industries, much to the chagrin of some architects, the value of the work coming out of architectural practices is not included. My hobby is running (often with my dog Minnie) and when I am […]

A decade and a half after we started to bemoan the state of new build housing in the UK, there is still a need to be noisy on this subject matter. It’s over 15 years ago since I coined the phrase the “Wimpeyfication and Barrattification of Britain” and started to publically criticise Britain’s mass housebuilding industry for […]

Oh how we hate this selling of new homes in London to “buy to leave empty” investors overseas. This is a plea to the Mayor of London to do something about it. Read The Guardian’s news story, 200 Flats Worth £140m Sold In Just Four Hours and the Independent’s take on it here. Surely it should be seen […]

At HemingwayDesign we work in a number of towns and cities that have suffered economically and socially over the past decades and I occasionally attend round table discussions or conferences in these towns that focus on regeneration. There is no fairy dust (as Oliver Wainwright said about what we do, possibly snidely, see here) to be sprinkled, […]

I’ve had an interesting few weeks sitting on the Eco Towns Challenge Panel. The proposed Eco Town programme has naturally caused a major outbreak (nay plague)  of “nimbyism”. Many of the new towns and settlements the Britain commissioned since the successes of Letchworth and Welwyn Garden City are having to have regeneration money lavished on […]