The City of Edinburgh Council’s Craigmillar Town Centre development was recognised at the Scottish Home Awards, scooping the ‘Housing Regeneration Project of the Year’ category last week.
The accolade was shared with the Council’s partners on the project CCG (Scotland), its housebuilding contractor and architects, Anderson Bell Christie.
The Craigmillar Town Centre housing development consists of 194 high-quality, energy efficient homes for social rent and mid-market rent. The judges recognised the important role that the project has played in supporting investment in retail and school estate in the town centre with further improvements planned for the wider area in the coming year.
The hybrid event held in Glasgow, welcoming guests in person and virtually, acknowledged the excellence in the Scottish housing sector. It was a great night for all involved and really shone a light on the work being done across the Scottish housing sector.
The Council was also a finalist in two other categories – in the ‘Social Housing Developer of the Year’ category which recognises achievements in the delivery of new-build affordable homes in Scotland and in the ‘Affordable Housing Development of the Year (Social Rent)’ category for Craigmillar Town Centre.
City of Edinburgh Council’s Housing Convener, Councillor Kate Campbell, said:
Through our Council house building programme we’re investing in communities across our city, being led by local people as to what they want, and how they want to see any regeneration in their local area happen.
As a Council we’ve made our priorities ending poverty, promoting wellbeing and making our city greener and more sustainable for future generations. In Craigmillar town centre the new homes meet all three aims.
We’ve built energy efficient, affordable homes that are easy to heat, there’s good quality outdoor space, the whole area is well maintained and it’s easy, and a pleasure, to travel through. There are areas for children to play and we’re investing more in public space through the Scottish Government’s Place Based Fund to create a space for community and public events. We’ve also got a fantastic new school building well under way.
The communities in Craigmillar and Niddrie deserve to have some of the best quality new homes and amenities, and this win and finalist recognition proves that we do. It is also testament to the hard work of the Council’s teams so I’d like to thank everyone for their dedication to making sure we’re not just building much needed affordable homes, we’re building some of the best new homes and developments in the city.
Councillor Mandy Watt, Housing Vice Convener, said:
The Scottish Home Awards is a great opportunity to see all the innovative and ground-breaking work going on across the public and private housing sector across Scotland. For Edinburgh’s Craigmillar Town Centre to be recognised in the Housing Regeneration Project of the Year category is fantastic and really demonstrates how we’re leading the way by creating community hubs, working within our new 20 minute neighbourhood principle, helping to deliver more sustainable places and meet our residents’ needs better locally.
And the nominations keep on coming.
In partnership with Collective Architecture, the Council’s Meadowbank Masterplan has been shortlisted in ‘Masterplan’ category at the Architectural Journal Architecture Awards.
Meadowbank will become the first development of its size in Edinburgh to promote the Council’s net zero carbon by 2030 goals by creating a low-car, low-carbon community and proposes around 600 energy efficient new homes. With support from Nature Scot and the Scottish Government, the Masterplan has been awarded Building with Nature accreditation, setting the standard for high-quality low carbon features. The winners will be revealed on Wednesday 17 November.
And later on that month, the UK Housing Awards 2021 awards will take place with the Council’s Housing and Regeneration team, shortlisted in the ‘Council of the Year’ category.
This award celebrates those teams and individuals who have demonstrated a real commitment to the housing sector across the country and whose work has made a valuable impact on the people and communities they serve.
The final round of judging will take place between Monday 11 to Friday 22 October and the winners will be announced on 25 November.