Highpoint

Highpoint I introduction:

“For a long time I have dreamed of executing dwellings in such conditions for the good of humanity. The building at Highgate is an achievement of the first rank.”

Le Corbusier, 1935.

Le Corbusier’s approval for Highpoint One was hardly surprising. Lubetkin had been inspired by many of Corbusier's ideas on urban planning, and was particularly affected by his Plan Voisin of 1925, which sketched a vision of cruciform towers set in lush parkland. And in early 1935 he had taken the other members of Tecton (the architectural practice he formed in 1932 with six young AA graduates) to Paris to visit Le Corbusier’s villas.

The client for Highpoint was Sigmund Gestetner, the owner of a company that manufactured office equipment. Gestetner had been interested in building housing for his workers but when he lost the proposed site in Camden he agreed to commission Lubetkin & Tecton to design a commercial block of apartments.

Building Design:

The site presented some difficulties. It slopes steeply to the west. There was a covenant on the rear of the site that prohibited building and local council regulations stipulated that the building height on the road end should not exceed 65 feet. Tecton explored a number of different plans and evaluated them against a checklist of requirements: economic needs, height, privacy, views, orientation and circulation. The chosen plan was a double cruciform, aligned perpendicular to the street. Entrance is made at the road end through a curving porte cochere.

Highpoint One incorporated many innovative features and was technically advanced for the time. The engineer was Ove Arup. He persuaded the Borough surveyor to waive the conventional regulations that would have required an internally obtrusive frame of columns and beams. Instead he used a monolithic panel and slab technique, whereby the exterior walls are treated as monolithically combined stanchions and beams. (The “eggshell” structure) This continuity allowed the thickness of the walls to be reduced and gave an almost unobstructed floor area. Other innovations included ceiling hot water radiant panels, built-in refrigerators that had a central condenser in the basement, a separate system of small service lifts, folding windows that slide to one side of the opening, carefully designed kitchens and bathrooms and built in wardrobes that fit beneath the spine beam supporting the middle of the slab.

An oblique entrance lobby delivers one to the centre of the building and presents a high ceilinged hall and winter garden in which both staircases are given equal prominence. This “architectural promenade” continues at the west end of the building, stepping down one level to a tea room and terrace overlooking the garden on the slope below.

The central east-west axis contains the two-bedroom (Type B) flats. The north-south axes contain the three-bedroom (Type A) flats. The services, lifts and staircases are grouped at the crossing.