A new 7,750-home garden community in north Essex incorporates a new youth engagement model. Over 18 months, Essex Young Designers, a diverse group of local 14-to-18-year-olds, has contributed ideas to shape the project’s design. Initiatives like Holiday Design Studios, Family Days, and a Schools Design Challenge ensure young voices are integrated into the development process, fostering creativity and community involvement in this large-scale residential project.

Who is on the project? 

Haworth Tompkins

Grounded, Stantec

Periscope

Kjellander Sjoberg

Lichfields

Arup

Jas Bhalla

HAT Projects

Describe the context of the community engagement. Why did the engagement take place?

To meet the needs of a growing population over the next 30 to 40 years for housing, employment and associated community facilities and infrastructure, Colchester and Tendring councils and Latimer by Clarion Housing Group are working together to plan for a new 7,750-home Garden Community in north Essex, in the south of England. Latimer recognised from the outset that youth engagement and empowerment were going to be key objectives for the project. The significant timeframe means that today’s young people will be its primary inhabitants.They therefore collaborated with youth engagement specialists Matt and Fiona to ensure young people’s ideas and values are placed front and centre from the outset. Together, they have implemented a pioneering new model of youth engagement for large-scale residential projects that centres the voices of young people, meaningfully integrating their ideas into the design of the future Garden Community. The entire model of youth engagement has been designed to foster a wider and more diverse participation, democratising the design process and giving young people a seat at the table. Bringing them into the same room as professional designers and architects fosters a very special kind of collaboration that treats professional and lived experience equally.

Who did you engage with and how? 

 The establishment of a long-term, representative group of young people – the self-named Essex Young Designers - ensures that young people’s ideas weave into the work of the design team throughout design development. The young designers form a diverse group of 14- to 18-year-olds from the local area who meet regularly with the design team to inform the brief and design of the Garden Community. They represent a broad range of communities and attend different schools and colleges in the area. In recognition of the value of their contributions, they are paid for their time. Holiday Design Studios/Family Days: This part of the programme accelerated from youth engagement into full co-design. 11- to 14-year-olds took part in a summer studio creating a large-scale model of a future Garden Community they would like to see. They also made full-scale prototypes of furniture for a meanwhile garden that has now been professionally fabricated and installed. This model of engagement will be replicated throughout the engagement programme to reach an even broader audience. Schools Design Challenge: To ensure wide reach, as well as in depth engagement, school children from across North Essex were invited to share ideas for the scheme through an open call, ‘Land Sky Water’. The challenge gave all primary and secondary school students in the area the opportunity to design and model innovative ideas for TCBGC. The ideas that came out of the challenge are being taken forward by the design team as part of their briefing.

How did the project and the community benefit from engagement? 

The benefits to the project of such an extensive youth engagement programme cannot be overstated. The young people who have taken part and shared their knowledge and lived experience are experts in their local area. There is huge value in hearing firsthand from them how they currently use the spaces around them and how they could be better served by local amenities and transport routes. After any engagement with young people, rigorous reporting is undertaken by Mat and Fiona, who collect both qualitative and quantitative data from workshops. This data is collated and analysed in a report which is then shared with Latimer and the design team, who use these documents to inform their work. Members of the design team also attend workshops to hear directly from the young people themselves. Spanning 18 months so far, the project is still in its early stages, relatively speaking, but there have already been examples of young people’s input shaping the design of the garden community. This is most evident in the masterplan of the central civic square, which is now incorporates much more green space, emphasising the idea of a ‘place at the table’ for nature. Other examples of the young designers’ input include the idea of public art as landmarks, active travel and the provision of food growing facilities, which will be a key way to achieve regenerative stretch targets. Moving towards the submission of the planning application for the masterplan, there will be further opportunities for young people to shape the project.