Aspal Lane, Beck Row

Lovell's willingness to think innovatively enabled the development, in partnership with Clarion Housing Group, of a project that sees new homes built at pace, resulting in both commercial success and meeting local demand while reducing costs.

“We are excited to join forces with Clarion Housing to deliver this high-quality scheme, which is set to extend the range of affordable options for the local community, both by helping people into home ownership and by creating new rented homes.”

Simon Medler, Regional Managing Director, Lovell Partnerships

Project

Aspal Lane, Beck Row

Location

East Anglia

Dates

2015-2019

Partners

Clarion Housing Group

Value

£20 million

Overview

We purchased the site to develop it as a Lovell Homes open market development with a standard S106 affordable housing element.  Clarion Housing Group approached us to explore whether they could buy the site from us in its entirety and use Lovell as contractor to build the site out.

We are designing and building the 115 new homes for Clarion as well as establishing a new foul water pumping station.

Innovative model

Lovell's flexibility, commercial awareness and willingness to explore innovative models with our partners - as well as our contracting experience - means we are able to deliver this excellent development at pace and with cost reductions.

Working in partnership with Clarion we were able to turn a Lovell open market site into a design and build project.

In return, Clarion gets instant delivery to help achieve their substantial public commitment to build more homes.  The discount that they received means they have been able to convert the private units to shared-ownership using their secured Homes England allocation.

By having this model at our disposal, we are able to generate our own contracting opportunities and achieve a commercially robust balance between our contracting, developing and joint venture workload.

Exemplary safety

This site won - against 60 other sites - our Lovell National Health and Safety Award 2018 for its high standards of safety. Key factors in the site's health & safety success were:

• Exemplar use of PAVES from the earliest planning stages and continuing throughout the programme, resulting in a properly-used system that protects the workforce and members of the public.

• An excellent learning event reporting culture from the very start, demonstrating a desire to get things right and continuously learn and improve.

• First class relationships with the supply chain, with the site team holding regular consultation sessions with all subcontractors, allowing a flourishing health and safety culture.

• Site housekeeping consistently recorded as exemplary from the start of the scheme.

• Overall the attitude, application and desire to provide an excellent working environment as shown by the team has been outstanding.

Aspen Lane, Beck Row - against 60 other sites - won the Lovell National Health and Safety Award 2018 for its high standards of safety.

“We are pleased to be working with Lovell to deliver much-needed new housing for Suffolk”

Philip Browne, New Business and Partnerships Director for Clarion Housing Group