Design Council's new partnership sets out to regenerate Waltham Forest

Design Council Cabe has partnered with Waltham Forest Council to run a design advice panel in order to help create successful places and improve people’s quality of life across the borough.

Waltham Forest Council is embarking on one of the biggest home building programmes in London, with the ambition to build 12,000 new homes over the next few years. The London borough has unmistakably transformed over the last few years and continues to experience unprecedented levels of growth. This transformation includes the regeneration of its town centres and the emergence of thriving arts and creative industries, contributing to a unique cultural identity.

In order to deliver this change in a sustainable fashion, Design Council Cabe and Waltham Forest Council have formed the Waltham Forest Design Advice Panel (WFDAP). The WFDAP is made up of twenty members of Design Council Cabe’s network of 400 Built Environment Experts. It will provide independent, expert design advice on key development proposals, and will encourage collaborative working with developers and applicants.

Councillor Clare Coghill, Cabinet Member, Economic Growth and High Streets, said: “We face a number of important challenges over the coming years as we regenerate the borough. The establishment of the Panel underpins our commitment to creating attractive, safe, sustainable and well-connected places for everyone in our borough.”  

Design Council Cabe has unrivalled experience in the field of design review and has provided design advice to a wide range of bodies, including the Royal London Borough of Greenwich, Oxford City Council, and continues to work on the transformational developments at Old Oak and Park Royal Development Corporation in West London, and Thurrock Council in Essex.

The independent design review process will instil design quality in development and provide long-term, expert advice to effect transformational change in our borough.

Councillor Clare Coghill, Cabinet Member, Economic Growth and High Streets

Councillor Coghill continued: We have already successfully used design review on some of our recent major schemes, so we are pleased to be able to put in place these arrangements with Design Council Cabe. These are exciting times for Waltham Forest and we look forward to working with our partners and residents to achieve our vision.”

Clare Devine, our Executive Director of Architecture, Built Environment and Design, commented: “We are delighted to have the opportunity to work with the London Borough of Waltham Forest. Members of the WFDAP have been selected from our national network of multidisciplinary design experts responding to the  borough’s growth and its future ambitions to provide new homes, regenerate places in need and improve people’s quality of life.”

Cabe Design Review is an independent and impartial process for evaluating the quality of significant developments, urban extensions and major infrastructure projects across England. The process is managed to the high standard established in The 10 Principles of Design Review – co-authored by Design Council Cabe, Royal Town Planning Institute, Royal Institute of British Architects and the Landscape Institute.