Situated in Sevenoaks, Quinton Court offers 2 and 3 bedroom apartments within reach of the rolling hills and valleys of the North Downs.

The heritage-inspired scheme was built on the former J Salmon printworks, the oldest established postcard and calendar publisher in Britain. AR Quinton, the namesake of the new development, was known for his watercolour paintings of villages and landscapes which featured on postcards of the company.

Quinton Court has carefully drawn on the historical context of the town of Sevenoaks using materials such as red brick, render and stone and slate detailing. Each floor of the building has been designed with considered architectural detail featuring bay windows, terraces and balconies built around a communal courtyard.

As winner of Development of the Year (51- 100 units) in our Excellence Awards, we were excited to talk to Dean Williams, Technical Director at Berkeley, about this scheme and Berkeley’s ethos and approach to developing new homes.

Can you give us a bit of background to Berkeley?

Berkeley Group builds homes and neighbourhoods across London, Birmingham and the South of England. Founded in 1976, we are passionate about reviving underused land to create welcoming, sustainable and nature-rich places, where people of all ages and backgrounds can enjoy a great quality of life.

We specialise in brownfield regeneration, focusing on challenging sites that are beyond the scope of conventional homebuilders. We are highly collaborative, working with local councils and communities to co-design unique places which reflect the best of their surroundings and stand the test of time.

A passion for quality and design underpins everything we do. No two Berkeley neighbourhoods are the same and every home we build is created with care, expertise and relentless attention to detail.

What were some of the highlights and challenges of the winning development?

Quinton Court is a striking addition to the town centre, replacing what was an unsightly car lot and otherwise unremarkable collection of run-down buildings. It is a prime example of the high-quality design and placemaking we strive for at Berkeley, creating much-needed homes in very desirable and sustainable locations.

The inherent constraints of its location and site topography demanded a very complex design solution for mixed uses in a traditional architectural language. All this was achieved on a very constrained site incorporating a double basement parking solution.

Courtyard at Quinton Court © Berkeley Group

What does it mean to win an Excellence Award for the scheme?

It reinforces the positivity across the production team on site and it’s particularly rewarding to receive acknowledgement from the warranty provider of the additional effort put in by everybody involved.

What are some emerging themes in house building and how is Berkeley readying itself for the future of building?

Berkeley has set out a ten-year strategy, called ‘Our Vision 2030’, which is designed to meet the big challenges of tomorrow and to maximise our positive impacts. This includes the next stage of our industry-leading climate action programme, which has already seen Berkeley reduce its direct carbon impacts by over 70% and create more resilient and low-carbon neighbourhoods. Our new focus is to meet challenging science-based targets for reducing the full scope of our emissions, which will put us on course to be a carbon-neutral business by 2040.

We are very proud to be leading our industry in reversing biodiversity loss, which is the other major environmental challenge of our time. In 2016, we became the first UK homebuilder to commit to delivering a measurable net biodiversity gain on every new site we develop and we are now weaving more ambitious and beautiful natural networks through our neighbourhoods. This is giving wildlife the conditions to thrive and is of great benefit to community health and wellbeing.

Berkeley is also investing in modern methods of construction, including our unique modular housing system, which will be precision manufactured in factory conditions rather than built on site. Berkeley Modular will be an exciting step forward combining Berkeley’s expertise with advanced production technologies from the aerospace and automotive sectors. This will complement our growing construction operations helping us to build more homes and to set the highest standards of build quality, sustainability and design. Our approach goes hand-in-hand with a wider investment in skills and technologies as we look to modernise our approach to production.

How have you found the experience of working with Premier Guarantee?

As our appointed warranty provider, Premier supports and scrutinises quality standards across the design and build of the project. The production team have built a good working relationship with the Premier surveyor who has always been engaging and offered guidance to the team when on site.

What does success look like for your company?

Transforming underused land into beautiful homes and places where people of all backgrounds can enjoy a great quality of life. We strive to achieve the highest standards of design, placemaking, build quality, sustainability and customer service, and to deliver a mix of benefits for the people and communities around our sites.

What’s on the horizon?

We are looking at various land opportunities and have a number of projects soon to go into planning and production. The future looks very exciting for the Berkeley Eastern Counties division.

Explore Quinton Court in more detail and find out more about Berkeley’s ‘Our Vision 2030’.

If your next project could benefit from the expertise at Premier Guarantee why not explore our warranties and services and get a quote today?

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