Imaginative use of small apartment space can turn a into an ideal home

BY JILL BURDETT

WHO needs a hallway when you live in an apartment? If you've buzzed someone up from the lobby you know what to expect when you open the door, so why not use the space for actual living? You might not think it would make much of a difference, but believe me it does.

In an exercise in product development that borders on the excessive, dandara, already winners of the M.E.N. Apartment of the Year Award with their Lock Building, have turned an empty warehouse on one of their many Manchester sites into a "mini street" of full-size apartments.

They have used it to show the standard of what they are building already - and what they can do with exactly the same amount of space if they lose a few walls, re-work the layout and get rid of the hall. And you would be surprised at how different 640sq ft can look.

Hugh McGuinness, the developer's new UK sales director, explained: "We wanted to make sure that the apartments we build are as good as they can possibly be.

"As a company every department gets together every three months to pool resources and swap ideas and these concept apartments are just a way of taking that a stage further."

dandara are in the middle of a massive building programme in Manchester, with four sites on the go at the moment and they have just got permission for another 990 apartments in a huge scheme on the Salford side of the River Irwell, in between the Lowry Hotel and The Edge, so they need to get it right.

The Chapel Wharf site will include a 40-storey glass tower and five more blocks, with a leisure spa in the base of the tower.

They also own a huge swathe of land at the end of Deansgate where they have plans for a big, mixed-use scheme that will happen sometime in the future.

Their concept apartments are in their most typical sizes: a studio of 320sq ft, a 470sq ft one-bedder and a 640sq ft two-bed unit. Of course, they build bigger apartments and it must have been tempting to play around with a much larger layout but they know their market and these are the sizes they build most.

They will not be used for day-to-day viewings as each of their sites has its own show apartments, but they will be a sort of test-bed cum training ground to both get feedback from investors and show sub contractors and people who work on their developments the standards they expect.

After seeing both the standard two-bed they are building now, which is itself a decent-sized living space and top spec kitchen and two proper double bedrooms, when you walk into the new concept one it is hard to believe it is just the same amount of space used differently

You step straight from the corridor into the living space, which is wider because you have lost the hallway and the kitchen is tucked in one corner, but the big gain is with the bedrooms.
Both are doubles, one on either side of the living space. One has a big en-suite bathroom and the other is next to the main bathroom which means they both have a sense of privacy, crucial if two people want to rent together.

It is so simple you wonder why developers have not thought of it before. McGuinness says that everyone who has seen the two layouts so far prefers the concept version.
They will be available in the second phase of Spectrum, the development currently taking shape at Salford's Greengate and of course will feature in the new Chapel Wharf scheme.
McGuinness is incredibly picky about detail.

He is already re-ordering tiles and work surfaces for the kitchens because he thinks other options will work better and is pleased when I compliment the spec of the interior doors which are glossy white with good handles.

He said: "We could have had the standard beech but we wanted to move it on even though these are much more expensive. I think people do notice."

The bathrooms are big, with textured white tiles and lots of mirrors giving a clinical feel that could be softened with towels and there is lots of hidden built-in storage for all the day-to-day clutter you don't want out on show. There is bathroom storage in all of the concept apartments.

The studio posed something of a problem. McGuinness said: "The feedback we have already is that people hate having to pull down the bed and say that if people call round they have to put it away again.

"So we tried to address that issue while still making the space big enough to sit and relax in."

Their solution is to have the bed in an area without doors behind a wall of frosted glass brick to allow in light.

There's a shower room, again fitted out in the same spec, and a wall of kitchen backed by mirror to help buyers think they are getting more than 320 sq ft. It is just about crash pad size but feels like a liveable weekday apartment.

The devil is always in the detail such as plug sockets. Once it was all brushed steel, but dandara have moved on to cream plastic and sourced large units that take four sockets for all the plugs and wires a city techno home has to have, so that the finish is better.

Because there are no fire doors they have had to install a sprinkler system in case of fire.

It's a shame this warehouse of apartments is not open to the public, it would make a great walking tour and be an eye-opener to developers wrestling with space layout.

The only thing with losing a hallway though is that you also lose the hall table. Now, where are you going to put your keys?

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