Project of Choice 2024 – Jordan Pegg
At the close of 2024, all Wilson Architects team members took a moment to reflect on their stand out property project of the year.
Jordan Pegg’s standout project of 2024 was a 10-Flat HMO Scheme, focused on converting a congregation church.
Constructed during the 19th century, the changes in local worship in the 20th century saw the church ceasing to operate as a religious institution. After falling into disuse, this was repurposed as the Sailors and Soldiers Club, an organization founded to support returning servicemen from the First and Second World Wars.
This reuse highlights the adaptability of the church and its ongoing role as a community asset. Falling within the boundary of the conservation area of Castle Donington, it’s classed as an unlisted building of architectural and historic interest.
“This project underwent planning for a year and a half, undergoing several design, layout and site changes,” Jordan explained, noting the intensive sympathetic scheme that paid homage to the historic landscape. “It took a few iterations of layout and window changes, reducing the mass of the building, to get it to a great place. The changes were incremental but visually it’s changed and is now a much more sympathetic building.”
The design features iconic red brick reminiscent of its surrounding buildings, tying it in nicely to the culture of the neighbourhood area that has slowly become more residential than commercial over the last decade. The vertical extension was part of a “visual betterment, tying it visually to the roof of the initial church,” whilst being conscious of surrounding structures natural light.
The historic former church on the application site will be retained and repaired where necessary in terms of its appearance, invigorating a historically significant asset to Castle Donington, whilst maintaining its architectural detail.
Speaking of the finalised design, Jordan said, “I’m happy with that set of drawings, it’s a better design now than what it was initially. I’m delighted it’s getting approved and it’s nice to work on a flat scheme. It’s a nice scale of development, where you can get a bit more localised design drivers in.”
“Flat schemes are of a scale where you can try to relate to the local vernacular a bit more, without losing a sense of self. Sometimes you can lose more of the smaller details if the buildings larger, so this was an excellent example, especially with the stone banding, Palladian-style windows, soldier brick coursing, and symmetry.”
Jordan’s most favoured element to the design was the symmetry. “The small, singular flat to the right-hand side mimics the larger adjacent one. I hadn’t done Palladian windows before, so that was nice, too. Overall it’s quite a traditional looking building – but not pastiche.”
