Honouring the voices that shape Poplar, whose traditions and stories are central to the life of this area, we asked local people: “What is your favourite thing about living in Aberfeldy?”

At last week's Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland (RIAI) awards ceremony, Springvale Grove, the social housing project we designed and delivered alongside ABK Architects for Dublin City Council was commended for its approach to Universal Design.

We recently welcomed Arts Ambassadors from Stebon Primary School in Poplar, Tower Hamlets to our London studio.

For the past two years, we have been supporters of PLACED Academy in the North West. This important initiative provides valuable opportunities for young people with an interest in the built environment to develop confidence and skills.

Celebrating spaces that welcome everyone with dignity and equality, the transformation of Bristol Beacon represents a landmark achievement in creating an accessible, inclusive, and community-focused cultural hub.

The team behind the regeneration of Pumpfields in Liverpool – including our own Jo McCafferty, Renzo Campisi and Emma Koch, together with Simon Cadle from Turner.Works­ – participated in group tutorials at the University of Liverpool with students of the Masters in Spatial Planning and Design.

The journey to becoming an architect traditionally follows a well-worn path through university education. However, we're proud to be able to offer an alternative route for aspiring architects through our apprenticeship programme.

65 new affordable homes delivered to Passivhaus standards in Newham, London.

It was great to be part of the launch event of Elevate 100, a new youth hub in Downham that supports young people by providing co-working facilities and career growth support—focusing on their needs, strengths, and ambitions to create pathways to employment. Levitt Bernstein worked closely with the Youth Action Board to co-design the new hub space. Youth Build, a local organisation that trains disadvantaged young people in construction, completed the building work on the space.

Architect Anureena D'costa explores why the architecture industry continues to be under representative of people of colour and those from ethnic minority backgrounds.

Following a public call for nominations, a Local Heritage List was launched by Waltham Forest Council. This list is a comprehensive record of the many unique buildings, structures, and public artworks that contribute to the borough’s distinct character and are cherished by its residents and communities.

This research project was born from a desire to communicate how the design of Highgate New Town, a 1970s housing estate built by the London Borough of Camden, has fostered a strong sense of community across generations.

Visiting the Phoenix Garden Community Centre, designed by Office Sian.

Jo McCafferty contributed to a panel discussion to celebrate the centenary of the St Pancras Housing Society. The event, as part of London Festival of Architecture, was organised by A Space For Us, an independent community initiative and museum in Somers Town.

As part of this year’s London Festival of Architecture, we opened our studios for an evening of presentations and Q&A with our panel of special guests. Our theme this year was ‘Reimagining Public Spaces Through Co-Design’. This is a mantra that we have always had as a thread running through our work. The process is now often referred to in briefs, so it was interesting to explore what this means in practice, what works well and the potential pitfalls of the process.

Levitt Bernstein has become an Employee Ownership Trust (EOT). The practice was originally founded as a Partnership in 1968 and then incorporated as a Limited Company in 1986. We believe this next stage of our evolution as a practice, entirely aligns with our ethos and principles to put ‘people first’.

The idea of a home strikes a deep, emotional chord within all of us particularly at this festive time of year. It represents protection, comfort and a place to be yourself. The communities in which our homes are set often reinforce these feelings. Together, they form the settings for our everyday activities and interactions. Many of us appreciate this more than ever following the upheaval over the last few years.

As part of our architectural contribution to the Manchester International Festival over the summer, Levitt Bernstein held a Glass House event which explored the question: What makes a great city?

The Bristol Beacon redevelopment has been partially made possible by the support of Arts Council England (ACE) funding on the provision that the Beacon was run with greater artistic and educational ambition. This led to the establishment of British Music Trust which has operated the Hall since 2011 with their core values of education, entertainment, and enterprise at heart.

What makes a great city? We reignited this discussion a few months ago in a panel event hosted by Levitt Bernstein, as part of the 10th anniversary of the Manchester studio. Insightful thoughts were shared across the panel, made up of a diverse group of young professionals, sparking a prompt debate within the audience about what makes people decide to live in our cities and what they value the most.

Buccleuch House, which completed in June 2015, is an intergenerational development in Clapton, east London which provides affordable housing for three different communities.

We’re proud and excited to share our ongoing voluntary collaboration at Springfield Primary School as part of the national education initiative Climate Change All Change, which aims to introduce children to the transformative power of design in addressing the climate crisis and adapting to its effects.

This was one of the contributions from panellist Carmen Fyfe, at the ‘What makes a great city?’ event we hosted in collaboration with Manchester International Festival as part of our ten-year birthday celebrations. This phrase resonated with me when thinking about the role of an architect in making relevant work, and, for me, communication is key to making something accessible, meaningful, and relevant.

At Levitt Bernstein, we believe in the power of architecture to shape communities and transform lives. That's why we are thrilled to announce our participation in the upcoming Manchester Half Marathon to raise funds for Shelter, a charity dedicated to combating homelessness and providing safe, secure, and affordable housing for those in need.

It was that time of year again over the weekend for Manchester Pride! - A time to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community and raise awareness of the challenges that continue to face LGBTQ+ people. It was about supporting diversity, progression and inclusion. It was about raising awareness and acknowledging there is still work to be done to ensure we are all respected equally. What better way to than coming together to transform the city into a sea of vibrant colours and uniting towards one goal – equal opportunity for people of all sexual identities and genders.

Last week we hosted ‘What Makes a Great City? The Sequel’ as part of both this year’s Manchester International Festival (MIF) and our ongoing 10th Birthday celebrations. The original ‘What Makes a Great City’ was held in 2019, with a great panel of Tom Bloxham (founder of Urban Splash and Chair of MIF), Eamonn Boylan (Chief Exec of Greater Manchester Combined Authority), Christine Cort (co-founder of MIF) and our own Jo McCafferty, with host Kasper de Graaf. The focus was very much on what had made Manchester great up to that point, including MIF and other cultural and sporting events, the resurgence of city centre living, pioneering scientific discoveries and innovation, rooted in the industrial heritage of the city, and focussing on the qualities of all great cities.

Manchester studio’s tenth birthday - what a year to make the move up north! My family and I made the move back to my home city, Liverpool. To allow this, I swapped from Thane Villas to Bonded Warehouse, and feel incredibly lucky that Levitt Bernstein has both a London and a Manchester studio. We are seeing the benefits of the move already, particularly for my son, Luke and his grandparents, who have been able to spend much more time together.

Over the last few months, we have been working with our neighbours, the Arts and Media School Islington. In March, we led three workshops with their DT department, where the students reimagined a disused area on their school grounds. We have since had a student join us for work experience and most recently welcomed fifteen year 10 students to Thane Studios for a careers day.

On Saturday we opened up our studio at Thane Works in Finsbury Park as part of the London Festival of Architecture. We thought this year’s festival theme, ‘In Common’, was a great chance to meet and speak to the creative communities that make up our neighbourhood, with whom we have Islington ‘In Common’. We hosted events across the day including workshops and tours of our building, together with stalls and demonstrations from weaving, ceramic and culinary industries.

This award-winning Extra Care scheme, completed in 2017, provides 60 independent homes for older people and strongly embraces the HAPPI standards, to enable residents to live more independently in their homes for longer. Although the HAPPI principles could apply to any residential setting, they are a key starting point when designing for dementia, because of the emphasis placed on maintaining a high quality of life, independence and a sense of community.

As the Manchester studio reaches its tenth anniversary, I have taken time to reflect on a decade of fascinating school masterplanning, building and landscape projects. Stretching the breadth of the UK (and the Channel Islands) we can pause to appreciate a multitude of varied and exciting commissions, the different places with which we have become familiar and, most importantly, the valued clients and colleagues that we have got to know along the way.

Following a successful bid to the Mayor of London’s Green & Resilient Spaces Fund, we are delighted that Down Lane Park has been granted the maximum award of £750,000. Since spring 2022 Levitt Bernstein have been working alongside the LB Haringey client team (composed of Parks and Regeneration officers) to deliver a new park masterplan. At the heart of this process a long-standing relationship with the Community Design Group has been developed as key stakeholders and representatives of the local community.

Following the recent report release by the IPCC, we have limited time left to act to help curb global warming. See Gina’s recent 'Story of Tens' piece on this, here. The devastating effects of climate change can be seen across the world, but also here in the UK. Weather extremes throughout the year; from flooding to drought, freezing cold to extreme and unprecedented heatwaves. As a result, our school buildings are having to work a lot harder to maintain the environments needed for learning.

Recently, we have been working with a group of fifteen D&T students at the Arts and Media School, just ten minutes from our studio in Finsbury Park. The students were given a site on their school grounds to reimagine. The first workshop was a very wet and rainy ‘site visit’ where they surveyed the site in groups and sketched any initial ideas or thoughts as we walked around.

Basil Anuar, Architectural Assistant Apprentice at Levitt Bernstein writes in recognition of this year’s National Apprenticeship Week theme – “Skills for Life”: In this post, I will share some of the things I have learned. I'll also answer some of the questions I am commonly asked, as an apprentice.