Limelight, Trafford Housing Trust’s new £20m health, well-being and community services hub which opens in Old Trafford later this year, has been nominated for a prestigious national Housing Development Award. Organised and managed by leading housing industry magazine Inside Housing, the Housing Development Awards celebrate the very best residential developments across the UK from the past year.
Limelight, which has 81 Extra Care apartments adjacent to the wider health and well-being hub, has been shortlisted in the Best Older People’s Housing Development category for schemes with less than 100 residents.
Limelight’s award submission highlighted how its Extra Care flats are spacious, very well-equipped and have features like free Wi-Fi and a video intercom door-entry system. In addition, every apartment has been designed to reduce the risk of falls, and have built-in assistive technology and alert systems which allow staff to respond quickly to any problems a customer might have.
The entry also included details of the highly sustainable building methods used to construct the Limelight development, and promoted the fact that a majority of the apartments are to be let with affordable rents.
However, beyond just highlighting the high-quality accommodation and support which elderly and vulnerable residents living at Limelight can expect, the award entry also focused on the wide range of amenities and services which will genuinely improve residents’ quality of life. These include access to a new GP surgery and pharmacy together with an optician, hairdresser, library, café and multi-purpose community centre.
With a nursery and numerous activities and provision for younger people and families also on-site, Limelight scheme will also be an intergenerational space. This means that older residents will have the opportunity to remain linked in to the wider community, and will have access to many services not typically available within Extra Care schemes such as a 4D immersive sensory room, and a variety of accessible multi-use spaces.
Residents will also have access to a secure, sensitively designed, communal garden space which will play an important part in improving well-being, and the whole Limelight hub has been designed to create a dementia friendly environment, ensuring that residents are supported to use the full building.
Limelight, which is situated in the heart of a diverse and vibrant community, has also integrated a range of features and facilities into the building’s design to accommodate the needs of different faiths and cultures.
Another key dimension of the Limelight hub is the role that local people have played in its development. Extensive public consultation involving over 2,000 local people, together with the formation of resident-led design teams, saw many aspects of the project shaped by the actual customers who will be using Limelight’s facilities when it becomes fully operational.
David Teasdale, Limelight’s Centre Manager, said: “We believe Limelight is a model for community-based, specialist housing, care and support which places older people at the centre of their own community. It also has the potential to be a national exemplar for integrated housing and care through the delivery of an inclusive and intergenerational approach to health and wellbeing. Being shortlisted for this prestigious national award is therefore great news for the Trust, our partners and whole Limelight team, and we look forward to attending the awards ceremony in London in November.”
Alex Atkinson from Identity Consult, a specialist Project Management consultancy who worked closely with Trafford Housing Trust to help develop the Limelight concept, said: “From the very beginning of the Limelight project, delivering a scheme which meets customers’ needs has been at the heart of all decision making. The result is a development that will have a really positive impact on the local community, and this scheme is a fantastic example of how partnerships can deliver many different activities and services which are far greater than the sum of their parts. I’m therefore thrilled that Limelight has been recognised by Inside Housing as one of the best developments of its kind in the UK.”
A selection of Housing Development Award finalists will be invited to present their work at a major housing conference in London on 23rd of November. The winners will then be announced later that evening at a black-tie ceremony at London’s prestigious Hurlingham Club.
