The first winning designs in Manchester's pioneering Tutti Frutti project have been revealed - and the innovative housing project will receive ministerial approval tomorrow when Hazel Blears, the Secretary for Communities and Local Government, visits the site in Ancoats.
The scheme sets a revolutionary trend in house-building, allowing all the occupants of an entire street to design their own homes.
Buyers were given a free hand to produce their own ideas of what a modern townhouse should include. As judge Will Alsop told Home In last year, "A building should be fun. Making inoffensive buildings is offensive." The entrants didn't let him down: ideas ranged from a stadium-style opening roof to a willow-clad den.
Now the first six of 26 designs are going before the city's planners for approval. When they are all built, the best one will be refunded the cost of the building plot - around £160,000.
The judges included comedian Griff Rhys Jones, who presented the BBC's Restoration series; Manchester's official creative consultant Peter Saville, who designed Joy Division's iconic album sleeves; Alsop, designer of the landmark Peckham Library in London; and Ellis Woodman, buildings editor of the architects' weekly, Building Design.
Developers Urban Splash borrowed the idea for the project from a canalside street in Amsterdam. "We fell in love with this wonderful terrace where each house is totally different," said Nick Johnson, the company's deputy chief executive.
Tutti Frutti - the name is derived from its location in Manchester's former Italian district - is part of the huge New Islington regeneration scheme on the city centre's eastern edge.
One of the Government's seven Millennium Communities, the 30-acre site will provide 1,700 homes, a school, a health centre, offices, shops, bars and restaurants around a new canal and water park.
Like their Dutch prototypes, the Tutti Frutti plots are narrow, around 15ft wide, but quite deep at 50ft. Designs range from two to six storeys. Some are extravagant, others simple and understated.
"We were all very much relieved not to see any neo-Georgian/mock Tudor pastiches," said Johnson.
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