London regeneration scheme that thinks inside the box

When Zoe Adjonyoh cooked Ghanaian peanut butter stew for hungry workers at an art fair five years ago, it sowed the seeds for the pop-up restaurant she runs today. Now Zoe's Ghana Kitchen will soon have a more permanent ven­ue. Ms Adjonyoh is one of 80 or so ent­re­preneurs finding a space in the re­cyc­led shipping containers of Pop Brixton, a business park opening in the gentrifying south London neighbourhood.

Carl Turner Architects, a small firm in Brixton, was handed the site by the local council to develop af­fordable space for young businesses struggling in London's frothy pro­perty market. "Rents are so expensive, the leases you have to sign are very long - it's just a huge commitment," Ms Adjonyoh says.

The project will last three years and, if successful, may be replicated elsewhere in London, where local authorities are eager to regenerate land, create jobs and support entrepreneurs.

Carl Turner Architects is currently dropping some 65 recycled containers on to the site, once a car park, where it will build units for rent at bet­ween £400 and £2,500 a month.

The firm won the chance to reg­ener­ate the land near Brixton railway station in a council-run competition, and plans to create a template for more sites. The venture is similar to others CTA has taken on, inc­luding a redesign for Slip House, an award-winning low-energy home that filled a gap in a Brixton terrace. Mr Turner says: "We're trying to show you can work with an existing site which al­lows the existing community to grow with that site and be supported by that development."

The £1.5m cost of the project is covered by a London-based property dev­e­l­oper, The Collective, and Mr Turner, who sold his house to fund the project. The council will share in any profits.

As well as food stalls and small retailers, Pop will inc­lude a radio station, a bike repair shop and a greenhouse. In a city where accommodation is inc­reas­ing­ly costly, the site even offers containers as af­fordable housing for people working from home.

Some containers will be occupied by Impact Hub, a co-working space currently hosting more than 60 people in the town hall. For The Champion Agen­cy, a social enterprise working with young creatives, Pop Brixton is a chance to move out of of­fices in an old piano factory. "To grow and to take on more people, it's time for us to get our own space," says founder Scott Leonard.

Tenants were chosen on the basis of local connections as well as business potential. All must contribute to developing the site's community. "We're creating a mini-city," says Philippe Cast­aing, commercial dir­ector at Pop, ad­ding: "What we don't want is for the skills to stay in Pop, we want them to radiate out into our community."

Many in Brixton are wary of further gentrification, which has transformed parts of east London into unaffordable hipster hang-outs.

Pop org­anised public meetings but ef­forts to increase local participation disappointed some, including The Edible Bus Stop, a landscape and urban design group, which dropped out in the early stages. Will Sandy, creative director, says: "Ult­imately, in Brixton in particular, people are apprehensive of change."

Others fear that rents at Pop will have to rise as costs mount, which could price out local entrepreneurs.

At Boxpark, which used freight containers to create a mall of pop-up shops in east London, standard rents for similar units are £1,000 per week. "It's difficult to run a business like that because if you are supporting small stalls they perhaps don't have the same financial capital," says Roger Wade, Boxpark founder.

But Mr Turner remains hopeful that Pop Brixton will make a profit and that there will be a feelgood factor: "It's a very forward thinking thing."

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