We’re delighted that Juniper House has been shortlisted for a RIBA East London Award. For us it feels especially meaningful because the project – delivered in tough circumstance during peak Covid - captures so much of how we read and work with the city.

On a tight triangular plot beside Walthamstow Central station, Juniper shows how a building can mediate between scales, stitching together infrastructure, speculative development and Edwardian streets so it feels rooted rather than simply slapped down. Its mix of homes, university classrooms, a nursery, and winter‑garden social spaces is a reminder that vertical life can be textured, local, and everyday.

For us, vertical placemaking is about way more than building tall. We treat height as a continuation of terrain, a device to carry the colours, functions and patterns of the neighbourhood upward. At Juniper, that idea threads through the façade, the public realm at the base, and the shared spaces at the top making a tower that works as part of the city.

Here’s hoping the judges will see what Juniper’s community has already begun to feel: a renewed, more definitive townscape that residents and the whole of Walthamstow can enjoy.