Issuu

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS A Regenerative Neighbourhood for Food, Water and Community

7039AAD DESIGN STUDIO BLOSSOM OHAERI 16772478

“Human activity can be a source of health and regeneration, rather than destruction and degradation.” Regenesis group

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

Table of Content Introduction 01 — Context and Needs 02 — Learning from Precedent 03 — Design Conceptualisation 04 — Village Structure 05 — Building the Commons 06 — Technical Resolution 07 — The Experience References Appendix

NOTE: Any Image not credited is Author’s own illustration

| Page 2

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

IntroductIon

Abstract Naul’s Mill Commons proposes a radical regenerative village that reorganises everyday life around water, food production, biodiversity, and shared community infrastructure. Located at Naul’s Mill in Coventry, the project responds to a site marked by ecological underperformance, fragmented public life, food-cost pressure, and weak communal structure. Rather than treating regeneration as a visual upgrade or a simple housing insertion, the proposal frames it as ecological and social repair. A central productive pond, clustered homes, wetlands, productive gardens, and a communal kitchen are combined into a living system that supports low-income family life, collective belonging, and environmental restoration. Water is treated as visible infrastructure, food as an everyday commons, and biodiversity as part of domestic and public space. The project argues that radical regeneration can emerge through the rebuilding of relationships between landscape, housing, work, and care.

Thesis Statement When water is restored as visible shared infrastructure and connected to food production, housing, biodiversity, and collective care, it can become the spatial and social foundation for radical regeneration. Through a water-fed village model of clustered homes, productive commons, wetlands, and a communal kitchen, the project demonstrates how ecological repair and social repair can be designed together.

| Page 03

Research Question How can regenerative design transform Naul’s Mill into neighbourhood that supports ecological repair, food production, and collective life for low-income families? How can the site’s existing water systems be reimagined as visible social and ecological infrastructure? How can clustered housing support privacy, care, and everyday community without losing a sense of ownership? How can fishery, food growing, and the community kitchen structure shared life, dignity, and local resilience? How can biodiversity and controlled wilderness be integrated into domestic and communal ground conditions?

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

IntroductIon

LItErAturE rEVIEW

Regenerative Development and Design: A Framework For Evolving Sustainability Regensis Group

Manual of Biogenic House Sections Paul Lewis, Marc Tsurumaki & David J. Lewis

Soft City: Building Density for Everyday Life David Sim

| Page 04

01 - CONTEXT & NEED

Radical regeneration at Nauls Mill Fragmentation and Potential of the Site Naul’s Mill Water Commons begins from the belief and neccessity of regenerative architecture; that design. must do more than improve appearance or add new buildings. It must rebuild damaged relationships between water, ecology, food, housing, and collective life. In this project, Radical regeneration is understood as a form of repair that goes beyond sustainability or site improvement. Rather than simply reducing harm, it actively restores ecological processes while rebuilding shared social life. Naul’s Mill represents a concentrated form of wider challenges facing Coventry, where ecological systems, public life, and everyday support structures often remain fragmented rather than mutually reinforcing. The site contains significant latent assets, including water, open ground, and strategic urban position, yet these do not currently operate as meaningful ecological infrastructure or shared social commons. For nearby low-income households, this reflects broader pressures of food insecurity, weak communal support, poor-quality public space, and environmental underperformance. The problem is therefore not a lack of land, but a lack of relationship between landscape, housing, productivity, and collective life.

KEY ISSuES •

Fragmented ecology

•

Underused water systems

•

Weak social commons

•

Brownfield site

•

Pressure on everyday family life

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

| Page 05

Lives, Work and Care Stakeholders Analysis Low-income young families are the primary social stakeholders of Naul’s Mill Commons, but they are not the only users the project is designed for. The proposal is conceived as a shared ecological and social commons in which human life, water systems, planting, habitat, and non-human species are interdependent. Within this framework, families act not only as residents, but as everyday caretakers and regenerative drivers of the wider living system. These households often negotiate insecure housing, food-cost stress, school runs, childcare pressure, and limited access to safe, meaningful shared spaces. Designing for them means creating a neighbourhood that supports stability, dignity, and belonging through both domestic life and shared commons.

1 in 3 children in poverty in Coventry, fast-growing city. 1 in 5 people in income and employment deprivation. More private rent, secure ownership

less

What this means at home? • Overcrowded or small flats • High share of income on rent, food, energy • Cold/damp homes, no real private outdoor space

“FOUR SOCIAL CRISES” Food Insecurity

Lack of dignity & social isolation

Unsafe Public Realm

No support for care & interdependence

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

01 - contEXt And ProBLEM

Composite family: Two adults (25–40), 2 children (6 and 9), renting in Coventry, no car, juggling shift work and school runs.

| Page 06

Key Social crises Key Problems faced by LowIncome Young Families

FOOD INSECURITY Low-income young families in Nauls Mill often juggle rent, bills and travel costs, so fresh food and proper family meals become irregular treats instead of daily life. Kids grow up on cheap, processed options while parents carry constant anxiety about the next food shop.

Low-Income Young Families

UNSAFE PUBLIC SPACE When streets, underpasses and park edges feel unsafe, young parents are reluctant to let kids walk or play independently. Everyday trips to school, shops or friends become stressful, car-dependent or simply avoided. NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

01 - contEXt And ProBLEM

LACK OF DIGNITY & SOCIAL ISOLATION Many young families rely on short-term, poor-quality rentals where a rent rise or eviction notice can uproot them with little warning. That instability makes it hard to build routines, friendships, or feel safe investing in the local area.

Low-Income Young Families

WEAK SUPPORT FOR CARE AND INTERDEPENDENCE Formal childcare is often too expensive, inflexible, or oversubscribed for low-income young parents. This traps them between caring for children and taking work or training opportunities, limiting both income and future prospects.

| Page 07

Why Nauls Mill? Contextual Photos of the site

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

01 - contEXt And ProBLEM

Nauls Mill was chosen as it matches the target group and the project ambition most directly. It sits within a context where low income families are present and where daily life needs stronger support systems, not just nicer buildings. There is a clear brownfield opportunity for development, meaning housing can be added without removing active homes. The water presence is a major advantage, both as a real flood and climate issue and as a design resource that can organise public space, landscape, and circular systems. Finally, the history of the mill and the working landscape gives the project a strong identity, so the regeneration can feel like a continuation of place, not a replacement.

| Page 08

Context: History 1843 - 1845

Historical Timeline of Nauls Mill early 1800s

Brook & Mill pond on maps Early 19th-century mapping shows Radford Brook feeding the mill pond.

1703

Naul family & charity Local Naul family philanthropy is recorded, anchoring the name “Naul’s Mill” in community life.

St Osburg’s Catholic Church (Grade II) On the city-edge approach to Nauls Mill, St Osburg’s rises as a Gothic-Revival parish landmark.

Changing leisure tastes. Park pivots

1889

Mill closes; pool remains 1908–1909

Nauls Mill Park is laid out The former mill lands are made public as Nauls Mill Park. Paths, trees, seating and a bandstan, with the pool as a picturesque focal point for strolling and gatherings.

c.12th century

Medieval Fulling Mill Naul’s Mill originates as a 12th-century fulling mill on Radford Brook, driving Coventry’s cloth trade.

1821 → late 19th C

Industrial intensification Coventry’s industrial rise; Gasworks and associated industries. Terraced worker streets press against a managed Brook; culverts and utility edges harden the water line, laying foundations (and problems) which the 21st century now has to repair. c.1860–1910

Terrace Residences (Victorian/Edwardian grain) Brick terraced streets grow around the brook corridor narrow plots, tiny forecourts. NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

1910s

Early park life Families and workers use the new park for rest, play and fresh air.

01 - contEXt And ProBLEM

2021 1963

Bandstand removed Changing leisure tastes. Park pivots from formal performance space to informal play and strolling.

1964

2003

Naul’s Mill House A 17-storey residential tower rises post-war as a mid-century solution public-housing crisis.

Radford Brook Linear Park Greening project daylights and naturalises the old brook, adds bridges and habitats, links neighbourhood streets to the city centre.

Nauls Mill Conservation Area Conservation Area designation recognises the historic and townscape value of Nauls Mill and its environs

Nauls Mill Park is laid out The former mill lands are made public as Nauls Mill Park. Paths, trees, seating and a bandstan, with the pool as a picturesque focal point for strolling and gatherings.

1960s–1970s

2019

Coventry Community Fire Station New Fire Station opens on Radford Road, replacing older central facilities

Ring-road underpasses Construction of ring-road bridges and underpasses creates low-light, ambiguous spaces at edges of the Nauls Mill corridor. 1930s–1950s

Early park life Families and workers use the new park for rest, play and fresh air.

Model boating tradition & everyday leisure Sunday crowds, benches and modest concessions make the park a small civic stage

2010

Hill Street Footbridge A tied-arch footbridge reconnects Upper Hill Street across the ring road, improving pedestrian flow and views to park

| Page 09

Site Analysis Current Site Conditions 1. The pond flows in culverted drain to the brook and connects to River Sherborne. 2. Brook recently unculverted and made into a linear park. 3. Existing entry into site. 4. Nauls mill under-park with some climbing area for children, not in use.

5. Thin walkway from under-park to the public road, frequently used by pedestrians. 6. Cleared site, existing dilapidated residential & industrial infrastructure now demolished. 7. Public Car park and under-bridge pass. 8. Footpath to underpark blocked. 9. School area 10. Nauls Mill Community Park 11. Nauls Mill park pond (historical) 12. Children playground area 13. Nauls Mill tower

Roads Railway

Buildings Site Boundaries

Water Body Vegetation Cover

Prevailing wind direction

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

01 - contEXt And ProBLEM

12 13

4 5 6 8

| Page 10

Context: Ecology Nauls Mill Flora & Fauna The site sits within the wider River Sherbourne corridor, an urban landscape being restored for both people and wildlife. Existing and nearby habitat conditions are likely to support urban birdlife, aquatic and wetland species, insects, mammals, amphibians, trees, shrubs and aquatic plant. The proposal seeks to strenghten the ecosystem and enable all possible species to thrive. Birds

AIR Flying Insects

Mammals

Terrestrial Invertebrates

Trees

LAND Shrubs and Herbaceous

Aquatic Plants

Fish

WATER

Amphibians

Aquatic Invertebrates

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

01 - contEXt And ProBLEM

Aquatic Birds

| Page 11

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

01 - contEXt And ProBLEM

Project Narrative What? Why? Where? Who? How? What? Naul’s Mill Commons is a water-fed regenerative village where clustered family housing, a communal kitchen and dining building, productive gardens, wetlands, and a central pond are organised as one shared living system. The project brings together housing, food production, biodiversity, and everyday community life, so that water, landscape, and commons are part of how the village works day to day. Why? The project responds to social and ecological conditions at Naul’s Mill, where water, open ground, and housing potential exist but remain fragmented and underused. Nearby families need more affordable, supportive, and dignified ways of living, with stronger access to shared space, food culture, play, care, and everyday community life. The proposal treats regeneration as repair by rebuilding the relationship between water, housing, ecology, and collective life. Where? Naul’s Mill, Coventry, UK, around the existing water landscape, including the, brook corridor, and surrounding open ground. Who? Primarily for low-income families, especially young and growing households, while also supporting multigenerational living, home-based livelihood, productive households, and wider community use through shared commons and village infrastructure. How? • Clustered housing courts create small shared commons between homes, balancing privacy, ownership, and everyday neighbourly life. • A communal kitchen, dining hall, and terrace act as the social heart of the village, supporting cooking, shared meals, learning, stewardship, and food culture. • Productive commons include gardens, growing plots, and fish-based food systems that support everyday food production and shared use. • Water structures the site through the brook, central pond, cluster basins, swales, wetlands, and planted edges, making water part of both ecology and daily life. • Blue-green movement routes link housing, commons, productive landscape, and water, making the village easier to move through and more socially active. • Biodiversity is built into the settlement through wetland edges, soft planting, habitat corridors, and biodiverse architectural elements. • Lightly raised timber buildings keep the ground permeable, support drainage and habitat continuity, and allow the village to sit more gently within the landscape. • A circular village logic links rainwater, pond systems, growing, cooking, shared meals

| Page 12

02 - LEARNING FROM PRECEDENTS

Precedent Framework Evaluating relevant projects through commons, housing & regenerative systems The following precedents are judged my these four categories based on the projects proposed program

Water as infrastructure Treating water as a visible working system that organizes space, supports reuse, and reduces flood risk.

Commons and community structure Shared spaces and shared resources that help residents cook, learn, repair, earn, and support each other.

Regenerative Systems Circular loops where waste becomes input, like water reuse, compost, energy, or food production feeding back into the site.

Housing typology and thresholds Clear, inclusive layout that connects homes to shared spaces through safe, legible routes for all ages and abilities.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

LEARNING FROM PRECEDENTS Shared spaces and shared resources that help residents cook, learn, repair, earn, and

Clear, inclusive layout that connects homes to shared spaces through safe, legible

| Page 13

PrEcEdEnt StudIES I

Taisugar Circular Village Circular systems as a framework Location: Tainan, Taiwan Year: 2017–2021 Type: Housing / circular residential community Project Overview Taisugar Circular Village is a residential development in the Shalun Smart Green Energy Science City in Tainan. It was conceived as a housing project that tests circular economy principles at the scale of everyday living, combining homes with shared facilities and environmental systems rather than treating sustainability as a separate technical layer. The project is described by its architects as Taiwan’s first residential scheme explicitly focused on circularity, peopleoriented community, and close connection with nature. Spatially, the development is made up of three residential blocks alongside two shared communal buildings: the C-House, which contains collective amenities such as a gym, library, tool room, and laundromat, and the E-House, which includes a shared kitchen and aquaponic system. This gives the project a mixed character: part housing estate, part social infrastructure, part environmental prototype. Rather than relying only on private domestic space, it uses shared facilities to support a more collective and ecologically conscious way of living.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

02 - LEArnIng froM PrEcEdEntS

Key learnings • Circular living can be organised at neighbourhood scale, not just building scale • Shared facilities were separated into dedicated communal buildings, including a shared amenity block and a shared kitchen with aquaponics • Housing was combined with nature-focused community living, not treated as isolated apartments • Circularity was made visible through how residents share spaces, services, and environmental systems • Productive and social infrastructure can sit beside housing as part of one residential system

| Page 14

PrEcEdEnt StudIES II

Regen Villages Regeneration as a productive network Location: Almere, The Netherlands Year: 2016 Type: Masterplan/Residential/Agricultural

Project Overview ReGen Villages is a masterplan proposal for an integrated ecovillage model based on self-reliance, local production, and closedloop systems. It is presented by EFFEKT as a prototype for resilient neighbourhoods in which families can be supported by on-site systems for energy, water, food, and waste recovery. The idea is not simply to build low-energy housing, but to create a settlement model where one system’s outputs become another system’s inputs. The project combines energy-positive homes with renewable energy, storage, water management, waste-to-resource systems, and doorstep food production, including vertical farming and aquaponics or aeroponics. In this sense, it is as much an infrastructure proposal as a housing proposal: the village is imagined as a productive environmental network that supports daily life through integrated ecological and technical systems.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

02 - LEArnIng froM PrEcEdEntS

Key learnings • The village was planned as one integrated system of food, water, energy, and waste • Homes were not treated as stand-alone units, but as part of a wider productive network • Food production was placed close to daily life through doorstep growing, vertical farming, and aquaponics / aeroponics • The project used the idea that outputs from one system become inputs for another • Shared environmental infrastructure can shape the identity of the whole settlement

| Page 15

PrEcEdEnt StudIES III

Marmalade Lane Clustering, and the making of everyday community Location: Cambridge, United Kingdom Year: 2018 Type: Cohousing / residential neighbourhood

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

Project Overview Marmalade Lane is Cambridge’s first cohousing community and consists of 42 homes designed around a pedestrian-focused shared environment. It is a multi-generational neighbourhood where residents have their own private homes but also jointly use and manage a range of common spaces and facilities. The project is organised to encourage everyday social contact through a car-free lane, shared gardens, and a common house, while still maintaining the autonomy of individual households.

02 - LEArnIng froM PrEcEdEntS

Marmalade Lane is Cambridge’s first cohousing community and consists of 42 homes designed around a pedestrian-focused shared environment. It is a multi-generational neighbourhood where residents have their own private homes but also jointly use and manage a range of common spaces and facilities. The project is organised to encourage everyday social contact through a car-free lane, shared gardens, and a common house, while still maintaining the autonomy of individual

Architecturally, Marmalade Lane is laid out in terraces facing outward to the surrounding streets while enclosing a large shared south-facing garden within. Cars are kept at the edges, bins are grouped communally, and the centre of the development is given over to people rather than vehicles. The Common House is a major part of the project: it includes a large kitchen, lounge, laundry, playroom, guest rooms, workshop, and other flexible communal spaces. The homes themselves are timberbased, energy-efficient, and offered in different dwelling types to support a mixed community of families, retirees, and professionals.

Key learnings • Community was built through layout, not only through intention • Homes were arranged around a car-free lane and large shared garden, making everyday encounter more likely • The common house concentrated shared life through a kitchen, lounge, laundry, guest rooms, workshop, and other communal spaces • Private homes remained independent, but were strengthened by collective facilities and shared management • Thresholds, shared gardens, and pedestrian-focused space are powerful tools for making community happen in ordinary life

| Page 16

PrEcEdEnt StudIES IV

R-Urban Colombes Bottom-Top Strategy Location: Colombes, Paris suburb Year: 2008 Type: Resident-run resilience / productive commons network

Project Overview R-Urban Colombes is not a single building but a broader participatory urban resilience strategy developed by atelier d’architecture autogérée. It proposes a network of resident-run facilities designed to strengthen local resilience through urban agriculture, recycling, cooperative housing, and shared cultural and economic activity. The project is explicitly framed as a bottom-up approach to urban transformation, built around local ecological cycles and collaborative everyday practices rather than top-down masterplanning. In Colombes, the strategy was organised around several prototype hubs with complementary functions. These included AgroCité, an urban agriculture and community space with composting and rainwater recycling; RecyLab, focused on recycling and eco-construction; and EcoHab, an ecological cooperative housing unit that included shared spaces and self-build ambitions. R-Urban therefore operates as a civic and ecological network, where production, learning, recycling, housing, and community support are woven together through shared infrastructures.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

02 - LEArnIng froM PrEcEdEntS

Key learnings • Resilience can be built through a network of small shared infrastructures rather than one large project • Different functions were split into complementary units: urban agriculture, recycling / eco-construction, and cooperative ecological housing • Urban farming was combined with composting, rainwater recycling, and educational / cultural space • Shared infrastructure supported production, learning, housing, and social life together • Regeneration can be resident-led and organised around everyday collective use, not only formal planning

| Page 17

Precedent Synthesis Learnings and Adaptations The precedent studies establish the foundation for Naul’s Mill Commons as a radical regenerative village where housing, ecology, food production, and collective life are organised as one integrated system. Taisugar Circular Village shows how circular living can be supported through shared amenities and environmental systems embedded within residential life. ReGen Village shows how food, water, and productive infrastructure can shape the wider logic of a settlement. Marmalade Lane Cohousing shows how clustered

homes, shared gardens, and carefully designed thresholds can support everyday community. R-Urban Colombes expands this further by showing how shared infrastructures for production, learning, and collective use can strengthen resilience at neighbourhood scale. Together, these projects inform Naul’s Mill Commons as a water-fed settlement built around clustered housing, productive commons, biodiversity, and a communal kitchen as the social heart of the village.

Taisugar Circular Village

Circular systems

Regen Village

Productive village system

Marmalade Lane

Cluster social logic and thresholds

R-Urban Colombes

Productive commons and resilience

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

02 - LEArnIng froM PrEcEdEntS

homes, shared gardens, and carefully designed expands this further by showing how shared infrastructures for production, learning, and collective use can strengthen resilience at Together, these projects inform Naul’s Mill Commons as a water-fed settlement built around clustered housing, productive commons, biodiversity, and a communal

Final Design Principles • Water is central and visble infrastructure • Community is built through clustered housing & commons • Productive ground supports dignity and belonging • Ecology and domestic life must overlap • Shared infrastructures anchor resilience

nAuL’S MILL

WAtEr coMMonS

| Page 18

03 - DESIGN CONCEPTUALISATION

Water as infrastructure for Everyday Resilience The Vision

Nauls Mill as Water-Fed Commons; water as infrastructure, food as commons, dining as heart.. The swirling blue current stands in for Nauls Mill Brook re-imagined as an energy field, not just a drainage line; it pulls people, housing and growing spaces into one shared system. The impossibly long communal table twisting with the water suggests everyday eating as infrastructure, cooking, sharing and gathering as seriously as pipes and paths. NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

Around it, modular housing fragments, children playing with water, aquaponics tanks, planting and garden bursts hint at circular water-food loops and resident-made architecture. The loose, floating composition mirrors the project’s ambition: a flexible, evolving commons where life in Nauls Mill is organized by water, community and productive landscapes.

A visible water spine powering circular food systems, with a communal table as the social heart.

| Page 19

Design Framework Nine Criteria for Livable Urban Density (Soft City) Diversity of Built Form Various building types and sizes for different kinds of activities dwelling, communal eating and cooking

Human Scale Dwellings and urban spaces that recognise the needs of people

A Pleasant Microclimate Central pond that helps with the evaporative cooling of the area, dense vegetation

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

03 - dESIgn concEPtuALISAtIon

Diversity of Outdoor Spaces Various kinds of outdoor spaces to accomodate more kinds of outdoor life Private, semi-private, shared and public zones

Walkability Easy connection with the life of the neighbourhood. Quick easy and conveinent access

Flexibility Communal Spaces built for seasons adaptability and activities also evolving change.

Sense of Control and Identity Distinct spaces and dwelling types for several families needs and livelihoods. Agency with space

Smaller Carbon Footprint

Greater Biodiversity

Reuse of site and existing ecology. Compact clustered housing layout. Timber construction. Passive design, Climate responsive roof strategy for rainwater harvesting, daylight access

Several strategies for biodiversity, raised dwellings to keep the ground untouched. Biodiverse facade and landscape. Pond edge and wetland habitat.

*Icon illustrations were gotten from the book | Page 20

concEPtuALISIng cHAngE:

Spatial Configuration Towards a Regenerative Commons Typology SOCIAL HOUSING CLUSTER • L-shaped or U-shaped courtyard UNIT TYPES • Studios – compact for couples or individuals\ • 1 Bedroom – single bed & lounge, couples / singles / parent & 1 child • 2 Bedroom – 2 beds & living area, families with 2–3 children • 3 Bedroom – 3 beds & living area, families with 3–4 children GROUND FLOOR – SHARED AREA • Common room – residents’ lounge • Shared laundry / drying & storage area • Bike stores, • Refuse & recycling stores

RECREATIONAL & OUTDOOR SPACES • Splash play, model boats • Stepped seating (amphitheatre) • Timber play deck • Market canopy • Small stalls • Picnic / dining terrace near kitchen • Under-bridge hub • Wildflower edge • Play Courts • Quiet gardens, reflective • Tree shelter

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

COMMUNITY DINING & KITCHEN • Big dining room, community hall (for meals, meetings, homework, events) • Production kitchen (big) (for community & training) • Storage & prep • Counter, café, servery / takeaway • Food skills classroom–lab (to hall) • Commons management room / office • Toilets & family washroom (baby) • Back-of-house

COMMUNITY GARDEN • Raised community beds • Poly-tunnels • Fruit trees / orchard strips • Composting area (worm farm) • Tool shed

AQUAPONICS & FISHERY • Fish tanks • Hydroponic grow beds • Bio-filters • Sump tank • Monitoring station • Fish pond

03 - dESIgn concEPtuALISAtIon

Big dining room, community hall (for meals,

| Page 21

concEPtuALISIng cHAngE: SItE ScALE

Concept A First Concept development Developing on my boards concept and ecploring ways of social housing and density

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

03 - dESIgn concEPtuALISAtIon

| Page 22

concEPtuALISIng cHAngE: SItE ScALE

Concept B Second Concept Development Developing the communal kitchenn space further, trying different realtionships of stacked boards

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

03 - dESIgn concEPtuALISAtIon

| Page 23

concEPtuALISIng cHAngE: SItE ScALE

Concept C Third Concept development Designed a full development of social housing development with central pond, kitchen and dining space and a fish storage, drying and resource center.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

03 - dESIgn concEPtuALISAtIon

| Page 24

04 - VILLAGE STRUCTURE

Water-fed Regenerative Commons Final Concept Statement

Naul’s Mill Commons is envisioned as a water-fed regenerative village where housing, food production, biodiversity, and communal care are collaboratively organised. The proposal features a central productive pond and communal kitchen/dining serving as both a social hub and ecological infrastructure, while clustered homes, wetlands, gardens, and shared spaces form a daily framework for belonging, livelihood, and restoration.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

Informed by permaculture, the project works through circular relationships where the outputs of one system are the inputs of another. Naul’s Mill Commons proposes a holistic village model combining clustered housing, food production, biodiversity, water management, and communal care into an interconnected regenerative system where social and ecological processes continuously support one another.

Water-led Water is the primary organiser of the settlement, shaping movement, structure, ecology, public life, and productive use.

Clustered Homes Homes are arranged in small clusters to balance privacy, ownership, and everyday shared life.

Productive Commons Shared open spaces that are working commons for growing, gathering, washing, sorting, and eating together.

Biodiversity and Care Wetlands, planting, soft edges, and habitat corridors turn the site into an ecology of care for both people and non-human life.

Kitchen as Social Heart

nAuL’S MILL

WAtEr coMMonS

The community kitchen and dining hall form the social centre of the village, where food, gathering, and collective life meet.

Food Production/Fish & Chips Informed by permaculture, the project works through circular relationships where the outputs of one system are the inputs of another. Naul’s Mill Commons proposes a holistic village model combining clustered housing, food production, biodiversity, water management, and communal care into an interconnected regenerative system where social and ecological processes continuously support one another.

Fish from the pond systems and crops from the growing plots can be prepared and shared through the kitchen. That simple loop helps make food production part of everyday village life.

| Page 25

Regenerative System Water, food, waste, ecology, and social life as one integrated loop

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

The project is proposed as a living regenerative system. Water acts as visible infrastructure, moving from roofs to swales, wetlands, and the central pond, where it supports both ecological repair and productive use. Food production is linked through fishery systems, growing plots, and the communal kitchen, while biodiversity is strengthened through habitat edges, soft planting, and reduced ground disturbance. Together, these systems create a shared circular framework reconnecting housing, care, livelihood, and landscape.

| Page 26

Masterplan Contextual Site Plan 1:1000 This site is organised as a series of clustered domestic territories linked by water, paths, productive ground, and shared commons. At its centre, the pond and communal building act as social and ecological anchors. Around them, housing, wetlands, gardens, and landscape routes create a village structured by gradients of care, work, and belonging 1 5

4 3

12 1

3 12 2

4 5

11 3

2 3

12 3

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

15 16

1. Building Type 1 2. Building Type 2 3. Building Type 3 4. Building Type 4 5. Greenhouse/Aquaponics 6. Community kitchen and dining hall 7. Fish preping and drying 8. Central productive pond 9. Stepped terrace & seating facing pond 10. Outdoor sit-out/terrace 11. Children Play area 12. Communal Garden 13. Retreat/Research edge 14. Reflective Ecological pond 15. Bio-based energy plant 16. Untouched land (Zone 5) 17. Brook, model boat play 18. Play area (under park) 19. Market stalls 20. 22

14 9

12 4

5 19

2 18

Water Body Site Boundary

10m

100m

| Page 27

Masterplan

Communal Gardens

Site Plan (1:500)

Housing Cluster

Main Extrance from church streets

Productive Landscape

Pond edge actifvity Housing Cluster

Central pond

Productive Landscape Wetland Habitat

Communal Gardens

Play Area

Pollinator strip

Pond edge actifvity

Water Storage

Housing Cluster

Shared Gardens

Productive Landscape

Livestock

Productive Landscape Reflective benches

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

10m

50m

Productive Landscape

Main Extrance from Abbots lane

Water Storage

Housing Cluster Inflow from brook Community Learning

Productive Landscape Fish tower Storage

Waste collection point Communal Communal Dining Dining & & Kitchen Kitchen

Fish prepping

Fish tower

Bio-based energy plan

Outdoor sit-out/ terrace

Communal Gardens

Reed beds

Stepped Terrace Expanded Brook Communal Wild gardens Outflow to brook

Housing Cluster

Livestock

Productive Landscape Productive Landscape

Service yard

Pollinator st

rip

| Page 28

Fish tower

Communal Communal Dining Dining & & Kitchen Kitchen

Central pond

Fish prepping

Wetland Habitat

Outdoor sit-out/ terrace

Play Area Pond edge actifvity

Communal Gardens

Reed beds

Stepped Terrace

Water Storage

Outflow to brook

Housing Cluster

Livestock

Productive Landscape

Livestock

Productive Landscape Service yard

Pollinator st

rip

Masterplan Site Plan (1:500) Underpark

Deculverted water channel

Activated underpass

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

Fish tower

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

Waste collection point Fish prepping

Fish tower

Bio-based energy plan

Expanded Brook Communal Wild gardens Outflow to

Pond

Wild Edge Retreat

Market stalls

Activated underpass

10m

50m

| Page 29

Site Strategy Layered Logics behind the final settlement form

Brook

WATER STRUCTURE

Central Pond

The central pond collects runoff from the housing clusters and also receives seasonal inflow from the upstream brook through controlled sluice gates. After passing through the pond and wetland filtration system, cleaner water is released back into the brook downstream through a second set of sluice gates. Together, the brook, pond, wetland edges, and local basins form a working water system that captures, stores, filters, and recirculates water as both ecological infrastructure and spatial organiser.

Water Body

PRODUCTIVE LANDSCAPE

Food production is distributed across the site through farmland, greenhouse growing, aquaponics, fish farming, and household growing edges. This creates a working landscape in which food systems are inseparable from housing, water, and community life.

Food growing Landcsape

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

CIRCULATION HIERARCHY

A hierarchy of paths, boardwalks, and crossings structures movement across the village. These routes connect the clustered housing, productive landscapes, communal kitchen, and pond edge, ensuring that circulation also supports interaction, access, and shared use.

Primary public paths Secondary communal paths Boardwalk & cluster paths

PUBLIC / SHARED / PRIVATE GRADIENT

The site is organised through a gradual shift from private homes to semishared cluster spaces and more collective commons at the water’s edge. This spatial gradient supports both domestic privacy and a strong communal culture of gathering, working, and belonging.

Private Homes Semi-shared clusters Collective commons Public spaces

| Page 30

Landscape Section I Community kitchen & Dining, Pond, Boardwalk, and Housing edge

This section shows the core social and ecological heart of the proposal. The communal building sits directly in dialogue with water, while the pond edge, boardwalk, and nearby housing clusters create a layered public commons around food, landscape, and shared daily use.

Housing Cluster

Greenhouse

1:200 5m

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

20m

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

Fish tower

Communal Dining & Kitchen

Boardwalks

Central pond

| Page 31

Landscape Section II Community kitchen & Dining, Pond, Boardwalk, and Housing edge

Communal Dining & Kitchen

Boardwalks Swale basins

Central pond

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

Water storage

Housing Cluster

1:200 5m

20m

| Page 32

Housing Cluster Logic Plan of one Housing Cluster (1:200)

Shared sitting

Wildlife zone

TYPE A Greenhouse

Enterprise edge

TYPE C Communal space

TYPE D

Productive edge TYPE B Bioswale

Rain garden Productive Landscape

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

20m

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

The 4-unit cluster is the project’s primary social unit, combining private thresholds, shared commons, productive edges, and shallow water-sensitive landscape into a small neighbourhood connected to the wider village.

Productive Landscape

| Page 33

Housing Cluster Logic Perspective Illustration of the Communal Space in a cluster

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

04 - VILLAgE StructurE

| Page 34

05 - BUILDING THE COMMONS

Housing Family Overview Four major dwelling types

TYPE A

NAME

HOUSEHOLD

STOREYS/BEDROOMS

KEY SPATIAL IDEA

Productive Raised House for Fishery / Livestock

Fishery or farmingintensive family

Raised 2 level house / 2 bedrooms

Domestic life lifted above a productive undercroft

2 storeys / 2 bedrooms

Core dwelling type of the village, linking domestic life to shared commons and backyard productivity

TYPE B

Standard Family House

Small to medium family

TYPE C

Multigenerational/ more accessible House

Extended family / elder-inclusive household

2 storeys / 3 bedrooms

Ground-level elder room, calmer thresholds, and more accessible family organisation

TYPE D

Trader/HomeEnterprise House

Family with homebased trade or micro-enterprise

2 storeys / 3 bedrooms

Semi-open public front edge with protected domestic life behind

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

KEY SPATIAL IDEA

Domestic life lifted above a productive

AXONOMETRIC

The housing strategy combines four primary dwelling types, each responding to a different household structure and livelihood pattern. Together they form a coherent architectural family linked by shared timber construction, productive outdoor edges, butterfly roofs, and a common language of threshold, care, and adaptability.

SHARED ARCHITECTURAL LANGUAGE Although each dwelling type responds differently to family structure and livelihood, all belong to one architectural family. Core dwelling type of the village, linking shared commons and backyard productivity

Ground-level elder

• Coherent timber housing family • Butterfly roofs for visible rainwater collection • Lightly raised buildings for permeable, living ground • Soft ground below supports drainage and habitat continuity and growth • Selected slanted columns for lighter, distinct, more responsive structure • Productive thresholds for washing, storage, growing, and trade • Strong relationship to commons and water • Biodiverse facades with planting and small habitat insertions

thresholds, and more accessible family

Semi-open public front edge with protected domestic life behind

| Page 35

Housing Type A Productive Raised House for Fishery / Farming

Go up! Sleep, Dress Go down!

Study

Wash Eat Rest, Play Homework

Cook

Live Sleep, Dress

FIRST FLOOR PLAN (1:100)

Work, Play, Learn, Observe

Climb to enter!

PRODUCTIVE GROUND/ UNDERCROFT PLAN (1:100) NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

SECOND FLOOR PLAN (1:100)

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

Type A is the most explicitly dwelling in the housing family. Designed for fishery and farming-intensive households, it raises domestic life above a productive undercroft used for washing, storage, fish barrels, repair, and small-scale work. The house responds to wetter ground conditions while reducing hard contact with the site, allowing drainage, habitat continuity, and everyday productive use to coexist beneath the home.

APPROACH ELEVATION (1:100)

10m

| Page 36

Housing Type B Standard Family House

Cook

Wash Sleep, Study, Dress

Go down! Eat, Homework

Sleep, Dress

Live Go up!

GROUND FLOOR PLAN (1:100)

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

FIRST FLOOR PLAN (1:100)

10m

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

Type B is the everyday family house at the core of the settlement. It is designed for a typical family with children and balances privacy, shared domestic life, and productive outdoor use. The ground floor supports daily family activity, while the upper floor gives quieter sleeping space. At the back, the productive strip allows space for washing, storage, fish barrels, and small-scale growing, so family life stays closely tied to the working landscape of the village.

APPROACH ELEVATION (1:100)

| Page 37

Housing Type C Multigenerational/more accessible House

Play, Relax, Work, Organise

Wash Cook

Sleep, Dress Sleep, Dress

Eat, Homework

Live

Void Go up!

Wash

GROUND FLOOR PLAN (1:100)

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

FIRST FLOOR PLAN (1:100)

10m

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

Sleep, Study, Dress

Type C is designed for intergenerational living and households shaped by care. It provides a calmer domestic structure, usually with a ground-level bedroom and easier bathroom access for an elder or dependent family member. The house supports family life across generations without turning the home into a purely functional arrangement. It keeps a soft front threshold, shared living space, and productive outdoor relationship, while giving more dignity to care, privacy, and long-term family stability.

Rest Go down!

APPROACH ELEVATION (1:100)

| Page 38

Housing Type D Trader/Home-Enterprise House

Work, Sell, Organise Sleep, Dress

Sleep, Study, Dress

Toilet Cook

Wash Eat, Homework Go down!

Go up!

Live Void

GROUND FLOOR PLAN (1:100)

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

Sleep, Study, Dress

FIRST FLOOR PLAN (1:100)

10m

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

Study, Dress

Type D is the house type for families whose livelihood is partly based at home. It has a stronger public-private threshold, often through a semi-open front platform, small trading edge, or sorting space that can face the cluster path or commons. This gives the household a way to work, sell, or organise goods without exposing the whole home. The domestic interior remains protected, while the front edge supports exchange, visibility, and small-scale economic life as part of the everyday life of the village.

APPROACH ELEVATION (1:100)

| Page 39

Cross Sections Ecology embedded in ordinary domestic life

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

| Page 40

The Social Heart Community Kitchen & Dining, Seasonal Terrace The communal building is the everyday centre of Naul’s Mill Commons. It sits by the pond and gives the village a shared place to cook, eat, gather, learn, and spend time with one another. It supports the culture of food production in the scheme, where fish from the pond systems and crops from the gardens can be brought in, prepared, cooked, shared, and talked about. The building also supports stewardship through daily habits: growing food, looking after the commons, teaching children, sharing knowledge, and helping each other. Its terrace keeps this life open to the landscape, while the biodiverse facade allows planting and small habitats to become part of the building itself. This makes it feel less like a hall and more like part of the living system of the village.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

| Page 41

Communal Building Community Kitchen & Dining, Seasonal Terrace

Productive Landscape

Central Pond

Dining deck

Communal dining

Terrace

Communal Kitchen

Storage & Sorting

Outdoor dining

W/C

Dining deck

Stepped Terrace

Communal garden

The Communal building acts as the social and productive heart of Nauls Mill Commons. It supports food prepartion, dining, gatering and a seasonal terrace. Positioned directly across the pond, it forms the everyday centre of collective life NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

Communal Garden & Play Area

Waste collection point Fishing deck

Outdoor dining Terrace

Storage

Fish cleaning / prep zone Fish tower

Communal Space

Stepped Terrace

Productive Landscape

GROUND FLOOR PLAN (1:250)

25m

| Page 42

Communal Building Community Kitchen & Dining, Seasonal Terrace

Void over Communal dining

FIRST FLOOR PLAN (1:250)

APPROACH ELEVATION (1:250)

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

W/C Upper level Dining Terrace

Easy dismountable wall

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

Fish tower

25m

| Page 43

Communal Building Community Kitchen & Dining, Seasonal Terrace

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

| Page 44

Wild Edge Retreat Zone 5 area for observation & ecological learning The Wild Edge Retreat marks the transition from the cultivated commons of the village to a quieter, less managed ecological landscape of Permaculture Zone 5. Designed as a light-touch timber outpost, the strcutures aids personal reflection, environmental observation and learning. The buildings are raised lightly above the ground and oriented toward water, and wildlife.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

The retreat area supports biodiversity monitoring and seasonal study. It is a place where residents, visitors, and researchers learn from the site’s living processes, allowing the project’s regenerative vision to extend beyond production into restraint, attentiveness, and care for the wild.

05 - BuILdIng tHE coMMonS

| Page 45

06 - TECHNICAL RESOLUTION

Facade Family Sheet Regenerative Biodiverse Facade

SoLId tIMBEr cLAddIng BAY

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

WIndoW WItH PLAntEr BoX BAY

trELLIS BAY for cLIMBIng PLAntS

BIrd HABItAt BAY

06 - tEcHnIcAL rESoLutIon

The facade family is developed as a primarily timber bay system that combines enclosure, planting, and habitat into one coherent architectural language. Solid cladding, window planter bays, trellis panels, bird boxes, insect hotels, and mixed habitat inserts are arranged within a constant structural rhythm to enhance biodiversity while maintaining clarity and order. This living facade is adapted across the communal buildings and reinterpreted through the housing types, allowing the project to support non-human life, seasonal growth, and a shared regenerative identity across the village.

InSEct HotEL BAY

MIXEd HABItAt BAY (SLAtS, PLAntIng, & EcoLogIcAL PocKEtS)

| Page 46

Fire Strategy In compliance with Building regs This fire strategy page outlines the concept-stage fire safety approach for Naul’s Mill Commons in reference to Approved Document B, Volume 1: Dwellings and Volume 2: Buildings other than dwellings. The proposal includes low-rise dispersed housing clusters, including the raised productive Type A dwelling, together with a communal kitchen and dining building as the primary shared-use building.

Dwelling house fire strategy Type A is treated as a dwellinghouse and is therefore considered with reference to Approved Document B, Volume 1. As the house is raised, the critical fire-safety question is the height of the highest occupied storey above ground level. Where the upper storey is a maximum of 4.5m above ground and served by one stair, all habitable rooms except kitchens should either have an emergency escape window or door, or direct access to a protected stairway. As the dwelling has one storey more than 4.5m above ground level, a protected stairway is required with either an alternative escape route or sprinklers.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

Protected Core

06 - tEcHnIcAL rESoLutIon

Inner room

4.5m

Fire-rated Glass

Smoke Detectors FD30s

Emergency Exit

Smoke Detectors

Type F follows Volume 1 dwellinghouse guidance. Raised occupation requires clear control of height, stair protection, and escape from upper storeys.

| Page 47

Fire Strategy Community kitchen & dining fire strategy The communal kitchen and dining building is treated as the main shared-use building in the scheme and should be assessed with reference to Approved Document B, Volume 2. It is reasonable to assess the dining/gathering use as Assembly and Recreation, for which the maximum travel distance is 18m where escape is possible in one direction only and 45m where more than one direction of escape is available. If the final internal layout is not fixed, the direct distance may be assessed as two-thirds of the actual travel distance.

The communal kitchen and dining building is assessed as a shared-use building under Volume 2, with escape distances checked against Assembly and Recreation guidance.

The building is therefore designed with clear outward escape to open ground, more than one escape direction from the main dining space, and direct exit to the surrounding landscape and boardwalk network. The kitchen, fish-prep, wash-up, and storage areas are arranged so that higher-risk service functions do not obstruct the escape route from the main communal space.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

06 - tEcHnIcAL rESoLutIon

Smoke Detectors

Emergency Exit

Smoke Detectors

assessed as a shared-use building under Volume 2, with escape distances checked against Assembly

| Page 48

Environmental Strategy Water, Climate and Ecology Across the Site

s t es w i n d w - g uthailin o S ev Pr

Living rooms of all units oriented towards the sun to harness solar gain

SUMMER SOLSTICE 61.04° 12noon

WINTER SOLSTICE 14.22° 12noon NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

06 - tEcHnIcAL rESoLutIon

Naul’s Mill Commons is organised as a village that works with water, climate, and landscape from the beginning. Water moves from the brook through ponds, swales, shallow basins, and planted wetland edges before returning in cleaner filtered form to the wider system. Rainwater from butterfly roofs is also collected and directed into storage, planting, and pond networks, making water a visible part of the life of the site.

S OM I NG R D F IL N E BU O L Z D AL DEBY T A SHEAR N

Buildings are oriented for passive solar gain, daylight, and seasonal shading, while solar energy can be used on roof surfaces with the best sun exposure. Heavily shaded parts of the site are kept less built up so they can remain greener and more ecologically active. The prevailing winds are used to support ventilation, and the lightly raised timber buildings allow air to move beneath them while keeping the ground soft and permeable. Tree planting, wetlands, gardens, and pond edges help create a better microclimate through shade, wind filtering, and evaporative cooling. Together, these strategies support a village that is comfortable for people and hospitable to the wider ecology of the site.

Living rooms of all units oriented towards the sun

Photovoltaic panel oriented to maximize solar enrgy Public thresholds

Prevailing winds

Flow of water in the site

10m

100m

| Page 49

Environmental Strategy II Section - Passive Strategy & Comfort The passive strategy of the project can also be seen in section. Butterfly roofs collect rainwater, raised floors allow airflow and reduce hard contact with the ground, and carefully placed openings support daylight and natural ventilation. At the communal building, the dining terrace operates as

a seasonally adaptable threshold, remaining open in summer while becoming more sheltered in colder months. Together, these sectional strategies reduce environmental dependence while strengthening the spatial quality of the village. Green roof to aid the biodiversity and microclimate

Photovoltaic panels orientaed to maximize solar enrygy inpiuts

Butterfly roofs to maximize rainwater harvesting

Clerestory windows to harness daylighting and the winter sun

High-level windows aiding stack ventilation

Cross ventilation Windows with planterboxes

Stack ventilation

Rainwater Harvesting Raised floors to allow more airflow in the site

Rain water is harvested for use in watering crops in the farm, as well as the hydroponics farm NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

06 - tEcHnIcAL rESoLutIon

Eaves length to blocking direct sunlight in summer

Clerestory windows to harness daylighting and the winter sun

Illustrations showing how the pergolas work in the communal space in each housing cluster

Seasonal vines planting over pergolas in clusters communal space

| Page 50

Technical Section I 1:20 Detailed Callouts

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

06 - tEcHnIcAL rESoLutIon

1:20 500mm

| Page 51

Technical Section II 1:20 Detailed Callouts

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

06 - tEcHnIcAL rESoLutIon

1:20 500mm

| Page 52

07 - EXPERIENCE

Physical Model Building models annd final spatial resolution

The physical model captures the overall spatial configuration of the Naul’s Mill project. It reveals the relationship between the housing clusters, the communal kitchen and dining spaces, the fish tower, and the water landscape, showing how each element is positioned to support both everyday life and collective living. The model helps communicate the project’s wider intention: to bring housing, food production, social exchange, and regenerative water systems into one integrated environment.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

| Page 53

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

07 - EXPErIEncE

| Page 54

Physical Model

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

07 - EXPErIEncE

| Page 55

Perspective Views The social and ecological heart of Naul’s Mill Commons

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

07 - EXPErIEncE

| Page 56

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

07 - EXPErIEncE

Final Render Site Concept Sketch | Page 57

References Atelier d’architecture autogérée. (2012). AGROCITÉ | R-Urban. R-Urban. https://r-urban.net/en/ Barnsley Biodiversity Partnership. (n.d.). Water birds. Barnsley Biodiversity Plan. https://barnsleybiodiversity.org.uk/

Office for National Statistics. (2022, June 28). How the population changed in Coventry: Census 2021. https://www.ons.

Bio-architecture Formosana. (2022, January 7). Taisugar Circular Village / Bio-architecture Formosana. ArchDaily. https:// www.archdaily.com/974658/taisugar-circular-village-bio-architecture-formosana

Office for National Statistics. (2023, January 19). How life has changed in Coventry: Census 2021. https://www.ons.gov.

Bio-architecture Formosana. (n.d.). TaiSugar Circular Village. https://www.bioarch.com.tw/en/work/taisugar-circularvillage/

Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. (2010). The human right to adequate housing: Fact sheet no. 21

Browning, W. D., Ryan, C. O., & Clancy, J. O. (2014). 14 patterns of biophilic design: Improving health and well-being in the built environment. Terrapin Bright Green.

Petcou, C., & Petrescu, D. (2015). R-Urban or how to co-produce a resilient city. Ephemera: Theory & Politics in

Complex Development Projects. (2021, August 25). Coventry brook flowing for the first time in over 100 years. https:// complexdevelopmentprojects.co.uk/coventybrook/

Petrescu, D., Petcou, C., & Baibarac, C. (2016). Co-producing commons-based resilience: Lessons from R-Urban.

Coventry City Council. (2017, September 18). Petition – Condition of Naul’s Mill Park pond / boating lake. https:// edemocracy.coventry.gov.uk/mgAi.aspx?ID=23426

Pintos, P. (2019, June 26). Marmalade Lane Cohousing Development / Mole Architects. ArchDaily. https://www.archdaily.

Coventry City Council. (2022). Coventry urban forestry strategy 2022–2032. https://www.coventry.gov.uk/heritageecology-trees/coventry-urban-forestry-strategy-2022-2032

Reed, B. (2007). Shifting from ‘sustainability’ to regeneration. Building Research & Information, 35(6), 674–680. https://

Coventry City Council. (n.d.). Deprivation. https://www.coventry.gov.uk/facts-coventry/deprivation Coventry Society. (2021, June 2). Radford Brook Linear Park. https://www.coventrysociety.org.uk/2021/06/02/radfordbrook-linear-park/ Coventry Society. (2021, September 17). Coventry brook flowing for the first time in over 100 years. https://www. coventrysociety.org.uk/2021/09/17/coventry-brook-flowing-for-the-first-time-in-over-100-years/ Coventry Society. (2025, May 16). A walk on the wild side. https://www.coventrysociety.org.uk/2025/05/16/a-walk-onthe-wild-side/ Creative Denmark. (2022, October 25). Circle House: Denmark’s first circular social housing units. https://www. creativedenmark.com/cases/circle-house-denmarks-first-circular-social-housing-units/ GXN & 3XN Architects. (2018). Circle House – Denmark’s first circular housing project [Fact sheet]. GXN Innovation.

Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, & British Trust for Ornithology. (2019). Waterbirds in the UK 2017/18: The Sherbourne Valley Project. (n.d.). Geography of the river. https://www.sherbournevalley.co.uk/geography-of-the-river Sherbourne Valley Project. (n.d.). How the project began. https://www.sherbournevalley.co.uk/how-the-project-began Sherbourne Valley Project. (n.d.). The River Sherbourne. https://www.sherbournevalley.co.uk/the-river-sherbourne Sim, D. (2019). Soft city: Building density for everyday life. Island Press. Terrapin Bright Green. (2014). Biophilic design patterns: Emerging nature-based parameters for health and well-being Warhurst, A., & Warwickshire Wildlife Trust. (2023, September 14). Threatened Warwickshire species to be saved

Historic Coventry. (n.d.). Naul’s Mill Park. https://www.historiccoventry.co.uk/nowandthen/content.php?pg=nauls-mill Kellert, S. R., Heerwagen, J., & Mador, M. (Eds.). (2008). Biophilic design: The theory, science, and practice of bringing buildings to life. Wiley.

Warwickshire Wildlife Trust. (n.d.). River Sherbourne Valley project. https://www.warwickshirewildlifetrust.org.uk/SVPTeam

Lyle, J. T. (1994). Regenerative design for sustainable development. Wiley.

birds/waterfowl

Mang, P., & Reed, B. (2015). Regenerative development and design: A framework for evolving sustainability. Wiley.

West Gorton Community Park Partnership. (2021). GrowGreen case study: West Gorton, Manchester – Green

Marmalade Lane. (n.d.). Marmalade Lane: Cambridge’s first cohousing community. https://www.marmaladelane.co.uk/ McDonough, W., & Braungart, M. (2002). Cradle to cradle: Remaking the way we make things. North Point Press. Meteoblue. (n.d.). Weather archive: Coventry. https://www.meteoblue.com/en/weather/historyclimate/weatherarchive/ coventry_united-kingdom_2652221 Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government. (2019). English indices of deprivation 2019. https://www.gov.uk/ government/statistics/english-indices-of-deprivation-2019 Nowysz, A. (2021). Modernist projects of community-based urban farms in Europe and North America. Buildings, 11(8),

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

West Midlands Combined Authority. (2021, August 24). Coventry brook flowing for the first time in over 100 years. CW WWT – Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust. (2024). Herons and egrets found in UK wetlands. https://www.wwt.org.uk/discover-

369. https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings11080369 Office for National Statistics. (2022, June 28). How the population changed in Coventry: Census 2021. https://www.ons. gov.uk/visualisations/censuspopulationchange/E08000026/ Office for National Statistics. (2023, January 19). How life has changed in Coventry: Census 2021. https://www.ons.gov. uk/visualisations/censusareachanges/E08000026/ Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. (2010). The human right to adequate housing: Fact sheet no. 21 (Rev. 1). United Nations. https://searchlibrary.ohchr.org/record/16779 Petcou, C., & Petrescu, D. (2015). R-Urban or how to co-produce a resilient city. Ephemera: Theory & Politics in Organization, 15(1), 249–262. Petrescu, D., Petcou, C., & Baibarac, C. (2016). Co-producing commons-based resilience: Lessons from R-Urban. Building Research & Information, 44(7), 717–736. https://doi.org/10.1080/09613218.2016.1214891 Pintos, P. (2019, June 26). Marmalade Lane Cohousing Development / Mole Architects. ArchDaily. https://www.archdaily. com/918201/marmalade-lane-cohousing-development-mole-architects Reed, B. (2007). Shifting from ‘sustainability’ to regeneration. Building Research & Information, 35(6), 674–680. https:// doi.org/10.1080/09613210701475753 Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, & British Trust for Ornithology. (2019). Waterbirds in the UK 2017/18: The Wetland Bird Survey report. British Trust for Ornithology. Sherbourne Valley Project. (n.d.). Geography of the river. https://www.sherbournevalley.co.uk/geography-of-the-river Sherbourne Valley Project. (n.d.). How the project began. https://www.sherbournevalley.co.uk/how-the-project-began Sherbourne Valley Project. (n.d.). The River Sherbourne. https://www.sherbournevalley.co.uk/the-river-sherbourne Sim, D. (2019). Soft city: Building density for everyday life. Island Press. Terrapin Bright Green. (2014). Biophilic design patterns: Emerging nature-based parameters for health and well-being in the built environment. Terrapin Bright Green. Warhurst, A., & Warwickshire Wildlife Trust. (2023, September 14). Threatened Warwickshire species to be saved from extinction. Warwickshire Wildlife Trust. https://www.warwickshirewildlifetrust.org.uk/news/threatenedwarwickshire-species-be-saved-extinction Warwickshire Wildlife Trust. (n.d.). River Sherbourne Valley project. https://www.warwickshirewildlifetrust.org.uk/SVPTeam birds/waterfowl West Gorton Community Park Partnership. (2021). GrowGreen case study: West Gorton, Manchester – Green infrastructure for climate resilient neighbourhoods. Groundwork. https://www.groundwork.org.uk/hubs/casestudy-grow-green-west-gorton/ West Midlands Combined Authority. (2021, August 24). Coventry brook flowing for the first time in over 100 years. CW Growth Hub. https://cwgrowthhub.co.uk/coventry-brook-flowing-first-time-over-100-years/ WWT – Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust. (2024). Herons and egrets found in UK wetlands. https://www.wwt.org.uk/discoverwetlands/wetland-wildlife/meet-the-family/herons-and-egrets-found-in-uk-wetlands

NOTE: All images and illustrations contained Author’s own illustration except any credited to the source ChatGPT (OpenAI, 2026) was used exclusively in the Amber category for language editing and grammar refinement, sourcing supporting infromation and exploring different possibilites only | Page 58

Appendix

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

| Page 59

Appendix

At the board, everyone is equal. The fishery where fish are cleaned. The kitchen counter where potatoes are prepped. The dining table where families gather for shared meals. The boardwalk connecting fishponds to potato beds to kitchen to table. The water-fed commons is organized around horizontal surfaces [boards] where work happens, food is prepared, and community gathers. Low-income families produce fish and potatoes for traditional fish and chips, eating together daily at long communal tables. The architecture is simple board construction: post-and-beam timber, plank siding, timber floors, wide overhangs. Everything is visible, the fish tanks, the potato grow beds, the kitchen, the dining. The production, the labour, and the meal are celebrated, not hidden. From water to table, from aquaponics to preparation to nourishment: architecture of democracy, sustainability, and shared meals.

NAULS MILL WATER COMMONS

A visible water spine powering circular food systems, with a communal table as the social heart.

| Page 60

Nauls Mill Water Commons