The Leamouth docks were used for shipbuilding and importing exotic goods from India and China and dockworkers’ homes around two narrow streets known as Orchard Place.
The settlement acquired the nickname of ‘Goodluck Hope’. Ballymore revived the name and featured it in its marketing campaign. A steel frame shed, built on an infilled dock in the 1970s, has been converted by HAL to create an evocative route culminating in a marketing suite overlooking the Thames.
Old signage is recreated for the shed, which serves as a point of arrival and events space. It leads on to a new palm grove open to the sky (palms were once imported here en route to the glasshouses and gardens of Victorian Britain).
A covered courtyard retains a blacksmith’s wood-fired stove and leads on to a new double-height sales gallery and exhibition space. Landscape is by Studio Huw.
