Homes designed to toast county’s traditions with harvesting hops

The firm behind plans for a “high-end” housing development says it hopes to celebrate Kentish traditions through the design of its houses.

A proposal to build four large family homes at Nethergong Yard in Chislet, near Canterbury, has been submitted by civil engineering firm Hannafin Contractors.

And bosses at the company are keen to see the county’s hop-growing roots honoured through the design, having used oast houses as inspiration. A spokesman for Hannafin said: “We hope to be an example of both design and biodiversity gain, as well as being viable from an economic point of view that can benefit the community by making use of a disused brownfield site. “In terms of the actual design itself, we’ve looked at the history of the area, and the idea of escaping to Kent is something people idealise and we’d definitely say this is a celebration of Kent and its traditions. “We’ve looked at the hop-growing history and have used the oast house at Chislet as an inspiration, using the anatomy of the building to help us design the houses at Nethergong Yard.” The site, which is just under one acre, is currently used to store building materials.

It was a chicken farm before becoming the home of a coppicing business in 2009. Hannafin had planned to turn the site into a temporary depot for its south east projects during the pandemic, but said operational changes led to this idea failing to come into fruition. If the plans are approved, three four-bedroom homes and a three-bedroom house would spring up, each named after processes of hop farming. Listed as lifting, drying, bagging and storing, each home would also be modified slightly to reflect this, with features changing from house-to-house based on its assigned stage. Rainwater harvesting and flood resilient measures are key parts of the plans.

It is hoped that raising the homes above ground could help to negate any issues linked to flooding. Biodiverse planting strategies could be used to encourage wildlife and threatened species, with the undercroft space being described as ideal for “shade loving plants and species”. When describing the potential cost of the proposals, the firm could not stipulate a project outlay but described it as “high-end”.

Details of the plans can be found on Canterbury City Council’s planning portal by searching CA/23/00014.

The site at Nethergong Yard in Chislet, near Canterbury is used to store building materials

The design of the homes is inspired by the Kentish oast houses used in hop growing

The proposals would see four homes built at the site inspired by oast houses