Finsbury Park has long been defined by its role as an intersection where transport routes and borough boundaries converge. Several lively pockets of retail activity are bisected by the major thoroughfare of Seven Sisters Road. However, the overall character of the town centre remained fragmented and confused.
Successful town centres balance the diversity of individual businesses with a measure of cohesion and a strong local identity. Working in close partnership with Islington, Hackney and Haringey Councils, JKA and Office S&M implemented a coordinated tri-borough shop front improvement programme, realising works to 30 businesses across the Finsbury Park area.
Thanks to this cooperative approach, JKA were able to work across political boundaries to consider the town centre foremost as a social and spatial environment. Building on existing communication networks between traders and local authorities, we targeted businesses which sit at key intersections and approaches within the town centre, are visually prominent, and offer unusual, even unique goods and services.
We worked closely with each individual business to offer a customised programme of support and investment. The result is a suite of interventions, ranging in scale from the transformative to the intimate, which work together to catalyse the emergence of characterful and resilient high streets.