Driving Better Design: Community-Led Feedback for Picture This Stockport

Image credit: Our Studio

Context

Progressive Housing, working with Picture This and its partners, including Counter Context PR, AEW Architects, EKPS, and Re-Form Landscape Architecture, utilised PlaceChangers to incorporate an interactive online consultation for "Picture This Stockport" into their in-person market stall events. The project aimed to engage nearby residents in shaping ideas for community uses on the ground floor of a new landmark residential development.

Picture This Stockport will deliver an apartment scheme of 245 one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments, replacing a derelict office building and surface-level car park. All the homes are designed to Lifetime Homes Standard, and a further 10%being suitable for wheelchair users. Designed as a Passivhaus Low Energy scheme, the development aims to create a vibrant and sustainable community with rooftop growing spaces, a neighbourhood hub, and partnerships with local businesses, creatives, and CICs in the centre of Stockport, an up-and-coming area of Greater Manchester enjoyed by young professionals and right sizers.

Consultation Approach

The consultation adopted a hybrid model, combining an in-person event at Stockport Makers Market with an online interactive engagement hosted via PlaceChangers.

At the Stockport Makers market, the Picture This team set up display boards and a creative badge-making activity for the community to spark conversations with visitors, asking, "What do you want to see in the space you call home?". The day resulted in wonderfully insightful discussions, with support from Civic and Social and Mr. M Ideas Studio.

Visitors to the public event were also invited to respond online, if they wanted to, and they were provided with information about the interactive consultation.

Counter Context PR's team accessed all online reports on PlaceChangers. PlaceChangers' interactive mapping and easy reporting tools enabled Progressive Living, Picture This, and their consultants to efficiently capture, analyse, and present community input. Printed and online feedback outputs were effectively combined in the final report.

Reflecting on the process, the Picture This project team noted:

"The combination of live and online consultation gave us some excellent ideas.Respondents and visitors could see what others had written. It meant the process felt clear and transparent from a user's perspective.”

Key Outcomes

The online engagement attracted 22 participants who generated three new ideas and provided location-specific feedback. Ideas raised included requests for flexible ground-floor community uses, comments on bike parking provision, support for a mixed-tenure approach to encourage community diversity, and a desire for EV charging.

The consultation also highlighted the benefits of PlaceChangers' in-built and real-time consultation reporting, enabling Counter Context to facilitate easy, high-quality reporting. This allows the client to streamline data collection and deliver faster consultation outputs. The hybrid consultation model helped maximise participation and broaden community reach.