Plans that "threaten the integrity" of an Art Deco block of flats by adding an extra storey have been put on hold after campaigners applied to have the building listed.
Developer Freshwater hopes to build seven more flats on a new top floor of the 1930s block in Howitt Close, Belsize Park.
The application was due to be debated by Camden Council's planning committee today (January 30) but was postponed at the last minute after The Belsize Society (TBS) made a Grade II listing application.
A Camden Council spokesperson said: "An application to list Howitt Close has been submitted to Historic England and the planning application will be determined by the council once that process has concluded."
READ MORE:
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- Developer resubmits application to build on 1930s Art Deco block in Belsize Park
The Howitt Close mansion block was built between 1932 and 1934 in an Art Deco style and sits within the Belsize Conservation area.
The proposal generated more than 100 objections, including from TBS, Belsize Conservation Area Advisory Committee (BCAAC) and the Twentieth Century Society, and no expressions of support.
TBS committee member Barbara Abraham discovered the building was filed with the Borough of Hampstead in 1932 by Henry F Webb & Ash, an architectural partnership that also owned the site.
On the BPS website she says the same partnership was responsible for the 1932 Ambassador Cinema at Hendon Central, and that Henry Frederick Webb (1879-1953) was the architect behind other significant north London buildings.
Barbara said Howitt Close has had a "quiet history".
Its construction dates between 1932 and 1934 "means that it was contemporaneous with the Grade I-listed Isokon flats in Lawn Road".
"Without good comparable examples like Howitt Close the significance of the Isokon flats cannot be fully understood," she added.
"It is fair to say that Howitt Close, as a pleasing presence in its location, has been taken for granted over the best part of a century, at least until the threat to its architectural integrity posed by the current planning proposal.
"It is surely only a matter of time before this building becomes highly valued and rightly appreciated for its distinctive architecture and well-preserved authenticity, and achieves listed status – unless the proposed development succeeds in violating the block before then."
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