K1 is an embryonic cohousing community in Orchard Park, Cambridge.

Approximately 40 householders are coming together to shape our own homes and community with the support of dedicated professionals. This is the first of a kind: as far as we know, there has never been a council/developer/cohousing partnership like this before in the UK – find out here what makes it unique.

Cohousing means that the community is central to the design of both the site as a whole and the individual homes. We will have a common house where we can share meals, get our post, watch films, have parties or just get together and chat. We’ll have communal gardens where there will be space for children to run, food to be grown, games to be played, gardeners to get creative and lounging in the sun.

Cambridge City Council, in collaboration with our group, has chosen TOWNhus to build our community for us. TOWNhus is a joint venture between UK developer TOWN and Swedish house builder Trivselhus, which builds us warm, comfortable and sustainable homes using a tried and tested, highly efficient timber panel system. Read the press release about their winning bid, view the stunning design here, or download the detailed design as a PDF.

The houses will be customisable, meaning that we can choose not only our fixtures and fittings but whether or not we want internal walls, and how many rooms we want on each floor! We’re beginning this process right now and we’re hoping that everyone will be moved in by mid-2017, so this really is an exciting time for us.