Office-to-homes conversions: London blocks hold fresh allure since shift to home-working
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Interest has surged since relaxation of planning rules last March, but technical difficulties often loom large. On a busy high street in Balham, south London, stands a boxy, beige-fronted building. Built in the 1940s, for decades the four-storey office block was home to hundreds of civil servants until Department for Work and Pensions officials moved out in 2020.
![[Julia Kollewe]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/uploads/2017/10/06/Julia-Kollewe,-L.png?width=75&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
Now, Irene House boasts 77 one- and two-bedroom upmarket apartments with seven more homes inside a roof extension. It still has its art deco entrance and other features inspired by the building’s original interior, and represents a growing trend: to convert office blocks into homes.
![[The Old War Office exterior.]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/3ae1efe3003ae1660edd37d33d61a6a52143c263/0_96_7646_4587/master/7646.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
The project might appear an example of how to solve the housing crisis, in a post-pandemic era when increased working from home has made offices less appealing and demand for accommodation remains high, but the reality is much more complex. There has been a surge in applications for office-to-residential conversions since the lifting of an office space limit last March. However, architects say they can be daunting and costly with challenges around deep floorplates and a lack of natural light.
![[Empire House, as seen from a park.]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/74333ee94a7d1e197981fb168c189c24a5f36cb5/0_129_3900_2340/master/3900.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
The ultimate office conversion is the transformation of the opulent Old War Office in Whitehall, Winston Churchill’s base during the second world war, into a 120-room Raffles hotel and 85 luxury flats in a £1.2bn project – albeit without any affordable housing.
Centre Point, the landmark 1960s office tower in central London, was also revamped as luxury housing in 2018, with 13 socially rented flats in a separate low-rise block. In Chiswick, an 11-storey office tower known as Empire House has just been converted into 121 homes starting at £625,000, despite local opposition.
