The UK’s housing challenge has developed over the years into a widely acknowledged crisis, nowhere more so than in London, which is currently planning for around 558,000 new homes over the next 10 years of the draft London Plan (published July 2026) against a local housing need of 850,000 over the same period.
With this in mind, out‑of‑centre retail parks represent one of the clearest and most immediate opportunities to pivot from low intensity land use, with areas predominantly occupied by car parks and single storey units, repurposed to residential led mixed-use communities.
Over 2025 and 2026, Lichfields has undertaken an analysis of London’s retail parks to identify and define guiding principles for a design‑led approach, helping to deliver sustainable, mixed‑use neighbourhoods that can contribute meaningfully to London's housing needs while creating better places, stronger communities and enhanced local centres.
