MIPIM | Circ_it – The Edge Edition
Why is it so difficult to get to grips with regeneration, and what is ‘good growth’? This interactive session held by Studio Hoodless, Civic, and Layer Studio brought the industry together to brainstorm how these goals can be delivered effectively across the North of England and beyond.
From drawing ‘how to make tea’ to group sessions focusing on good growth, the session delved into what that means, who informs it, and when it happens.
Opening the session, Danny Crump, director of Layer Studio, underlined the different ways in which good growth can be measured: “There’s a conversation happening not only where we are based in the North West, but across the UK, which is beyond the economic outputs of regeneration. How do we deliver successful good growth? Good growth is really those values that are based around community and social capital, environmental capital, and it’s also about not having it focused in a particular area – it’s about spreading that prosperity in a broader sense.”
“People have said the development model is broken from a financial perspective, which might be controversial, but we need to focus on the good bits too,” noted Harry Hoodless, director of Studio Hoodless, underlining the importance of community benefits.
Rather than focusing purely on economic output, the session reframed growth as a broader and more inclusive concept that prioritises community wellbeing, social value, and environmental sustainability.
Isla Jackson, director for Scotland at Civic, said: “We like to describe ourselves, rather than multidisciplinary, we’re a team of system thinkers – and that’s about being collaborative. And this is what good growth is really all about: being collaborative, working across public and private sectors, and just getting involved – trying to solve these wicked problems that we’ve talked about.”
A room packed full of architects, investors, landscape designers, council figures, and developers, showcasing the full spectrum of the development industry, worked together to roadmap the building blocks needed for good growth, the blockers, the fixes and solutions – with an overwhelming sense that collaboration across the public and private sectors, government cooperation, and tenacity can lead to the most beneficial regeneration for communities.
The importance of involving young people in regeneration was also highlighted, with the importance of youth having a voice in how their communities are shaped highlighted by the participation of charity Regeneration Brainery and its team members.
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Circ_it connected policy, capital and place in real time. Participants were challenged to move beyond rhetoric and confront the practical barriers that so often stall well-intentioned development, such as funding silos, governance complexity, viability pressures, and the tension between speed and stewardship.
Devolution can be a once-in-a-generation opportunity, but is one that will only succeed if local authorities, private capital, and delivery partners align around shared outcomes. Rather than treating growth as a numbers game, the session explored how city regions can embed prosperity, inclusion, and quality of life into development models from the outset.
Working in cross-sector teams, attendees stress-tested a repeatable approach aimed at accelerating neighbourhood delivery without losing sight of place, people or purpose. The emphasis was on practical tools: how to align investment strategies with local priorities, how to structure partnerships that reward long-term value, and how to design for social and economic resilience rather than short-term uplift.
