Manchester’s Embassy Village offers 41 homes as well as teaching people how to budget and cook to prepare them for the future
Each block holds eight homes (Image: Sean Hansford | Manchester Evening News)
Embassy village, a new housing project aimed at tackling homelessness in Manchester, is officially complete. The development offers 41 high-quality homes, alongside support services and the planned introduction of a gym, boxing space, and carpentry studio.
Located under the Castlefield arches, the project has seen more than 130 organisations contribute and aims to provide housing alongside teaching a range of life skills from how to budget to cooking and job readiness. The village is one of the many projects the Embassy charity has to help fight the issue of homelessness.
Sid and Tess Williams founded the charity in 2019 after getting the idea from a friend to redevelop a tour bus to house those in need. They both decided to quit their jobs and with the help of family members and Capital and Centric were able to buy a tour bus, once used by the likes of Coldplay.
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Over the course of several months, the bus housed 111 men, giving them the chance to get back on their feet. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, temporary shelters were forced to close and their solution was no longer viable.
They transitioned from the bus to leasing properties as they didn’t want to send people back out onto the streets. They learnt this was a better approach as they could teach people to cook, budget and “things you can’t do on a bus”.
Obstacles occurred when they struggled to find landlords who were willing to take those they helped, even though they had the first month rent deposit ready. As they couldn’t give the landlords a reference and their credit ratings weren’t always great, it became difficult.
This challenge led to Tim Heatley, from Capital and Centric, to introduce the pair to James Whittaker, from Peel Waters, who offered the pair the opportunity to lease some of the arches in Castlefield.
Inside each home has a bathroom and cooking facilities (Image: Sean Hansford | Manchester Evening News)
Whittaker’s offer of the arches gave Embassy the chance to design a unique housing solution. “It seemed too good to be true,” said Sid. “We had only been running as a charity for a year at this point.”
The new development, which took over six years to fundraise and cost £6.3m to build, is now complete. Featuring 41 homes, each designed to foster a sense of community and support. The homes are arranged under five arches with 8 homes in each.
The layout is planned to create a tight-knit environment where they can share experiences and get talking. The development of a gym, boxing space and carpentry studio are planned. These resources are aimed at providing the tools necessary for the residents to move to stability.
The homes have been designed to face each other to create a tight-knit community feel(Image: Sean Hansford | Manchester Evening News)
Sid estimates that close to 95 per cent of those who leave the village will do so with stable employment and no longer reliant on benefits. The charity currently has 25 full time employees and is looking for more to help on their projects.
“We’re not just housing people. We are offering the chance for them to rebuild their lives,” said Sid. “The goal is always to help them break the cycle of homelessness.”
Sid explained how he had learnt from the local authority that the average wait now for able-bodied men for housing can be up to 15 years. For them the average stay is about 14 months and they are keen to make this a place people can keep on moving through.
While the village is now complete, the Embassy is continuing to look for support from landlords, businesses and private individuals to help expand the services they provide. He shared how they have one support worker for every six people and are looking to hire more staff to ensure their personal care model remains effective as the charity grows.
“It’s been a team effort, I could have never done this without Tess, we are a team and we led it together.
“The same is true about our beautiful colleagues and team. We have an amazing team of people at Embassy and the same is true about the business community that has got around this,” said Sid.
“We want to make this a place where people can move forward with their lives. There’s still room at the table for anyone who wants to help.”