Embassy Village, Manchester

Embassy Village is a unique project in Central Manchester, with its aim to construct & provide 40 homes in a purpose-built village for the homeless. The project also includes the provision for education, training, mentoring and sports facilities for its users.

The developers are a Charity organisation called Embassy, which started from volunteers who were shocked in the rising number of people waiting in shelters or temporary accommodation. Embassy was founded in January 2019 and initially comprised of a luxury tour bus turned shelter that provided a safe place for the homeless to temporarily sleep. In addition, this also included basic support aiming to get people back on their feet. As Embassy grew, so did its aims to provide housing accommodation alongside teaching them how to budget, shop, cook, look after a home and get them ready for employment. They also provide emotional support, mentoring and being guided through a recovery course, with the aim of ultimately providing the confidence to run their homes.

Cheshire Scaffolds Limited initially provided financial charity support to Embassy during its initial days, when it was only the tour bus. More recently they also provided scaffold service support, in aid of the construction of its permanent buildings within its Embassy Village.

The Construction Development Team selected for the project was Vermont with Cheshire Scaffolds Limited tasked with delivering all scaffold requirements. The Village accommodation consisted of 40 homes that are all of 2 storey high building design, uniquely built under an existing rail viaduct on the outskirts of Manchester City Centre.

Scaffolding works required were a combination of external progressive blockwork scaffolds with internal birdcages within the new buildings to remove internal fall hazards and provide internal birdcage platforms, to build the internal face of the building.

In line with the community spirit, a mural was painted on a local wall with the names of all contractors who supported the project.