The Placemaking Awards were set up to recognise excellence in the planning and delivery of placemaking initiatives across the country. The Design Excellence award is given to a project that can best demonstrate how it has used high quality design to improve a place or create excellent prospects for improvement, whether by improving the local built environment, attracting investment, improving people’s self-esteem, raising the design standards of other local schemes, or by some other factor. The scheme responds sensitively to its mature landscaped context. It creates a series of character areas which reflect the pattern and character of the neighbouring townscape and also maintains and enhances the intrinsic qualities of the site. The heart of the scheme is a retained avenue of mature lime trees.