LAURENCE GARTON, DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR, YORKARE

Laurence, aged 33, has built and registered 350 Yorkare beds with a further 128 to be started in 2018, opening his first home aged 25. He has worked with a mixture of new build sites and conversions, taking each site from scratch and gaining full planning permission before going on to complete the developments. Of the recent homes, Lindsey Hall in North East Lincolnshire, won its category for Best Care Home redevelopment in the UK, at the Pinders Healthcare Design Awards, while Beverley Parklands, was a finalist at this year’s awards.

Lindsey Hall was a derelict grammar school which had been closed for over five years. Laurence presented his vision to a local Council Scrutiny Panel against 14 other developers of how Yorkare wanted to sympathetically develop the school, keeping all of the original 1920s locally listed property, while extending with new build elements. He combined the character and space provided by the school building to develop a luxurious care facility.

Lindsey Hall incorporated a street scene evolved from Yorkare’s Magdalen Park using the assembly hall for a high street setting around an indoor bowling green next to a shopping arcade, with charity shop, post office, cinema, licensed pub, tea room and hair salon. This provides residents with 400sqm of additional social space, becoming the heart of the community at the home which our, and other local residents, now enjoy.

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Yorkare’s latest care home, Beverley Parklands, combined the reminiscence features which had proved so successful at Lindsey Hall, as well as the community use rooms such as a piano bar, tea room and cinema, in a luxury setting.

Laurence is leading Yorkare Homes expansion, as it actively seeks further sites across Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, with a view to developing over 100 beds each year.