Human Nature, the company delivering the project, is founded by previous Greenpeace directors, Michael Manolson and Jonathan Smales.

The development is designed to be walkable and will include a co-mobility hub to incorporate electric car sharing, car hire and car club, electric bike service and a shuttle-bus facility — Human Nature has described the development as the ‘UK’s most sustainable neighbourhood’.

The site, which is located on the site of what was previously an industrial estate in Lewes in the South Downs National Park is planned to provide 685 homes, with 30% being affordable.

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Once completed on the 7.9 hectare brownfield site, the development aims to be the largest timber-structured neighbourhood in the UK the buildings are planned be constructed from engineered timber including CLT (cross-laminated timber), with prefabricated cassettes made from local timber and biomaterials such as hemp.

Jonathan Smales, founder and CEO at Human Nature, commented: “The current mainstream model of development is catastrophic, baking in deeply unsustainable fabric, infrastructure and transport, fuelling the climate and nature crises; it also creates social divisions and exacerbates loneliness.

“We aim to show that living sustainably can be a joy, not an exercise in self-denial, made far easier by the design of neighbourhoods.”