Living in the Barbican

The Barbican was designed as kind of utopian post-modern community which would bring residents back to the centre of London. The blocks of flats are set above road level, with pedestrian highwalks to allow pleasant traffic-free walking around the area of the estate. The Barbican Arts Centre is situated at the heart of the estate, by a shallow lake ornamented with fountains and an Italian-inspired sunken garden. There are two green private gardens for residents which both contain play areas popular with Barbican families.

This is a calm and safe place to live, with a population that is generally respectable, mostly well-to-do and courteous. An estate like this - all concrete and maze-like walkways - could easily become run-down and sinister. But the Barbican is well-maintained, well-patrolled by friendly City of London police, and it is very rare for anything more untoward to occur than a visitor illegally walking their dog off the lead.

Among the conveniences of living in the Barbican is our 5-days-a-week rubbish and recycling collection (removed from special hatches by front doors). The underground car parks beneath the flats have 24-hour attendants, who take in  large postal deliveries, help if you get locked out of your flat and are a friendly point of contact.

The arts centre is a big attraction and is a focal point for the estate, with many of our walking routes passing through the building. As well as a theatre, concert hall and art gallery, the building also houses a very good public library, which is a great service for those of us living or working here. The arts centre's conservatory is a remarkable and atmospheric space. It also has cinema screens, though these were recently relocated in a process which caused annoyance to many residents.

Living here in the Barbican means you can walk almost anywhere in central London, so it's good for keeping fit, saving money, and avoiding the tube at rush hours. Covent Garden is half-an-hour's walk away.

All this comes at a cost - not just the price of property but also of the local standard of living. Residents pay central London prices for restaurants and services, and our local supermarket is Waitrose, which may be nice but is not the cheapest place to buy basic provisions.

Buying property in the Barbican comes at a premium with prices at the time of writing starting at around £290,000 for a tiny studio flat and rising to multi-million pound flats in the three high towers. You can find the latest properties on www.rightmove.co.uk (search postcode EC2Y) and the websites of local estate agents.

Renting in the Barbican is expensive, but not much more than comparable areas of central London. Letting is only permitted for periods of 90 days and more (although several residents can be found online breaking the terms of their lease by offering occasional holiday lets).

There are, of course, negatives to living here too. Central London is polluted, and once you leave the tranquillity of the highwalks, there is London traffic to deal with and London commuters. The local authority does not always show much consideration for its residents, as in the story of the cinema relocation mentioned above. Although the Barbican was designed to have a community feel, and in some places it may do, this is still London and - bar the odd garden fete - there aren't quite small-town levels of friendliness.

Still, this is a great, and  unusual place to live. On my earliest visits to the area, I used to walk along the highwalks and imagine futuristic secret agents living in lakeside flats, or that the whole estate was a kind of space station ("Beam me up to conservatory level"). Even now, when I walk over the bridge above the lake on an errand, I still feel a bit of a thrill at living here.