I grew up in a council house in 1970s Washington, between Sunderland and Newcastle, and I loved it. We had a brilliant time growing up on our estate. We rode our BMXs around, played football on the field, got into a bit of trouble and spent our lives outside with our mates. We didn’t have a lot, but what we had we loved. And I loved the home and the community where I lived.

I didn’t grow up thinking there was anything shameful about living in a council house. Why would I?

So I get frustrated when we talk about social housing as though it’s some kind of consolation prize. Only last month, shadow Housing Minister Gareth Bacon argued that restricting Right to Buy would leave people “trapped in the system” – as though a secure council tenancy were something to escape. We’ve become obsessed with the idea that success means owning a home, and that renting, particularly from the council, somehow means you’ve fallen short. But decent, affordable homes should not be a symbol of how well you’ve done in life – it is one of the things that allows you to build a life.

When I think about what my council house gave me, the first word that comes to mind is security. Through everything, we had our home.

Our house had two storeys, and four bedrooms with a front and back garden. It faced on to a pedestrianised square where it was safe to play. But more than anything, I had my little bedroom where I could disappear into books, documentaries, drawing, design and architecture. I didn’t want anyone else to see that I was a proper geek – having my own room allowed me to pursue those passions privately. And, of course, these things became my obsession and, eventually, my career. That council estate didn’t limit my ambition. It helped give me the foundations to have ambition in the first place.

I also hate it when people talk about housing in terms of “units” – I think a result of the way government departments and council planners refer to it. They’re not units. They’re homes. Places where children will grow up, where people will fall in love, argue, celebrate birthdays, grieve, work and grow old. The council estate I grew up on understood that. Washington New Town was designed. Architects, planners, landscape architects and engineers thought about the homes, but they also thought about the spaces between them, where children would play, how people would walk to school and how communities might actually work. There was beautiful landscaping, with trees and shrubs all around. There were young families like us nearby, and schools a 15-minute walk away. I don’t know anyone who got driven to school, because the route didn’t involve crossing any roads, thanks to the many pedestrianised areas.

My council house allowed my family to put down roots and become part of a community. It gave us the breathing space to work, study, save, plan for the future and get on with their lives. It’s in total contrast to the stigma which exists around council housing these days – there’s often a suggestion that you’re unemployed, lacking ambition or associated with antisocial behaviour. I’d argue this is down to the scarcity of council housing. With so few council houses being built, it increasingly goes only to those in greatest need, which reduces any sense of inclusivity around social housing.

I’m worried about the housing crisis which young people today face. When housing bears so little relationship to what many young people earn, this isn’t a failure of individual aspiration. We have a generation who are working hard and doing what we’ve told them to do, yet for many the prospect of having a secure home of their own feels increasingly remote. Too often they’re told to save more, stop spending money on this or that, or somehow try harder. I think my generation needs to be very careful about lecturing them. It’s a massive affordability crisis, created by decades of terrible legislation and a frightening lack of imagination and creativity in everything from design and planning to outdated financial models.

We need different models of ownership and renting, better social housing, more genuinely affordable homes and places designed around communities rather than spreadsheets. That’s why I was struck by new Design Council research showing that architecture and built environment design has grown in economic value by £5bn, or 35 per cent, since 2019. Built environment design means designing the physical places we live and work in – buildings, streets, parks, public spaces and the layout of neighbourhoods. It includes disciplines such as urban design, landscape architecture and planning. Britain isn’t short of design talent or capability. The question is whether we’re applying enough of that ingenuity to the problems that matter most.

There is no way I’d be the person and the architect I am today if I hadn’t spent my childhood on the council estate that I did. My mam still lives in that council house I grew up in. Every time I think about it, I’m reminded that the places we build can have consequences that last for generations. Get them wrong and people live with those mistakes for decades. Get them right, and they can give a child the security and confidence to imagine a future beyond their own front door. 

This week I have been…

. and it’s brilliant. I’m usually so busy that I’m terrible at sitting down and properly watching a series, but I’ve really got into this one. It’s funny, dark, completely ridiculous in places and just incredibly entertaining.

Sometimes you don’t want to watch something that feels like homework, you just want to be properly entertained, and this absolutely does that. I’ve loved having something I can stick on at the end of the day and completely switch off to. Although I’m probably incapable of totally switching off. I’m always looking at the buildings and interiors in the background when I’m supposed to be following the plot.

from a sports injury. I’ve had a bit of enforced downtime recently after picking up a minor sports injury in June. I’m absolutely terrible at resting. I love being busy, I love working and I’ve always been someone who wants to make the absolute most of every day, so being told I need to stop and recover doesn’t come naturally to me at all.

But sometimes your body makes the decision for you. It’s forced me to slow down a little, which has probably been no bad thing. I’ve had to be patient, take the recovery seriously and accept that occasionally doing absolutely nothing is actually the most productive thing you can do.

reading the Design Council’s  report. One of the things that really jumped out at me was what’s happening in the North East. The design sector’s economic value there – how much architecture, product, fashion, graphic and digital design is worth – has grown by 67 per cent since 2019, which is fantastic.

I’m a very proud North Easterner and I started my career in architecture there, so I love seeing that creativity and design are helping to drive growth in the region. There’s sometimes still this idea that design is something that happens in London, or that it’s about expensive buildings and beautiful objects. It isn’t. It’s problem solving. It’s making our homes, towns, products and services work better for people. The North East has always been full of brilliant makers, thinkers and problem solvers, so perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised.

Architect and broadcaster George Clarke serves as a Design Economy 2026 Ambassador for the UK Design Council