South Cambridgeshire District Council has invited bids for the parcel of Faith and Community Land on the edge of Northstowe’s first phase and the soon-to-be-developed town centre.
The Northstowe Lakes Centre
In response to this opportunity, the Northstowe Church Network (NCN) is working with the wider Northstowe community to develop the Phase 1 Faith and Community Land into the Northstowe Lakes Centre. Set beside Bug Hunters Water and close to the emerging town centre, it will be an inclusive, sustainable and welcoming landmark for all who call Northstowe home.
At its heart will be a Christian Chapel — The Chapel by the Lake — designed as a space for prayer, worship, and reflection. Yet its vision reaches far wider. Alongside the chapel, flexible rooms and shared spaces will be available for community groups, charities, wellbeing services, and other faith groups to use and hire. Through conversation with interfaith collaborators, the Centre will embody our shared hope for a town where people of every background can meet, celebrate, and belong.
The Northstowe Lakes Centre will be a place where faith, community and the cultural life of Northstowe meet in harmony at the intersection of the urban and rural, the built and natural, the spiritual and secular.
At its heart will be a Christian Chapel — The Chapel by the Lake — designed as a space for prayer, worship, and reflection. Yet its vision reaches far wider. Alongside the chapel, flexible rooms and shared spaces will be available for community groups, charities, wellbeing services, and other faith groups to use and hire. Through conversation with interfaith collaborators, the Centre will embody our shared hope for a town where people of every background can meet, celebrate, and belong.
The Northstowe Lakes Centre will be a place where faith, community and the cultural life of Northstowe meet in harmony at the intersection of the urban and rural, the built and natural, the spiritual and secular.
Listening to Northstowe
Since the very beginning of Northstowe’s story, we’ve been listening. From the first Deckchair Listening Project events back in 2018 to this summer’s festivals, fayres, and creative pop-ups, hundreds of residents have shared what matters most to them — spaces that feel welcoming, beautiful, sustainable, and alive with community. Families, young people, faith groups, and neighbours have helped shape our vision not just for the Chapel by the Lake (a light-filled, nature-connected chapel) but also the surrounding flexible indoor and outdoor areas for wellbeing, creativity, and togetherness.
With ongoing conversations across our growing new town, interfaith collaboration, and professional design input, this truly is a Northstowe project — rooted in local hopes and shaped by shared imagination.
On our display at the Midsummer Festival we explore four themes:
- Wow!
- Welcome
- Well Being
- Worship
- which of the four themes are important to you and why?
- what kind of activities, spaces, or support would make you feel more connected or at home in the town?
- If you could build just one thing into this site, what would it be?
- Is there anything else you'd like to say about the Chapel by the Lake or what Northstowe needs?
More Than Walls: Growing a Place to Belong
From the start, people have told us that what happens outside the walls is just as important as what happens inside. At the Northstowe Running Festival, our Deckchair Listening Project invited runners, families, and passers-by to add handprints and drawings to a giant “butterfly meadow,” sharing hopes for what could grow by the Lake. The ideas were beautiful and down-to-earth — wildflowers and herons, benches to rest on, "a place to be alone without being lonely", art and sculpture, and shady spaces to sit and chat. Together they painted a vision of outdoor areas that blend nature and creativity — places to breathe, play, reflect, and feel part of something bigger than ourselves.
(c) Northstowe Church Network 2025
