My grandfather was Sidney Gilliat, who directed some of the St Trinian’s films He collected modern art and got me to love Shakespeare. That said, when I announced I wanted to go to drama school, aged 28 – before I became a photographer – he thought I was mad. But we will fight on and have restrictive covenants up our sleeve.”This could be the first of many such battles.. Amanda Eliasch lives in a four-storey house in Victoria with her husband John and sons Charles and Jack

Amanda Eliasch lives in a four-storey house in Victoria with her husband John and sons Charles and Jack
My theatrical taste has been very influenced by my grandmother, a concert pianist who had a good eye for colour, and my mother, who had a flair for clashing colours harmoniously.

It is quality, not quantity, that is important and they might be able to do a trade-off so that a beautiful new garden is created in one area with another being better suited for building.”She points out that our ancestors knew a more about providing for densely populated areas than we give them credit for. “Take the tall, narrow Georgian houses that would have had large households. This was high-density housing but they would probably surround a garden square or be close to a park. Quality of life is dependent on our maintaining green spaces.”This is the kind of message that is music to the ears of the Haringey residents who fear, like many others, that their view of treetops could disappear. The issues of planning are hugely complex and inconsistent, as Helen Smith has discovered. “No one has even mentioned the problems associated with doctors and school places There seems to be no one looking at the wider picture. “We strongly believe that local authorities should take a strategic approach to its green spaces, not deal with them one by one.

Nicky Gavron, deputy mayor of London, has made it clear that housing targets should not be met through backland development and other insensitive schemes.When the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) announced that a site in Salford, put forward by residents, had the dubious honour of winning its Wasted Space? campaign, Julia Thrift, director of CABE Space, suggested that it might be used as a wildlife meadow or playground. The onus on local authorities to provide housing has persuaded them to look gratefully on anything offered, but at the same time there is a growing realisation that too many green spaces, however small, could be lost for ever. She explains that the effect on existing homes would be huge. Even though the site has some low-level use at present, it is unobtrusive and quiet, with birds and even bats flourishing there. “It is a breathing space for us, and putting buildings there would be intolerable. Until the last war it was used as a garden with tennis courts, and we would love to see it returned to community use.”This is by no means the only backland site that is being sized up by developers. In Haringey alone they have a rush of applications and this is being repeated in every London borough.