I'm a student at the Guildhall and love the way The Barbican is like a separate city, with walkways and bridges over the roads - and everything you need is there, restaurants, the library and a cinema - I'd love to live there!

...expecting to stay a year - sold in 2003! Since then in terrace block 2 bed, floor 5. Great onsite amenities and close to work if that's where yours happens to be, plus plenty more shopping in / near the City these days.

Downside: lift/defective roof repair/maintenance costs have been high. Lift replacements will recur about every 25/30 years. Typical service charge for 2-bed terrace block flat before these exceptional items: £2,250p.a. During lift etc renewals: £8k a year (yes and for 2 years approx).

If you are not paying a season ticket it sort of evens out (to some extent). But if you do not work locally, knowing the service charge is there to get you can be a frightener if you find yourself on a low income.

Yes the buildings are ugly BUT the location and amenities are great. The whole arts complex, one of the best public libraries on the doorstep, and here there are lots of good restauraunts and pubs around. There is a street market and a supermarket only a minute or so away and the complex lies between two major tube stations (Barbican and Moorgate) so transportation is easy. Crime is almost unheard of within the complex and the apartments are remarkably quiet. I'm now looking for a bigger flat, but having lived in the Barbican I now feel there is only one place to search - yes - still in the Barbican.

Amenities are excellent, crime rate is incredibly low and you are in the Barbican Centre with its theatres, cinemas, concert hall, library. Most of the flats are really quiet. Underground parking available for those with cars. Service charge includes underfloor heating, refuse collection from your door. I'd thoroughly recommend it having lived there now for six months. Looking to upgrade to a bigger flat and the only place I'm looking is THE BARBICAN.

The whole of the City is within walking distance; even the West End is no more than a healthy 30 minutes on foot. From my flat the Barbican tube station is 3 minutes' walk; and, when I need to use the car, I have my own(ed) parking space at the foot of my lift-shaft.

The site is secure and astonishingly quiet for its location; the Corporation of London is a reassuringly paternalistic guardian of the residents' interests.

And the icing on the cake is the Arts Centre. I have seen more Shakespeare, both in quantity and quality, here than anywhere else - and I once lived in Stratford-Upon-Avon! The world-class LSO is the resident orchestra. We can even come home for coffee in the interval.

Even the 'brutalist' architecture of the place grows on you (like fungus, you may say) after a time; and in any case is much ameliorated by extensive planting. The Conservatory is a joy.

And, if you live in the City, you can really see and enjoy it at the weekends.