December Studio Update

In this months roundup, we’re pleased to share highlights from Darren’s recent talk at the RIBA conference, the opening of our Winchester art installation, and the exciting news of our award win for Brockenhurst House.

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Photography by Karla Gowlett

RIBA Conference, Guerrilla Tactics

Darren was invited to present at this years RIBA Guerrilla Tactics conference themed “The DNA of Practice: Shaping Identity Beyond the Portfolio,” explored what defines a practice’s true identity beyond its built work.

His talk was titled, “Making Meaning: Communicating Practice Values with Clarity and Confidence”, reflecting on his own experiences as founder of Studio BAD nearly seven years ago, and the importance of establishing and staying true to a set of guiding principles that underpin every aspect of our work. You can read more about the event here. 

Architecture Award Win

We are absolutely thrilled to have won the ‘Best Architect for an Extension Project’ at this year’s Build It Awards for our Brockenhurst House project. The design has taken a tired 1970’s chalet home set within the New Forest National Park, and transformed it into a stunning, contemporary home to perfectly suit the clients’ needs.

The brief had been to extend and reimagine the property, to deliver a low energy home that could support the owners evolving needs, while remaining true to principles of beauty, sustainability, and architectural integrity, elevating everyday living while responding to change. You can read more details about the project here.

Art Installation Opens

We were delighted to attend the official opening of Allegra Ambition Installation this month, a project that delivers a free-to-use outdoor fitness space and sculptural seating area beside the Winchester Sports Centre at Garrison Ground, Hampshire. Our design was selected as the winner of the public art competition for the charity, Allegra’s Ambition.

Lucy Whittome, Trustee of Allegra’s Ambition, stated about the design:

“We have tried to create something truly special here. It is a place that welcomes people and children of all ages to gather, sit, play, and exercise, with a focus on calisthenics.”

Solent University Collaboration

We are really excited to have teamed up with Solent University and Mettricks, collaborating on a project for the second year graphics students at the University which looks at ways to help reposition the city.

Background:
Southampton is a city rich in culture from both the past and present. There is so much to love from the architecture to the music, to the food – there’s nowhere quite like it. Although not everyone thinks this way, and we want to show them Southampton is a place to be proud of!

Challenge:
Looking at ways to help reposition Southampton away from its current perceived image; to make it relevant to its current residents and visitors. The project is to create a poster campaign that showcases the cities creativity and culture, to make it somewhere we can all be proud to belong to.

The work will focuse on key areas of the city, including: Arrival/Departure (the docks, train station, airport), Nature, Heritage, Literature, Sport, Music, Theatre, Art.

We cannot wait to see the results from this inspiring work later this year.

Winning Design for Art Commission

We are absolutely thrilled to have won the commission by the charity Allegra’s Ambition and SPUD to deliver a new piece of public art, to be located outside the Winchester Sports Centre which opened in 2021.

The brief was to design a new sculpture as a place for people to gather and sit, adjacent to the playing fields at the new recreation centre. The piece needed to versatile, to be interesting visually, create a natural gathering point, but also to offer some form of seating, and to ideally incorporate the charity within the design, all within a budget of £50,000.

Our answer was the ‘Tactile Seating Structure’ crafted from hardwood timber fins. Each fin could be a different hardwood to offer a variation on tone, positioned at a slightly different angle to create an organic ripple, reflective of the ribbons within the charity logo. The shape of the wooden structure creates a welcoming enclosure for people to gather, encouraging people to sit or lounge within, or climb and crawl over the undulating surface. Conceived out of reclaimed natural timbers, sourced locally, to create a robust, warm and durable structure which can sustain the public interaction with minimal on-going maintenance. The structure will be integrated with landscaping and outdoor apparatus, offering everyone an opportunity to participate in physical activity and activating an underused public area outside of the leisure centre. Public consultation workshops will be carried out to ensure that the structure incorporates a wide variety of uses for all ages and abilities.

The Allegra’s Ambition charity aims to encourage and empower young and disadvantaged people to fulfil their potential through participation in sport, the charity was set up in memory of Allegra, a keen sports person who died suddenly at the age of 16. SPUD is an arts and education charity located in the New Forest, they aim to create opportunities for people to engage with art, architecture, design and the environment.

Collaborative Process Exhibition

Last week we hosted our first exhibition, held at the awesome God’s House Tower in the heart of the old town of Southampton. The show was in part a celebration of Studio BAD’s 4th anniversary, and in part a commemoration of our collaborative process of working. The show looked at some of the key projects for our practice, past, present and future, that have been uniquely shaped by the way we work.

The show was a huge success, over the weekend we were honoured to welcomed over 300 people to the show. On the Saturday night we hosted a special drinks reception, a moment to stop, reflect and celebrate with our friends, colleagues and collaborators.

We worked with Reading University architectural students to create a centrepiece for the exhibition. We gave a design brief to design and build a prototype temporary ‘room within a room’ to sit within large internal spaces, as you often find within churches. The idea was to create a structure that can be used as a private space, to hold meetings, private contemplation or just to create a more comfortable, space smaller in scale.

The prototype device was built in-situ within God’s House Tower, creating a wonderfully warm room, which we have nicknamed the ‘Bishops Hat’ due to the overall space and detailing. Crafted from chip board with a Perspex window, laid out in a simple cross shape, the design offers a small scale room which is designed to fit comfortably within a church environment.

We would like to thank our sponsors of the event, University of Reading, Arts Committee, Eckersley O’Callaghan, Mesh Energy, Bentley SIPS Systems and Muse Coffee (who have defiantly fuelled this exhibition!) without all their support we could not have gone ahead with the event. We would also like to thank God’s House Tower; the team have been so helpful and the space is beautiful and so versatile.

Finally, we would like to thank the whole of the Studio BAD collaborative team, you can find the list of our team here, each and everyone has shaped the practice.  Studio BAD is a rich tapestry of all our skills, experience and heritage, the company has thrived from our collaborative approach and I could not be prouder of what we have all achieved together.

Architecture Through a Shared Collaborative Process Event

We are thrilled to be hosting ‘Architecture Through a Shared Collaborative Process’ at God’s House Tower in Southampton, it is a free to visit exhibition and discussion from Friday 20th January until Sunday 22nd January 2023.

‘Architecture Through a Shared Collaborative Process’ celebrates four years of working collaboratively and highlights the process and potential in working collectively to achieve inclusion and equality. 

The possibility that architecture can be developed through shared collaboration is an ambition and lived experience for us at Studio B.A.D. Our practice ethos is to collaborate with clients, designers, architects, artists and academics to bring a range of voices and perspectives to enrich their projects.

The process is inclusive; all collaborators are equal.

As a practice we work with community groups through a process of listening initiated at community consultation workshops to develop shared visions and goals with the client body. The practice develops proposals with clients that are about the long-term sustainability of the community, with the architectural practice as partners in this relationship.

Come and join us, tickets are free and can be booked on Eventbrite here

First phase of Gosport complete

Phase One of our Gosport regeneration work has been completed, reimagining and activating the city centre through incremental and meanwhile design solutions. A key aspect of the plan was to install large scale art murals at key points across the town, to highlight and celebrate the heritage of Gosport and injecting bright, bold colours into the street scene.

One key area of town we looked to reactivate was the waterfront area, which hold such potential as a destination for Gosport. We selected a dated, uninspiring public convenience block to be the location for a new piece of public art, celebrating the maritime history. Working with a talented graphic designer, Nathan Evans, we created a unique graphic mural to wrap around the entire structure, visually lifting the dated building and injecting a sense of fun to the street scene. The artwork uses subtle, abstract graphics to commemorate the industrial maritime heritage, using bold blues and aquamarine tones inspired by the sea and air.

Already a local favourite, in a few well considered images this work brilliantly captures the story and rich maritime heritage of Gosport.’ Peter Fellows, Project Manager – Gosport High Street Heritage Action Zone.

Other work completed includes a large, abstract mural installed in the centre of the High Street, designed collaboratively with Amber Ryan coming up with the concept designs and Amanda Moore refining and delivering the project. The vivid design was inspired by the iconic ‘Dazzle’ camouflage used on navy ships during WWI and WWII, the designs consist of a complex patten of geometric shapes in contrasting colours, which have been reinterpreted and applied to a rundown, post war commercial block located at the cross section of the street, visually lifting the appearance of the structure at this main artery of town.

We look forward to seeing the additional aspects of the design come to completion onsite in following months.