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.

St Margaret’s Church Film

Working with the brilliant team at E&J Videography, we have put together a short film detailing our St Margaret’s Church. In the video we discuss the design and the concept behind it, by talking to key members of the team from all aspects of the church – management, end user and of course the design team.

St Margaret's Church Film

Building Trends for 2023

THE AGE OF DEEP RETROFIT AND REIMAGINED EXISTING BUILDINGS

I was asked to predict the a key trend for 2023, by Homebuilding & Renovating Magazine. The one trend I can see being high on all those self-build enthusiasts list this year, is deep retrofit of existing buildings.

We are already seeing this in the self-build industry, where homeowners and those investing in new properties and projects are looking to invest in the fabric of their buildings so that they can save energy in the long term. This is in response to the challenging times we face, with energy costs, rising inflation and how this impacts on construction costs.

So this may include new triple glazed windows, insulating the fabric of a building first, existing walls, roof and floor. It makes sense to put investment into the existing envelope of the building first, before investing in the interiors such as kitchens, bathrooms, lighting and decoration. There is a move to upgrade building fabric now, so that money can be saved and put aside for further improvements on buildings.

We are working with many clients on existing buildings and a phased approach or meanwhile delivery is becoming more prevalent where funds are prioritised to invest on upgrading elements, prior to delivery of perhaps new elements and extensions. In some cases, extensions may be built up to a shell level, so insulated and weather tight, until funds become available to complete and install finishes.

I think we will see a continuing trend for client’s and architects, being smart, taking these moves in order that the continuing pressure on budgets energy, material costs and interest rates, will simple mean that this has come out of a necessity, to have a clear strategy of how you plan your self-build refurbishment, sourcing and prioritised affordable materials, in an age where materials are constantly increasing.

Marley interview, AJ Award

I was recently interviewed by Marley, the UK’s leading roofing product company, about our success at the Architects Journal Small Project Award which they sponsor. The St Margaret’s Church project won the Sustainability prize at this year’s award, which was a huge honour for the myself and the collaborative team.

The award ties in succinctly with the founding ethos I had when setting up Studio BAD, we are interested in two things, one is social architecture and the social impact of architecture. The other is our passion for the reuse and reimagination of existing buildings. I always had a crazy idea that as architects, we could run sustainable businesses by doing pieces of work that question whether you actually have to build anything at all. The success of St Margaret’s Church has demonstrated that my crazy idea is possible!

At this project we only touched the church lightly, yet have achieved a huge transformation for the building and the community that use it. I think it was brave for AJ to give the award to a project that isn’t glamorous architecture. This award is important for all of the Studio BAD team, and is equally important to our client.

 

The full article can be found here.

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

Architects Journal Sustainability Webinar

We were delighted to have taken part in the recent webinar with Architects Journal, discussing sustainability in small projects, hosted by their sustainability editor Hattie Hartman. It was a really interesting conversation which looked at the approach to sustainability in two very different projects, if you missed the seminar you can catch up with a recording here.  

We presented and discussed our St Margaret’s Church project, a large community hub redevelopment which won this year’s AJ Small Projects Sustainability Award. We were joined by Summer Islam from Material Cultures, who discussed their small Block House project which focused on experimental materials, and which had also been shortlisted in this year’s sustainability awards.

It is increasingly important to shine a light on projects that lead the way in sustainability, which is something that we all understand to be important within the build industry but unfortunately it is not always imbedded in design. During the seminar we discuss and explore ideas of retrofitting, collaboration and innovative use of materials.

The seminar concluded with some interested questions from the audience, including what the process was for focusing on the heating of the church, why we choose to use concrete within a historic building, how the church is now use by the community and what we would have done differently.

A really interesting conversation you do not want to miss!