DIGITAL WEBFORM 'TRACK DESKS'

As with every other part of Digital Webform the worker's desks are also versatile and adaptable. The desks all run on a track system, the partitions move up and down and the extra table space also pivots with movable drawing boards attached.


All white wall surfaces are covered in a wall covering, Wall Talk. This allows the designers to draw on the walls as they see fit. The walls act as an extension to their drawing boards.

DIGITAL WEBFORM - OFFICE

Liverpool - Final project

'RIBS' 
A versatile and adaptable space located on the top floor of a 7 storey office building in Liverpool's Baltic Triangle. Below the glazed space cage roof lies a curved I-Beam supporting a chain and hoist system. This system allows the 'Ribs' to move and rotate into almost any position.

'NEST'
Located between 3 storeys of the office building the 'Nest' is a secondary versatile space within Digital Webform's office building. The 'Nest' houses a large number of movable interlocking blocks that can be arranged to suit the needs of the occupant at that time. It is possible to arrange the 'Nest' as an auditorium, exhibition space, meeting room and conference space.

RESEARCH PROJECT - SUSTAINABILITY

TITLE

Assess whether the Code for Sustainable Homes can be utilised as an assessment method for historic buildings, basing the research on a 260-year-old Georgian farmhouse.

ABSTRACT

 In the Housing Strategy 2011 the Government recognises that homes  in the UK need to be well designed, of the highest quality and environmentally sustainable. This applies to both new and existing homes, which, where possible, should be more energy efficient and help to reduce carbon emissions, be resilient to a future climate and protect the natural environment. High quality homes in high quality natural environments will support plans for growth and are necessary for social, environmental and economic sustainability.

The aim of this research is to generate ratings based on The Code for Sustainable Homes (The Code) for a 260-year-old Georgian farm house, taking into account the energy consumption in construction, usage and operation and how that has changed throughout the 260 years. It will also seek to evaluate whether the Code should be amended to recognise the potential benefits for sustainability in the improvements of existing historic housing stock.

3 main assessment dates to be considered are: 

1760 - Original construction – Built entirely from local materials.

1950 - Extension to the original footprint and first installation of electricity and mains water.

2011 - After major refurbishment/repair and retrofit in 1991.

THIS RESEARCH PROJECT BECAME ACTION RESEARCH

CONCLUSION SUMMARY

The Code for Sustainable Homes gives very detailed guidance and encouragement for the building of new “sustainable” homes.  However its criteria and scoring provide no support for restoration and redevelopment of existing, particularly traditional, homes.

The results illustrate that a sensible common sense interpretation of the Code for Sustainable Homes show that the sensitive and careful redevelopment and retro fit of traditional residential buildings can be sustainable.  However a strict application of the Code’s criteria would show that traditional buildings are unsustainable compared to new construction.  Is this really the case or is it purely the result of the Code failing to adequately measure the long term sustainability of traditional buildings? The answer is, of course, not simple.  The Code is designed only for new construction, but if Government is seeking to encourage better design and increased sustainability in meeting its housing targets, does the Code skew the argument unfairly towards new residential construction.

Developers know very clearly the cost associated with the acquisition and development of green field sites. The renovation and retrofit of existing housing stock is more financially problematic. Sometimes there is a risk of ground contamination and there can be unexpected additional costs in the renovation of existing buildings. Just as the Government provides grants for the development of sustainable energy sources a proper evaluation of the benefits of renovating existing housing stock could lead to the reintroduction of government grants to remove the element of insecurity for private developers.

This research could therefore be extended by accessing each level of The Code against similar scale new build or retrofit projects and suggesting a mechanism for a parity between the two.

COMPETITION

I entered the Janine Stone 'Young Interior Designer of the Year' 2011. The brief was to design a space measuring 6m x 12m x 4m (high) with the inspiration coming from the view out of the window. I was shortlisted out of 100 entries into the top 10 finalists and attended an award ceremony in London. My submission is illustrated below with design synopsis.

The View

The view from the window looks down onto the late 18^th and 19^th century brick dockside warehousing (some already converted to shops, galleries, apartments and offices) and the late 20^th century redevelopment of vacant sites into high rise office, apartments and hotels in steel and reinforced concrete.  The river is on the other side of these buildings and there is still some maritime traffic. This could be any of the dockside redevelopment areas in European or American cities.

Design Synopsis

The design is a challenge to the viewer; is it a redevelopment in one of the 19^th century warehouses incorporating 21^st century concepts or is it a redevelopment in one of the late 20^th century buildings reflecting the 19^th century industrial architecture outside?

The design has changes in floor level to create visual interest.  Lighting is used to enhance the definition of the divisions of the living space.  Mirrors at either end make the c1850 “industrial” train line inset under a glass floor appear to run to infinity.

Conversely, the window openings with the vertical stainless steels reflect the late 20^th century reinforced concrete buildings outside with the concrete removed.

Around the edge of the floors and ceilings and where the internal wall meets the external a 200 mm mirror strip has been inset.  Visually the reflected walls appear to continue into infinity and the floors, ceilings and internal wall float, disconnected from the main structure.

The materials used are both cutting edge 21^st century (the glass wall to the bathroom becomes opaque with an electrical current) or reclaimed c 1850 oak floor boards/bricks in the living area.  The highest level of insulation is to be used using sustainable natural insulation materials and sustainable concrete. All windows are to achieve a BFRC rating of C or above.  The area under the raised floor provides for a heat sink and heat storage.

The cost of the fitting out is likely to be about £50,000 and the design could be applied to either a suite in a small boutique hotel or to a luxury apartment development.

http://www.yida-award.co.uk/victoria_crawcor.html

CONSERVATION

THE SPACE

A versatile space designed to adapt to the community needs. 

Hire this space to transform it for your individual requirements.   

The ground floor atrium houses a nursery. The organic simple white exterior with flashes of colour through the glass window tempt you to explore the magical wonderland inside. The nursery bursts through the Florrie’s exterior wall to reveal an enchanting play garden for the children to explore. 

The large open void of the first floor atrium is the heart of the building. Manually sliding ‘ribs’ run on a concealed track reflecting the structure of the original building above. The white steel framed ribs are lit by LEDs at the seams creating a rhythm of changeable colour. The ‘ribs’ can be moved into different arrangements to produce individual meeting room pods, extended to create individual spaces or closed to create intimate surroundings. The structure can also be used as a gallery/exhibition space.  

OFFICE MEETING ROOMS

CONFERENCE FACILITY

A number of different arrangements can be set up to suit the end user. 

   

GALLERY

ART HOUSE CINEMA

CREATE CINEMA

The developer proposed a new venue for moving pictures, multimedia performance and other presentation. It must distinguish itself from the city’s existing offer of cinematic experience, offering a program committed to revelation. This will be a picture house that links Liverpool to the world in ways only marginally explored in the city’s other cinema venues. 

The cinema has been designed to visualize the debate between creationism and evolution, both through the programs and films it features and also through the design of the building and interior forms.

I looked at 3 main aspects of the debate, along with a few others smaller ideas when designing this cinema; Scale, Time and Change. The ideas of light and dark, soft and ridged and, ebb and flow also came into the design process. 


Creationism, particularly in America, is now called "intelligent design" on the basis that the creation had to be planned by something that knew what it wanted to create.  The exterior of the building is illustrative of "intelligent design" - precise, organised, structured, planned, whereas the interior is illustrative of evolution - darker, curved, organic, changing reflections, wandering pathways.


The exterior of the building is predominately glass. The structure of which is exposed reinforcing steel bars. However, these bars have been designed to visualize the feeling of tension within the debate/argument between creationism and evolution. Extra bars have been placed at angles, always leaning in the same direction, this has to be done to create the idea of rhythm and time (as the sun changes throughout the day, creating different shapes and shadows). The bars also create shapes and holes through the glass, illustrating holes in the theories behind both evolution and creationism. I wanted to look at ‘deconstructing’ the debate/argument and rebuilding it as a (w)hole.