What is your role within our Creative Collective?
Senior Architect.
What are you working on at the moment?
Major hospital masterplanning, Ayrshire Hospice, Children’s Burn Unit at Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, and window replacement at the William Street Clinic, Glasgow.
What aspects of your work are you most proud of?
The number and breadth of project types I’ve been able to adapt to.
Which designers / projects do you most admire and why?
The makers of architecture without architects.
Image shown above: Typical House, Li Tang.
What is your favourite place / building / landscape and why?
The Tibetan Plateau – Vernacular Tibetan/Himalayan architecture. No matter whether domestic or palatial in scale, it is so deeply rooted in place and setting and it must tick every environmental box there is. The landscapes and skies are the most incredible huge spaces in all conditions.
Image shown above: Chortens Prayer Flags, Li Tang.
Which of Austin-Smith:Lord’s guiding principles do you most relate to, and why? Design excellence. It’s why I chose to do this – to make things work well and look good at the same time.
What’s something you’re planning on doing in the next year that you’ve never done?
I definitely need to plan to go up Ben Nevis.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever heard?
Measure twice, cut once.
Complete the following – “I couldn’t get through the week without….”
Hitting my head or injuring myself somehow (oh and coffee and grapefruit juice).
What is your role within our Creative Collective?
Architect.
What are you working on at the moment?
A mix of residential and masterplanning projects
What inspires you most in your work?
Imagining a journey through a design and crafting functional places dotted with focal points of delight.
What lessons have you learned in your work? Do one thing at a time; creative tasks require focus and time to get in the flow.
Which designers / projects do you most admire and why?
I admire the work of countless designers; creativity never ceases to amaze. We all tap into an enormous wealth of already existing ideas, rarely anyone produces anything entirely new. I am in awe of how vigorous, fruitful, and sometimes frightening humans’ collective intelligence is.
What is your favourite place / building / landscape and why?
Vantage points with expansive views over a city or landscapes have an appealing draw for me. I have been fortunate to settle in Penarth located on high cliffs affording plentiful vistas of Cardiff, Vale of Glamorgan and Bristol Channel. I grew up in a town spread across the skirts of a mountain where beautiful long view scenery is a short walk away. Enjoying a large panorama resets the narrow perspective imposed by the mundane day-to-day; it is humbling and freeing experience.
What’s something that recently made you smile?
My son making his first steps, and ‘I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue’ after the 6 o’clock news doom on BBC radio 4.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever heard?
“If you are irritated by every rub, how will you be polished?” – Rumi
What is your role within our Creative Collective?
Passivhaus Designer.
What are you working on at the moment?
A number of residential and higher education Passivhaus schemes.
What inspires you most in your work?
Opportunities to design buildings that are elegant and contextual, as well as self-sustaining and regenerative.
Which designers / projects do you most admire and why?
Carlo Scarpa, for his originality and craftsman-like approach to design.
What is your favourite place / building / landscape and why?
Glanusk Estate, specifically during the 4 days in late August when it hosts the Green Man festival. A special mention also goes to the Princess of Wales Conservatory at Kew Gardens which is a plant-lover’s heaven.
What is one of the key challenges facing our design professions in the 2020s?
Getting to a point where everything we design gives back to the environment, rather than taking from it.
What’s something that recently made you smile?
Probably a dog video on Instagram.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever heard?
Becoming Vegan is a really effective way to reduce your personal carbon footprint, and it can open your eyes to delicious new recipes too!
Complete the following – “I couldn’t get through the week without……..”
Making something out of clay. Spending a couple of hours on my potter’s wheel helps me wind down and clear my head at the end of a busy week.
Embracing adaptive reuse & repurposing of buildings:
My top 6 challenges & solutions
By Kate Thomas, Director and Head of Interior Design, Austin-Smith:Lord
Kate Thomas
The future of Estates management is without doubt in the adaptive reuse and repurposing of outdated building stock, fuelled by the sustainable agenda behind reuse, programme time pressures, and by the noticeable reduction in appetite in several sectors for large budgets to be spent on capital new-build projects.
Amongst other specialisms, as a design practice Austin-smith:Lord is very well seasoned in refurbishments, and it has always occupied a high percentage of our portfolio. However, we are now predictably seeing this percentage grow further to become one of the mainstays of our work. Over the years in my role as head of Interior Design I have been involved in ‘reimagination’ projects across sectors including universities, colleges & schools, commercial, healthcare, arts and culture facilities and heritage projects. Our specialist team takes on projects ranging from full strip out with heavy structural and envelope changes, to light touch renovations. Every project is as unique as the building it adopts, but there are definitely recurring challenges. I’ve come to see these as ‘personality quirks’ of the building, and like any good carers responsible for restoring the outlook of their dependant, we have armed ourselves with an arsenal of responses for handling them, embracing these challenges and giving the building the best reboot possible to ensure long and useful life.
Here are my top 6 commonly recurring ‘personality quirks’ we see in existing buildings, with examples of successful responses to these challenges from recent projects:
1 – Low head heights
Often exacerbated by the need for overhead services, low existing head heights regularly pose a significant challenge to the feel of spaces. Where raising the roof is financially or structurally unviable, we concentrate on manipulating the proportions of space along with pushing ceiling heights to their practical limit. Open style ceilings such as grid mesh retain a sense of height above them whilst visually screening services above. Alternatively, we have often decided to remove ceilings completely to allow the eye to appreciate the height to the soffit above, and achieve acoustic absorption and masking of services with free hanging rafts or baffles rather than wall to wall ceilings. We have used this approach in our own Cardiff design studio which we recently converted from an old cosmetic surgery clinic which had existing low ceiling grids. The extra feeling of height the exposed soffits has given along with omitting the institutional aesthetic of the grids and exposing the structure and services has completely transformed the feel of the space.
Tight ceiling voids, exposed services and setting out of suspended rafts between equipment requires close coordination with mechanical and electrical engineers to give a neat finish and avoid clashes. We routinely model spaces in 3D drawing software, import a corresponding 3D model of M&E services and run coordination workshops moving items around live on screen together to best effect.
2 – Aesthetic goals & innovative space planning
Clients need their new buildings to reflect their mission, vision and principles and communicate their own brand identity. Existing buildings come with their own style and feel and it can require clever and careful design intervention to dovetail the two. At one end of the spectrum some of our listed property restorations such as Llanellay House or The Reader Mansion House bring the joy of historic beauty and heritage features to capitalise upon when set against newly designed contemporary insertions in the space.
At the other end of the scale, some existing buildings can pose more of an aesthetic challenge if they are seemingly without charm. We pride ourselves in the ability to bring that charm ourselves through a strong interior design vision. The outside need not dictate the internal style if it is not appropriate. In the refurbishment of Alexandra House for product design company PDR in Cardiff we transformed an ‘aesthetically challenged’ 1980s building. With limited budget the client was keen to prioritise the interior reflecting their ethos, transporting you to another dimension when you enter the scheme.
Increasingly however we find value in using a contemporary take on the strongest design language from the time the building was originally conceived. For example, we have used black crittal style internal glazed partitioning in post war building refurbishments to give a nod to the building’s era whilst maintaining a contemporary response.
Building plans with existing constraints can limit the way spaces can be used. Existing constraints can include structural columns breaking up a space, or existing window positions which limit where new partitions can be introduced. In this instance we are fans of increasing flexibility by only introducing partitions where really needed, and are advocates of a world without excess internal walls. The latest loose acoustic furniture, pods and curtains can in certain circumstances give a viable more flexible alternative for privacy and can often more easily work around existing constraints. Rethinking creatively how people could use the building in future avoids replicating past cellular environments that are ultimately outdated. Cloud based mobile technology enables more free flowing agile space that was previously possible.
In my experience, the key to the most successful repurposing projects in often in organising the new spaces to work with the original layout rather than forcing unnatural uses into the form. For example, the simple task of grading existing floor areas by daylight quality then using the best spaces in this regard to create the areas where people will spend most time is of huge value. Equally, simplifying the diagram of people movement through an old building to aid space efficiency and wayfinding often means undoing the piecemeal additions that have been introduced over time and restoring the original clarity.
The approach of simplification of people movement has been critical in redesigning the new Community Hub, reimagining the disused Debenhams department store in Carmarthen town centre. Various community uses are combined in the scheme including healthcare, council services, education and leisure. Complex wayfinding and circulation strategies were hampering the design prior to our involvement. Our solution has been to create a single wayfinding hub in the central courtyard of the scheme with access to various departments from this internal landmark point, allowing instinctive wayfinding and clear signposting. Mixed use refurbishments are becoming more prevalent in the drive to rejuvenate town centres, and empty retail units present a fantastic opportunity for a wide variety of community uses with great transport links and accessibility.
3 – Weak soffits
Where possible we advocate natural ventilation through opening windows to avoid unnecessary energy use and vent kit. However, where mechanical ventilation is required due to high occupancy numbers or specialist activities, existing soffits routinely need to support the kit suspended from them. In recent projects we have found that the poor structural performance or listed nature of the existing soffits has made this unviable. In this circumstance we work closely with mechanical and structural engineers along with cost consultants to assess the alternatives for viability and select the preferred approach. Housing kit outside the building and lacing lightweight ductwork through to internal spaces can be one approach, although often poses penetration and routing challenges. For Cardiff University’s new School Of healthcare (currently in construction) we have recently developed a solution with Aecom (MEP) & Curtins (structures) and ISG (contractors) in a post war building with weak soffits, forming internal steel skeleton frames sitting on the floor slabs to support overhead kit. The existing soffits are a rare type of hollow concrete beam and block, which has very little capacity for fixing or suspending from them. The new steel overhead steel is now painted black and the vertical posts encased in the wall linings. Once installed, acoustic rafts will visually detract from the exposed services. In this circumstance the solution fits well with the industrial aesthetic of the existing building. Whilst this has added cost to the project, the combined sustainability and cost benefits along with the faster timescales of reuse have ensured the viability of the project.
4 – Poor thermal efficiency and air tightness
As part of our sustainability and net zero agenda, often along with that of our clients, we routinely analyse options for improving the thermal efficiency and air tightness of the existing buildings we are refurbishing. For Building Regulations Part L compliance, consequential improvements are often required to demonstrate that reasonable energy performance improvements have been made. Working with cost consultants and M&E engineers we analyse the cost benefit of options including upgrade of building services, as well as championing a ‘fabric fist’ approach such as using additional internal thermal lining, external thermal upgrade, cavity fill or replacing old windows & doors. For the aforementioned School of Healthcare, the design team calculated the U value improvements, future energy savings and associated costs for each viable option. As the existing external walls had cavities that had previously been filled, the relative U value gains from internally lining the external walls in this instance was not worthwhile. Instead, replacing all of the external windows and doors was found to have a much greater impact on performance due to the poor air tightness of the existing UPVC units. this also had the added benefit of vastly improving the external appearance of the building.
For historic fabric and listed buildings, viable options are often reduced in number. In this circumstance, as well as limitations in changing the appearance or replacing windows, breathability usually becomes a key consideration in options feasibility studies. It is crucial to understand the original way the building was intended to perform and not undermine this through sealing in moisture in the quest to insulate. This can eventually degrade the fabric and cause more problems than it solves. In this circumstance, as an example, we are increasingly looking to the use of breathable thermal finishes such as insulating lime render with cork content. Happily, experience has taught us there is very rarely no viable way to improve the energy performance within the project budget.
In historic properties, working with our in house Conservation Architects, we are often required to retain or re-use finishes and fittings of heritage value. Where the project is small in scale we survey, photograph and measure these elements ourselves to incorporate into the proposed design. Where the building is large or complex in varying requirements room to room, or a fair distance away, this becomes very time consuming to survey and heavy on our carbon footprint for the travel. In this circumstance we weigh up the cost benefit to the client and environmental benefit of commissioning a Matterport 3D ‘virtual walkthrough’ building model. This has recently been completed for us on the Fulton House refurbishment project for Swansea University, and will allow the project team to check existing ceiling heights, historic features and existing finishes in each room, analysing the existing interiors virtually at our convenience. It is a powerful 3D visual tool which even allows approximate dimensions to be taken within it, and gives a fast and clear understanding of existing constraints within this listed environment. The project is at early design stages so this upfront investment will certainly pay dividends going forwards.
6 – Penetration limitations for lifts & services
A common constraint we find is limitations on the ability to create penetrations through the existing walls and floor slabs for both services and new lifts for accessibility compliance. This can be due to historic value of the building fabric, or frequently their structural limitations. The existing hollow concrete beam and block floor and roof slabs at the new School Of Healthcare for Cardiff University are interlocking, meaning individual blocks could not be removed to make penetrations without the whole structural bay needing replacement. The solution has been a combination of three approaches. Where possible we have reused existing service risers formed into the original construction and used horizontal distribution from these points. Secondly, where existing penetrations were not adequate, we have added new build vertical service risers and a lift shaft as small building extensions to avoid punching through existing slabs. Where we required local air intake and extract for ventilation, the height was not available to add in separate louvre openings above the first floor windows with requirements for structural support of the roof edge. Windows are being replaced for improved thermal performance and air tightness, so our third approach was to raise the lintels on the existing window openings to house new ventilation louvres in the top of the window openings. Whilst many internal soffits will be exposed with acoustic rafts, perimeter plasterboard bulkheads will house vent services against the louvres internally where they occur.
The list is much longer than these six subjects, and there is much more to discuss for each than is covered here! However, tackling whatever quirks and challenges existing buildings present, we stand by the belief that the key skills to identifying the correct solutions and successfully implementing them are creativity, pragmatism, design flexibility, strong communication and above all proactive design team coordination.
Please get in touch for further information or to discuss how we can support your refurbishment projects. Kate.thomas@austinsmithlord.com
UKREiiF 2023: Thoughts from Eleanor Kemp, Part 2 Architectural Assistant
By Eleanor Kemp, Austin-Smith:Lord
Attending UKReiif in Leeds has been an extremely positive experience as I have been able to connect with a variety of people from different roles. Through these discussions I have been able to learn about how we can utilise collective knowledge and experience to enhance life and environments by design.
The healthy cities to healthy economies panel highlighted that there is critical infrastructure that we need to be delivering in order to support national wellbeing and place making. The panel made reference to the ‘Fair Society, Healthy Lives’ Michael Marmot report, which states that amongst other issues, improvements to life expectancy have stalled and declined for women in the most deprived 10% of areas.
Whilst considering these figures it is undeniable that healthcare and wellbeing is struggling. However it is the panel’s belief that we can begin to address the inequalities face on to develop healthy and sustainable communities.
To develop sustainable communities the panel suggested investing in existing housing stock i.e. retrofitting to help improve internal air quality by filtering incoming air and tackling damp.
In addition to panel discussions night-time events had been staged around the city centre to allow people to learn and network. I was able to attend a Women in Architecture event at Buro Happold in which a lively debate on building gender parity occurred. The discussions included commentary on how we can create an inclusive environment for all at industry events.
As a Part 2 Architectural Assistant I have felt very fortunate that I have been able to attend UKReiiF. I have been able to absorb vital information about how we develop and work together to improve current practices. I look forward to advancing the knowledge acquired and connections made.
Carmarthen Hwb – pioneering high street regeneration through community services
By Rob Firman – Arts, Culture + Heritage Sector Lead, Austin-Smith:Lord
Following our commission to design the adaptation of the redundant British Home Stores building in central Swansea to create a new Community Hub for Swansea Council in spring 2021 Austin-Smith:Lord is delighted to have been appointed in the autumn of 2022 by Bouygues UK to develop design proposals for the adaptation and re-purposing of the redundant Debenhams department store building in the centre of Carmarthen into a new Hwb facility.
Existing Debenhams frontage to St Catherine’s Walk Shopping Mall in central Carmarthen
We are thrilled and excited to be involved in these two paradigm shifting projects, creating a new building typology and enabling redundant buildings to serve their community in innovative and engaging new ways. Whilst quite different in their respective content, there is commonality of ambition and imagination in taking these empty buildings in a very different direction from their original purpose. They will attract and generate and sustain visitor footfall into the central retail area of their host towns for the benefit and enjoyment of the local community and wider regional population.
Carmarthen Hwb will contain facilities for Hywel Dda University Health Board, Carmarthenshire Museum Service, University of Wales Trinity St David and Carmarthenshire County Council Leisure and Advice Services, the new Hwb will be a significant destination within the town, providing essential community services.
The ground floor will be dedicated to health and well-being with a major clinic and healthcare centre working with a 24 hour Gym operated by the Council’s Leisure Services team and the Council’s Advice Hwb providing client facing Council services.
The first floor will feature a publicly accessible Carmarthenshire Museum collection store, workshops and group activity rooms for community engagement. In addition, it will offer spaces for training and conference that will be operated by the University of Wales Trinity Saint David.
Existing ground floor emptied of retail activity is a vast ‘empty canvas’ for new activities and uses to occupy
The Museum Collection Store project adds to our current portfolio of buildings for museum stores and archives that also includes the West Glamorgan Archive and South Wales Miners’ Library at Swansea and the new Storehouse for the V&A Museum in East London. All 3 projects will be opening in 2024.
Our design concept for the repurposing of the Carmarthen Debenhams store is predicated on the creation of a new meeting place in the town centre, a one-stop destination for health, well-being and education. Visitors will enter into a space that will shift the perception of civic and institutional buildings. Arriving into a generous foyer/welcome-space designed to facilitate intuitive navigation through the building to destination spaces and activities all sense of the building being a retail space will be dispelled.
The Health Board clinics, community well-being services and the gymnasium and associated studios are arranged around a central atrium with entries into the clinical spaces identified by signage and public art specially commissioned for the space animating the surfaces. Visitors to the first floor will arrive at a second central orientation space from which all occupants of this floor will be visible.
The Museum Collection space will include storage for a significant proportion of the Carmarthenshire County Collection as well as objects, art and artefacts from the national collection held by Amgueddfa Cymru | National Museum Wales. It has been designed to Government Indemnity Standards.
Visitors will be able to experience the collections on guided tours through the store room and participate in activities in a purpose designed workshop and activity space.
Proposed reception and Main Entrance/Welcome Space
Proposed central atrium orientation space
UWTSD will provide training to students in collaboration with the Health Board and intends to host conferences as well as training to widen still further the range of visitors using the building.
This apparently eclectic group of stakeholders have grasped the opportunity the building and location offers them and are already collaborating to devise new ways of working with each other for the benefit of all visitors to the building. Spaces throughout the building will host co-curated activities, exhibitions and other events, including outside of normal working hours, and people of all ages will be encouraged to avail themselves of the opportunities these events offer for lifelong learning and well-being.
Currently in the detailed design stage, the project will commence construction in the summer of 2023 and be completed in late 2024.
By Catherine Cosgrove, Sustainability Lead, Austin-Smith:Lord
To meet net zero emissions targets we will have to retrofit our existing buildings. But our built environment has developed over centuries, using many different materials and constructions. Retrofitting heritage buildings using modern materials can sometimes lead to unexpected and damaging consequences. Before we start to make any changes to our buildings, we need to understand more about how they perform.
Building constructions evolved over centuries to take advantage of the properties of the materials available. Construction methods using stone, slate, timber and plaster became increasing sophisticated through the 18th and 19th centuries. The constructions and materials used serving more than one purpose. As well as keeping the weather out, they helped to control the indoor environment through moisture management and ventilation. They rely on the properties of the construction materials to move moisture through walls, floors or roofs. Key elements include lime mortars, plasters and harling, rubble cores in external walls and “penny gaps” between roof sarking boards.
Through the 20th century the use of cement, steel, ready mixed mortars and plasters, mass produced bricks and roof tiles significantly changed the speed and consistency of construction. Construction methods and detailing changed to accommodate their different physical properties. Volume house building today uses off-site fabricated timber wall, floor and roof panels, sometimes pre-insulated, with plastic air-tightness membranes used to seal up any routes for draughts. These constructions take a different approach to moisture movement, preventing it through the separation of elements with ventilated and drained cavities, the use of plastic vapour barriers and by using mechanical ventilation to remove any condensation trapped inside the building.
Dampness at base of wall causing mould growth
Internal finishes damage due to moisture trapped in wall
Traditional heritage constructions use materials that wick water away from the source using capillary action, suction and diffusion. The rate and direction of moisture movement can change due to weather conditions, pressures, heat sources and ventilation rates, all of which vary through the seasons of the year. In heritage buildings external walls tend to have reached a moisture equilibrium state, where they can cope with absorbing a certain amount of water regularly as long as they have the capacity to dry out. They can be significantly affected if they are exposed to more water ingress. While identifying gutter and rainwater pipe leaks are relatively simple, finding leaks in roofs and external walls is much harder. The material properties of these constructions can move water away from the source of any water ingress, making it difficult to find any underlying problem.
It is important to make sure that all sources of moisture ingress are repaired before starting retrofit works because of the potential long term damage that they can cause. These can have health implications for the building users as well as affecting the structure. Problems caused by water ingress can include wet rot, mould, algae and the leeching of salts through masonry. If you know where to look for problems then they can easily be repaired before causing significant damage. Common sources of water ingress include: blocked gutters; gutter leaks at joints; a build-up of ground levels or the use of hard landscaping at the base of the wall that direct rainwater into the wall; pointing repairs using a cement mortar rather than a lime mix, which traps moisture in the stones rather than allowing it to wick out through the joints; and using a cement-based render finish, which prevents moisture from being wicked away from the outside face of the wall.
Internal dampness caused by chimney leaks
Dampness in wall affecting internal finishes
By adding modern materials to heritage buildings as part of retrofit works there is the potential to block the moisture management process, trapping moisture in a place where it can’t dry out and will eventually damage the building fabric. Two key steps to avoid this are to make sure that the retrofit materials are vapour open, e.g. using natural insulations, and that the constructions are in a good state of repair using materials and methods in keeping with the original construction.
For more information on this subject Historic Environment Scotland provide several publications: Technical Paper 37 Moisture properties of Scottish masonry materials; Technical Paper 15 Assessing risks in insulation retrofits using hygrothermal software tools; and Inform Guides on how to identify and repair dampness in buildings. The Under One Roof website (https://underoneroof.scot/) and Edinburgh World Heritage’s publication “Guide to Building Maintenance in a Changing Climate” are also useful guides to dampness problems and how they can be repaired.
This blog was first published in the RIAS Quarterly, January 2022.
When did you join Austin-Smith:Lord?
Originally 2016-18. Rejoined 2019.
What is your role within our Creative Collective?
Associate Senior Interior Designer.
What are you working on at the moment?
Rougemont School, Fairwater Campus, University of Exeter Wellbeing Centre, Fitzalan High School.
What inspires you most in your work?
People!! Chatting with people, sharing around ideas, seeing how people work/behave within a space – those are the things that inspire me in my work.
What lessons have you learned in your work?
The biggest lesson I have learned in my work is that without collaboration, this job is nearly impossible! During lockdown when we weren’t able to share ideas and knowledge as easily as we could before, the role of designer became incredibly challenging, so it has made me forever grateful of the collaborative culture within Austin-Smith:Lord.
Which designers / projects do you most admire and why?
Morag Myerscough – her work always just feels so joyful and inspires me to have more freedom as a designer.
What are the key issues facing our design professions in the 2020s?
How do we design buildings to adapt at the same rate as our behaviour? This encompasses how we act sustainably as well as how we behave socially and culturally. It’s our responsibility as designers to design buildings that are fit for the future, but how do we design for the unknown?
What fictional place would you like to visit?
The Gatsby Mansion – I would have loved to have been around for the roaring 20s!
What’s the best advice you’ve ever heard?
Just do it…what’s the worst that could happen?
Complete the following – “I couldn’t get through the week without……..”
Crisps.
What is your role within our Creative Collective?
Architect.
What are you working on at the moment?
Life Sciences Innovation Centre in Inverness, and Ayrshire Hospice.
What inspires you most in your work?
The aspiration of making a fine public building for clients.
What lessons have you learned in your work?
Communication is key in both verbal and drawing format.
Which designers / projects do you most admire and why?
Renzo Piano, because his buildings speak to their surrounding in a humble but elegant way.
What is your favourite Austin-Smith:Lord project and why?
The restoration and refurbishment of Anchor Line. The building is absolutely stunning from the outside, and the refurbished interior further compliments the experience of dining in the restaurant on the ground floor.
What are the key issues facing our design professions in the 2020s?
The challenge to convince clients that retrofit is the new way to go for combating climate emergency, instead of a knock-down-and-build strategy. Many including Architects’ Journal are campaigning for retrofit, and it’s slowly gearing up across all professions in the construction industry.
What’s something you’re planning on doing in the next year that you’ve never done?
Explore North America and visit major cities like New York, Toronto, Los Angeles…
What’s the best advice you’ve ever heard?
See the world before you design the world.
Complete the following – “I couldn’t get through the week without……..”
Social media.
When did you join Austin-Smith:Lord?
September 2018.
What is your role within our Creative Collective?
Head of Conservation.
What are you working on at the moment?
Old College Aberystwyth, Coliseum Theatre, Caerphilly Castle, Woodchester Convent, Bexhill Town Hall, Newport Transporter Bridge.
Which designers / projects do you most admire and why?
Carlo Scarpa. His understanding of history, space, materiality and technique created buildings that are timeless.
What is your favourite place / building / landscape and why?
My favourite places seem to change depending on what place or site I have visited most recently! But the two experiences that have stayed with me are coming over the bridge and seeing Hampton Court Palace for the first time, and seeing the Louvre from the Carrousel. Both are instantly identifiable and the Lescot Wing at the Louvre in particular was incredibly influential on later French architecture.
What is your favourite Austin-Smith:Lord project and why?
The Great Pagoda at Kew. It was such a well-researched and executed project, it’s hard not to admire the work that went into it which shows in the end result.
Which of Austin-Smith:Lord’s guiding principles do you most relate to, and why?
Knowledge sharing and life-long learning. We constantly strive to learn which benefits us as individuals and as a practice, and the clients and communities we work with. Knowledge sharing allows us to learn from each other, find better ways of doing things and I believe it fosters strong relationships.
Which fictional place would you like to visit?
I think Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory would be a great day out.
What’s something you’re planning on doing in the next year that you’ve never done?
Buying a house I hope. I’ve always put it off but I’m finally content to say I am where I want to be.
Complete the following – “I couldn’t get through the week without…”
My family. My nephews in particular allow me to be scruffy, silly and forget the serious stuff we all have to deal with in life.
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