After many years, and several dozen projects, last year we have finally succumbed to delivering an entirely new build project. Having boldly stated at the founding of our practice that we would work so hard to avoid this, some form of justification feels needed! If nothing else, to demonstrate that this did not happen lightly, and to reflect upon the subsequently opportunities it presented.
In 2019, we were invited by English Heritage to consider a new ticketing kiosk for Old Wardour Castle- and incredible 16th century ruin set within deepest Wiltshire. In stark contrast to the centuries old ruined castle, existing facilities at the visitor destination measured more in the decades, yet were almost as ruinous. A number of off-the-shelf wooden huts had agglomerated as visitor needs grew at the site, leading to a form of small shanty town- clinging to the edge of this breathtaking site yet with no real connection to it. With no infrastructure or substructure, the sheds had begun to dampen, to rot, and to subside. Direct electric heaters provided a modicum of heat within the draughty, uninsulated interiors. In this rare instance, and after more than reasonable consideration, we concluded there was very little to work with. We would have to agree with the client that a new building would be needed, and it was here that things started to get interesting.
What became immediately clear was that building from new is comparably easy. No matter how regularly we do it, working with the existing- or ‘Building on the Built’ as an emerging enclave now terms our shared approach- is rarely without surprise, or curve ball, or the downright esoteric. As almost all architects will surely attest to, it is not an easy way to build. To have such control over so many aspects of the detail, without the sleepless nights of half brick thick walls where you had anticipated brick and a half, or one hundred mm deep footings where you had hoped for five hundred is so incredibly liberating. Our challenge was therefore to maintain a rate of interrogation, to continue to sweat the details, to drive for an architecture stitched into its context; just in the absence of that most intimate context within which we more typically work.
Building from new is a privilege. It is an opportunity to reflect upon- and distill a sense of place. It is a chance to form new relationships with- and enrich- context; to add wholly contemporary layers of architecture and thereby draw forgotten places into our sense of modern relevance and guardianship. It is an opportunity to engage with, and add generosity to the public realm. Perhaps in a time when this has never felt so pressing. Finally, it is a time for sincere ambition around ever pressing issues of embodied and operational carbon.
In our first fully new build project, albeit one with a GIA of 54 square meters, we have sought to speak to all of these challenges, and more. This is a building that recognizes its layers of lifecycles. It can be maintained, it can be repaired, it can be overhauled. It dresses for the occasion, yet is honest in its tectonic. It is legible in its construction. Hopefully it is a gift for future generations of architect to work with. Without the risk of those esoteric details, or sleepless nights. With the boot on the other foot for once, we have duly learnt to consider those who come after us.
Ferg.