JACKCASE

PORTFOLIO

2015

CONTENTS

British Library Digital Collections Archive

The London Riots of 2011 and the Production of

Urban Space

The Ping Pong Pavillion, Oxford

Heygate Cinema, London

Une Nuit Sans Opera, Aix

Oak Frame, Stroud

DVD Bang, Birmingham

British Library Digital Collections Archive2012 - Third Year University Project

The Brief for this project was to create an complementary, ancillary space to the existing British Library providing access to it’s digital archives. The site was located in an area with amongst the poorest green space provision in europe. A priority from the start was to engage with the relationship between inside and out, creating a seamless journey between the two that could provide a seasonally sensitive place for contemplation and study. The design of the space would, I hoped, act as a counterpoint to the synthetic and digital nature of the collection. The design was also to develop some themes explored in the existing British Library building.

The site for the project is located less than a mile South East of the existing Library facility. As you might assume given its location, the history of the site is a multi layered and palimpsest story; The fleet river buried beneath a site that has also hosted a scrap metal yard, a prison, a burial ground, a bombsite and a station on the little known ‘mail rail’ network. My strategy is to make small interventions in the fabric of the site, but generally to leave the textures and topography untouched so that the history can be read.

Site Analysis

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1. Building spills onto animated open plaza.2. Cafe space bleeds into public realm.3. Building looks inwards, with a focused and calm interior.4. The library forms an elevated ‘slab’, rising above the plaza.5. Raised building takes advantantage of the site topography.6. Courtyard provides green space and allows sunlight to penetrate deep inside the building.

Site Views/ Design Strategy / E-book Reader

The space was designed through an iterative process, drawing and redrawing the plan, until I felt I had accommodated all programmatic requirements within a space that was able to be continuous yet contain within it distinct individuated spaces. I had from an early stage conceived of the space as an inward looking slab, raised above its context. The courtyard quickly became an important feature of the space, enabling an intimate connection between the user of the library and a seasonal outside. To this end a large proportion of the desk space was to be oriented surrounding these planted areas.

Iterative Design Process

Iterative Design Process / Skethcbook Excerpts

Spatial individuation / Precedent studies

Desks oriented surrounding ‘Quod’

Sky visible from desks

Connection with growth

Continuous, sloping space

Variable floor/ceiling relationship

Tree rises to fill court-yard

Skylights vary quality of space

Floor heigh aug-mented

Internal Auditorium Corridor Overlooks seating area

Spacious multi level work area

Tapered facade reveals views

Structural Core for circulation

Calm, contemplative corner

Grand escalator ascent

Brick Samples 1:1 / Design Process extracts / Sketch Models

1. Prototyping Bricks 1:12. Atmospheric sample shot of plans reflected in facade3. Testing workspace proportions4. Sketch of spaces coming together5. Wrapping spaces in a coherent, contemporary facade6. Sketch models;

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i. Spaces are pinched and warped, with holes cut for courtyards.ii. The shapes are honed more clearly defined.iii. An internal ‘landscape’ is revealed, providing different zones within one continuous space.

First Floor Plan

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Social Inhabitation

Planting Strategy

Material Qualities

Sections

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1. Lower Facade connection detail2. Facade Mounting System perspective.3. Bricks built up conventionally to interface with surrounding traditionally constructed brick walls.4. Exploded view showing double skin and mounting detail.

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Construction Details

Cherry Blossom / Spring Elevation

Sattelite View

Street View

This piece of work was

written over the winter

following the London

Riots. It charts the genesis

of Neoliberal ideology,

looks at examples of its

translation into urban form,

speculates on some of the

social consequences of

this experiment and posits

ways forward. Winner of

the Riach prize for best

Architectural Dissertation.

In January 2012 I was part of a small team that came first in a competition to design a ‘Playful Pavilion’ at Oxford Brookes University. The competition asked for an interactive and playful installation to feature in the School of Architecture Oxford end of year show on the 25th May, The RIBA’s Love Architecture Festival and the London Festival of Architecture from 23rd June to 6th July. As a response to the LFA’s 2012 theme ‘Playful City’ and a critique of the professional and corporate aspects of the London Olympic Games that were to take place later in the year. The entries were encouraged to engage the public in examining spaces for sport.

The game was Rundlauf or ‘Around the World’. Ping pong for 4 or more players; the space space can host over twenty players in one game, surrounded by screens with different spatial consequences. A screen to hold 50 paddles, to depict the rules, to hang a game bell. Social space was designed into the areas created by the arrangement of the screens, with benches and tiered seating to view the play.

The competition entry we submitted was created through a process of testing- playing the game together and arranging the furniture around us until we had found a spatial configuration we found conducive to an intensely social and unpredictable play experience.

The Pavillion was constructed by ourselves in collaboration with students from Montana State, who were visiting as part of an international summer school. The construction took 10 exhausting days, and involved two redesigns and and drawing up many of the construction details required. With the exception of one of the workshop technicians and one of the Montana students, nobody involved had ever previously built anything on this scale and the experience was a steep learning curve.

The Pavillion was located on a site next to the Design Studios at Oxford Brookes for three months, then relocating to the ‘Industrius’ site in Canning Town, London, in time for the Olympics.

The Heygate Cinema was a project I designed in a largely abandoned section of the Heygate Estate, near Elephant and Castle, South London. The project was based on the idea of inhabiting a space that was being deliberately run down by the council in order to pave the way for a huge ‘redevelopment’, which amounted to a conversion of social council housing into luxury, private flats.

The Cinema was chosen as a typology because it is a destination, easily understood and can support an open and diverse programme of events. The site was specifically chosen as it was close enough to one of the few remaining occupied flats on the estate, so we could run power from there and use the toilets during events. The design was based around some scaffold boards and OSB sheets that had been found in the run up to the build.

HEYGATECINEMA

Final planning meeting before demolition

Residents protest evictions

Tenants Displacement Map

The site before construction

Cinema Construction meeting

In total. about £100 was spent on the construction of the cinema, which was reimbursed to those that had spent money during the build. This money went on screws and a few replacement tools for when things broke. The construction team was drawn from friends of mine working alongside some of the remaining residents of the estate and local housing campaigners.

The build took under a week and, given the antagonistic nature of the project, was constructed without permission or knowledge of the council or other authorities beyond an informal discussion with some firemen about potential hazards and solutions. As we got closer to the deadline we began to work long into the nights.

The opening night was a screening featuring a selection of resident and activist films, followed by a Q+A. The event sought to contextualise the contemporary situation on the estate and provided an opportunity for different local groups to meet one another.

For about a month the cinema hosted screenings and events. The most fitting was a screening of ‘Wolfen’, a crime thriller investigating the mysterious murders of high profile buisinessmen, politicians and property developers in early eighties New York. It transpires that the murders are carried out bu a group of feral ‘Wolfen’ whose very existence is threatened by the gentrification of the city.

After the first few events the council deemed the cinema to be an ‘unauthorised structure’ and ordered its removal. An event was schedduled for later that week and it was decided that the cinema be dismantled and re-erected on the night of the screening, as a way to outmanouvre the demolition. This process was repeated on two occasions before the onset of winter.

For a while we had created a functioning events space within a previously unused space in central london. The site is now rubble, and over the course of the next five years will see the construction of a huge luxury development.

Following the completion of a Level 2 diploma in Carpentry and Joinery, I worked for a summer on the construction of an Oak Frame, built using traditional techniques. The joints were cut by hand, and held together without glue, screws or bolts. Instead, the frame is held together using the strength of the wood itself. I worked assisting an Oak Framer called Mark Creasey.

CONSTRUCTION PROJECT, 2013

OAK FRAME,STROUD

Most of the work consisted of hand-cutting joints in the workshop, and one of the biggest challenges was manoeuvring the logs into workable positions, and then into storage. Most joints were a variation on the Mortice and Tenon, although the variation, as illustrated on the opposite page, dictated by the requirements of the frame’s different elements, is striking.

a) Checking assembled frame on the workshop floor. b) ‘laying up’ to mark out for joint cutting. c) Shouldered Mortise and Tenon detail. d) Pegged joint on site. e) Inside corner of floor beams. f ) Assembled outside corner. g) Pegging the frame atop scaffolding. h) Preparing to raise a Rafter. i) The last joint goes together.

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Une Nuit Sans Opera is an event that t akes place annual ly in the garden of painter Paul Cezanne in the South of France.

The event is composed as a ser ies of interd iscipl inar y col laborat ions, and st aged as a counter point to the Fest ival of Opera in Aix.

Alongside 5 other s t udents , I was inv ited in 2011 to par t icipate in the design and const r uct ion of a bar and bel ltower for the event , which was a ser ies of per for mances based a round the Opera ‘La Traviata’.

UNE NUIT SANS OPERA 3,AIX-EN-PROVANCE

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1. Drawings showing extent of bar and bel ltower.2. Detai ls and completed st r uct u re.3. Montage of tower erect ion.4. Tower seen f rom event ent rance.5.Montage showing relat ionsh ip between the two objects.6. Photog raphs f rom the opening n ight .4.

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DVDBANG is a not-for-profit project

based on the South Korean movie

rental shop and micro cinema.

DVD-bangs are South Korean

entertainment spaces where you can

enjoy a film of your choice in a private

movie room with your friends and

snacks. The spaces are open 24 hours

a day.

Alongside another young architect,

Jack Hardy, I have been involved

in developing the aesthetic of the

project from the start . I designed and

managed the construction of the first

iteration of this project, during the

2014 Flatpack Festival in Birmingham

for 10 days. DVDBANG has since

been relocated at two London film

festivals and is currently seeking a

permanent home.

It was important for us to create

somewhere intimate, social and

memorable, which could make sense

both day and night.

Our site was an empty shopfront in

the Custard Factory on the Eastside

of Birmingham. We essentially

divided the space into two: The front

area near the window was used for

congregating, selecting DVD’s and

hanging out while the area further

back was used to house the ‘bang’, or

room, itself.

The room was constructed by

hanging blackout fabric beween two

sets of racking, one used to hold

the screen and the other containing

an elevated tier of seating, with the

projector and speakers above.

In the social, public areas, emphasis

was placed on texture, lighting

and the juxtaposition of spaces. It

was built by 4 people over a long

weekend on a tight budget.

I designed and built this shelving system to

house DVDs, snacks and drinks. The shelves

can ‘hook’ on in a variety of configurations.

1/8. Closing night of Birmingham

DVDBANG as part of Flatpack

festival.

2/6. Opening night of London

DVDBANG ‘FUTURES’ event

3. Inside of the Birmingham bang

before a screening.

4. Lightbox hosting a game of ‘GO’,

the ancient Korean boardgame.

5. Bespoke neon sign.

7. A visitor enjoys warm Korean

noodles before heading in to the

bang.

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1/8. Closing night of Birmingham

DVDBANG as part of Flatpack

festival.

2/6. Opening night of London

DVDBANG ‘FUTURES’ event

3. Inside of the Birmingham bang

before a screening.

4. Lightbox hosting a game of ‘GO’,

the ancient Korean boardgame.

5. Bespoke neon sign.

7. A visitor enjoys warm Korean

noodles before heading in to the

bang.

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