Continuity in Architecture

A studio for the design of new buildings and public spaces in the historic city, interventions in existing structures and the advancement of knowledge in building repair and conservation. We use two sites each year, one at home and one abroad. Contacts are made with architectural practices working in both locations and accompanied visits and lectures form part of the study tour. Studio teaching is supported by a lecture course exploring theoretical and practical approaches to intervention in existing structures and urban fabric.

The main source of our architecture is the place itself. We reflect upon the persistence, usefulness and emotional resonance of particular places and structures. Historical solutions to architectural problems - cases that have emerged in real situations – offer a rich context for teaching, learning and research. Extant examples of city pattern, use of materials and architectural form provide a starting point for our studies.

We are interested in the qualities of places that have persisted and we prefer a reading of history that stresses the permanence of tradition as the subject of architecture. Tradition in architecture in this context is the embodied meaning of buildings and cities produced by centuries of lived experience. Embodied meaning can be interpreted through building. Discovery and recognition are a vital part of the design process - we presume that we have a duty to carefully analyze and describe a place before we can alter it. Can the legibility of architecture be increased through the establishment of continuity with history?

The architect brings order to the world through building. The artistic and scientific tools of the architect are brought into contact with the site and architecture emerges through a process of negotiation with physical context and lived experience. In this context typology (defined as a system of typical solutions to architectural problems) is enriched by coexistence and accommodation with the existing urban fabric. The importance of the retention and sustenance of existing structures leads us to study building conservation, repair, and the detail of connections between new and old.

Building during any period of history represents a significant commitment of human, material and financial resources. The most successful cities have adapted urban patterns and buildings to uses never imagined by their original creators. We are inspired by the efforts of architects working within existing structures and urban fabric to produce a responsive architecture of narrative, space, intervention, and detail. We aim to show, through the example of architects engaged in critical practice, that the ideas and methods we examine in the studio have real and profitable applications.

Studio Programmes

This year

Bachelor of Architecture: Like a Walnut in an Enormous.....

Discovery and Recognition

Fleetwood Renaissance

Urban Ideals and Deformations

Last Year

Bachelor of Architecture: The Persistent Context

Year 5 & 6 project

The year before

Bachelor of Architecture Programme 2003-2004 Events Session 1. Blackburn Cathedral Visit, September. Guest speaker: James Sanderson. Dublin visit, December. Guest speakers: James Howley (Howley & Harrington Architects), Ian Lumley. Visit to Aldborough House. Lectures: RE-READINGS: A series of lectures about reusing buildings. Lecturer: Graeme Brooker.Thursdays 11.00-12.30 Lecture Room 303 Chatham Building.

B.A. Programme Year 3 2003-2004: 1 2 3 4 5

The year before that

Bachelor of Architecture Programme 2002-2003 Events Session 1. Barcelona/Sant Sadurni d'Anoia November 2002. Guest speakers: Joan Guibernau Zabala (Ferrater Studio), Antonio Sanmartin G. de Azcon. Cvs available on request. Reception meal, site visit and tour of cavas, Sant Sadurni. Preston Found. Events Session 2 RE-READINGS: A series of lectures about reusing buildings. Lecturer: Graeme Brooker. Fridays 12.30-13.30 Lecture Room 303 Chatham Building. Schedule: 14 February 'Symbiosis & Containment' (Muncheberg Public Library, Germany). 21 February 'Suspension & Separation' (Najera monastery, Spain). 28 February 'Architecture as Palimpsest' (Barn Museum, Hamar, Norway). 7 March 'Sequence & Threshold' (Galeria Nazionale, Parma, Italy). 21 March 'Intervening with History' (Canova Sculpture Gallery, Castelvecchio, Brion...). 28 March 'Datascape' (Villa VPRO, Hilversum). 4 April 'Dialectics & Space' (Art Gallery, Bregenz) 6,7,10 March Studio Reviews. Visiting critic: Manel Bermudo Pla

B.A. Programme Year 3 Session 1 2002-2003: visit2 visit3 Interplanetary Tectonic Communicate

B.A. Programme Year 2 Session 2 2002-2003: Propylaeum Datum Balkon Centro

Earlier

Bachelor of Architecture: Remember, reveal, construct.

Some years ago

BA Programme Semester 1 2000-2001: Pastoral & counter-pastoral: an industrial building in the country

BA Programme Semester 2 2001: The Spoon is like the City

Bachelor of Architecture Programme 2000-2001: Harvard Square cannot yet be faxed

Even further back