Journal

We’re off to the World Architecture Festival this week where James will be speaking on the main stage as part of the INSIDE programme chaired by Nigel Coates. Our talk – ‘Broken Engagements’ explores our work designing with and for people and discusses how to invite genuine candour to shape places that are not only useful, but colourful, joyful, and compassionate.

We were delighted to receive a copy of the newly published Beyond Walls book which features the interiors of the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services unit we designed in Edinburgh. Beyond Walls profiles the many art and therapeutic design projects curated and produced by @Ginkgoprojects for the new Royal Hospital for Children and Young People and Department of Clinical Neurosciences in Edinburgh.

We’ve just completed a week long residency at Accurx where we enjoyed many delicious lunches in the communal dining room. By embedding ourselves within the team and working from the first phase of the office that we designed earlier on this year, we were able to experience first hand how spaces are currently being used and help support the company culture. We also conducted drop in sessions, structured conversations and carried out occupancy surveys to help refine the brief for phase 2.

We kicked off our project for Chelmsford City Council on Saturday, gathering insights and ideas on what local people would like to see and do in the city’s Market Square.

Last month we hosted an event with Nine Elms London for the London Design Festival which explored the past and future of Nine Elms. Siddy Holloway gave a fascinating history of the railway infrastructure of the area while St Mary’s Primary School spoke about engaging school children through art and design. We discussed how both have been brought together in our designs for Arch 42. Delicious food was supplied by Waste Not Want Not Battersea.

We’ve been selected for the Archiboo / UPP 2022 Architect Pitch. As one of seven shortlisted practices, we will be pitching our ideas for communal student living to a panel of judges on May the 18th 2022.

Projects Office co-founder, James Christian, will be a judge for the 2022 Design Week Awards.

We contributed an extended article to the latest issue of the Design In Mental Health Network Journal, exploring our user centred collaborative design process for Edinburgh’s new CAMHS facility. Click the heading for a link to the full article.

The first phase of the workplace campus we are designing for accuRx is on site and due for completion next month. The software company who are revolutionising the way in which healthcare providers and patients communicate, have expanded rapidly over the last two years – outgrowing the offices we designed for them in 2019. The campus, located near Liverpool Street Station, will be formed from a series of former industrial buildings re-purposed to provide state of the art facilities for the team. 

We spoke to Design Week about workplace design post-covid and the importance of working together in the same space. Click the heading above for a link to the article.

We are delighted that our design for the new child and adolescent mental health services unit at Edinburgh’s Royal Hospital for Children and Young People has been shortlisted in the 2021 Dezeen Awards.

We’re very happy to learn that our CAMHS Edinburgh project has been longlisted for the Dezeen awards in the leisure and wellness interior category. The shortlist will be unveiled in September.

Projects Office director, James Christian spoke to Frame Magazine about the power of design inspired by dialogue, the creative navigation of health codes and the hidden dangers of the domestic. Click the heading above for a link to the article.

Our young people’s mental health unit in Edinburgh has been reviewed in Wallpaper* where it is described as “A design led by functionality, light and colourful architecture that encourages a sense of security and healing.” Click the heading above for a link to the article.

We’re delighted to kick off this year’s London Festival of Architecture 30 Objects in 30 Days. Our object of ‘Care’ is The Table – a critical piece of social infrastructure that gives meaning to architecture. Click the heading above for a link to the film.

We are delighted to have been selected as the winners of the Arch 42 Gateways competition, organised by the London Festival of Architecture and Wandsworth Council. We are looking forward to developing the scheme in collaboration with the local community to create a bold new landmark that unites the Nine Elms regeneration area with New Covent Garden Market and the established residential areas.

Public voting is open for our scheme and the other five shortlisted entries on the London Festival of Architecture website.

We’re delighted to have made the shortlist for the Arch 42 competition in London’s Nine Elms regeneration area. Organised by the the London Festival of Architecture, the competition sought proposals to rejuvenate a long abandoned railway arch that will soon become part of the main route connecting the American Embassy and residential area to the new Nine Elms Underground station. Our proposal and those of the five other shortlisted teams will be unveiled towards the end of November.

Many children visiting hospital have autism or additional needs. We were commissioned by CW+ Charity to design mobile sensory trolleys for use in clinical environments Chelsea and Westminster Hospital that can otherwise be distressing for children – such as recovery rooms. The trolleys provide sensory equipment such as infinity tunnels and fibre optic cables in a safe, compact and easily transportable unit.

As we judder out of lockdown into a new gear, many individuals and employers are making decisions about how – and if – they should return to work.

But answers to this question don’t just reflect approaches to health and safety, economics or even the climate emergency. It’s an indicator of how employers think about equality.

Drawing on experience designing out-of-the-ordinary landscapes, joyful clinical environments for young people and offices for tech start-ups, we see this moment as an opportunity for companies to build new ecosystems of flexible, non-desk-based workspaces, designed to promote collaboration, good mental health and equal opportunities.

Projects Office is delighted to have been selected for the Southwark Council architectural services framework. We’ve been appointed to the commercial and industrial category, one of seven lots for new public sector projects across the borough. The framework is administered by procurement specialist LHC and is accessible to any contracting authority in London.

The Architects Journal has interviewed Megan about how the pandemic has affected the work she’s been doing with Public Practice and the London Borough of Newham. She discusses her work leading a strategic masterplan scoping project for Beckton and North Woolwich as well as a recent switch to helping the council distribute food parcels to isolated residents.

We’re delighted to have been selected to feature in the Architecture Foundation’s upcoming book, New Architects 4. This major new publication surveys the best British architectural practices established in the past ten years – we’re in good company.

Projects Office are delighted to be part of Dalston Architecture Collective – a network of architecture and design practices based in east London. The DAC practices are currently offering free 45 minute online consultations.

We proposed to transform an unloved underpass in the London Borough of Waltham Forest into a ‘Bridge Below’ featuring decorative towers co-designed with local residents, to create a cheerful, safe and well-lit route across a railway line.

Our extension to a 1930s semi-detached house near Victoria Park in east London has been approved. The project opens up a constricted kitchen and dining room to create an open plan, top-lit living space.

Our entry into the Turner Contemporary gallery’s Pioneering Places competition has been shortlisted. The proposal, a whimsical on-shore wind farm, is designed to celebrate the weather, reference Ramsgate’s nautical heritage, and offer shelter from the storm.

The Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services unit we designed for the new Royal Hospital for Sick Children (RHSC) in Edinburgh is finished! We won the competition in 2015 and undertook in-depth user consultations before designing a suite of unconventional healing spaces.

Our extension to a detached house in Yorkshire’s Nidderdale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty has recently secured planning permission. The design will replace a small conservatory to create new living spaces across the rear and side of a family house, providing a spacious kitchen and snug, and making the most of the impressive views across the valley.

It’s moving day for accuRx, who are leaving their very cramped premises to take possession of the offices we just completed in Haggerston. The fast-growing healthcare start-up briefed us to design a space which accommodated flexible working and events.