Grow Places

GP 20: Truman Brewery 03: Enhancing Heritage and Cultural Places: with Chris Dyson Architects

• Grow Places • Season 1 • Episode 20

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Ever wondered how historic buildings can maintain their charm while adapting to modern needs? 

Join us as we chat with architects Chris Dyson and Mathew Witts of Chris Dyson Architects about the remarkable transformation of the Truman Brewery's Listed old Boiler House "Block O". Originally a stable block from 1800's, this space has been reimagined to serve as a flexible, functional exhibition venue that continues to be a vibrant part of Brick Lane in East London. We dive into the building's unique accessibility features and the ever-changing street art that helps make the area alive and dynamic.

Discover the pivotal role of a modest extension building in a our comprehensive masterplan project, designed to breathe new life into under used parts of the Truman Brewery Estate. As we explore the area, we examine the diverse architectural styles contributing to the neighbourhood's charm, showcasing how robust yet elegant materials honour the industrial heritage while being as progressive as the people here.

Listen in as we explore the art of preserving local character through bespoke design with an architect who has called this area home for over 30 years. Chris's profound connection to the neighbourhood is evident in each of their many local project, utilising materials and local knowledge to address practical challenges and enhance community ties. We also discuss the economic benefits of cultural buildings as destinations and the meticulous preservation and creative reuse of materials in redeveloping this site. 

Speaker 1:

Hello and welcome to the Grow Places podcast where we explore the virtuous circle of people, growth and place Brought to you by Grow Places and hosted by our founder, tom Larson. Today we have a special episode recorded on site at the Truman Brewery in East London, where we are excited to work in partnership with the Truman Brewery and local people in Brick Lane, spitalfields and Banglatown brewery and local people in Brick Lane, spitalfields and Banglatown.

Speaker 2:

So here we are at the Truman Brewery site. This is the Grow Places Scheme led by development manager Tom Larson, and I'm here with Chris and with Matt architects. Is that right, chris? Tell me a bit about where we are and what's happening and who you are.

Speaker 3:

Well, we're on the corner of Quaker and Brick Lane. This is like a beating heart of this area in many ways, and you've got the Truman Brewery, which has long been established as the kind of centre of this area, crossing Brick Lane on both sides. So it is a big area of land and with many buildings, and a lot of these buildings have changed juice over time and it's really kind of uh exciting to be engaged with that process again. Where we're looking at, um, the building behind us which is the boiler house, um, uh, which you know started out in 1837 as a stable block and then has changed to a built being, becoming a boiler house in the in the 1930s and they added the hopper which is a taller part of the building and it's. It's an amazing how, uh, the character of that building has kind of been retained, um, but still is capable of adapting and changing, and that's we're in that next, next phase of that change fantastic and matt.

Speaker 2:

You're an architect as well. How are?

Speaker 4:

you involved in this at all. So I am the project update on this, working with chris kind of managing it through and pushing it all hopefully, towards a successful application fantastic.

Speaker 2:

So everything hinges on you, and neil desire a little bit there, yeah.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, it's a team effort, but yeah of.

Speaker 2:

Of course, of course. Okay, so talk to me. I don't know anything about this building. What's it going to do once you've redesigned it, or are you knocking it down and starting it again? So it?

Speaker 4:

is an exhibition centre at the moment. That's what it's used for. It's flexible, so they have sales, they have exhibitions, they have shows, they have things to tour things at all, and the aim of our work is to make sure that that kind of flexibility remains and stays, but it works better. That's what we're trying to do. So we're trying to use the space behind the boiler house to create all the ancillary spaces that you need to make the boiler house function properly and really well and just guarantee it as part of brick lane because, as chris said, it is the heart of this bit of brick lake.

Speaker 2:

So so what kind of use will it have after it will retain?

Speaker 4:

expedition space. Yeah, so we've designed it so it's going to have three key spaces in it, one being the boiler house, another being a new room that is 150 square meters, and then at the top, we're going to reuse that hopper. So it's three different types of spaces of use, with all different types of events, and, because it's flexible, it's designed that someone could take the whole building and use it as a gallery, or three different people could do three different things at once, and it would all work fine.

Speaker 3:

So flexibility is where it needs to be right okay, fantastic but it's true to say it's really specific in the way it's responded to the brief. Yeah, in that, you know, you've got a building which is partially blind in many ways. It doesn't have regular pattern of windows necessarily because it is an exhibition building and it's kind of. It is what it is. You know, it's kind of responding to the brief from this, what it needs to be okay, and how?

Speaker 2:

how are you? How does your design sort of influence what else is happening in the area, or is it sort of influencing anything else? Is there any sort of porousness that comes into the design at all, or is it more contained to that one building?

Speaker 3:

Well, it is accessible from many different parts, so it'd be accessible from, bricklay be accessible from, as Matt described, there are three elements to it so each element can be independently accessed so it animates those areas around, all of those different sides of the building.

Speaker 2:

And I mean, as you can hear, there's a lot of traffic, a lot of activity here today, so access is obviously going to be really important, but also probably quite complicated or tricky. Is it a challenge?

Speaker 3:

actually the way the building and the site is accessed at the moment is really um, easy and good, in a way that you can get trucks in off the street here We'll go past that way later, but you can basically drive a truck in and in our new building you'd be able to slide a big, massive double high door open and bring in massive exhibition pieces or smaller pieces, it doesn't really matter, but you can get the access and then and then bring the trucks back out again. So it's always been a site that's quite well accessed by trucks, because it was a Coop Bridge, because it was an industrial site, and so in a way we're kind of building on that heritage and that fast.

Speaker 2:

And so then talk to me about the interventions you'll be making, because you're going to retain the area of course. So how's it going to look and feel differently?

Speaker 4:

So when you're walking up Brick Lane, it won't look or it won't feel different at all. The idea is that this is how the character of the area is. It's a beautiful old building, but it's a very, very robust building. So things like the graffiti that you will see that changes constantly. We're not cleaning it off, we're not taking it back. We are leaving these casades. There are repair works that we'll do, but they'll be minimal, so it will look as it is, because it's a big bone, solid building.

Speaker 4:

When it comes to internally, there's been a lot, a lot, a lot of things that have been done over the years, like a section that has been quartered off, which into a separate unit that'll be taken out so the main space opens up. There are lots and lots of buildings from the 1920s at the back that are toilet blocks, little walls, ancillary boiler houses, things like that. That will all be cleared out so that we can create ourselves a site to build our extension. But really, the idea is that as you're walking up and down Brick Lane, this building will be as it is, but when you're inside the master plan as it evolves, it will be a focal point for one of the yards that is being created by the master plan architect. Okay, so it's got quite a difficult job to do in terms of it's got quite a lot to do internally, but it really is an internalized thing. On Brick Lane, it will still have its character.

Speaker 2:

Okay, and you said extension Is. And you said extension. Is there going to be a new part added on?

Speaker 4:

There is. We are building a block to the back, which is Well, you'll see when you get around the back, the hopper is very different at the back to the stable block at the front. But our building respects that hopper because that hopper is part of the development of the building. So we bring it in and we bring it down. It's a small cubic building, which Chris will talk about, I'm sure, just really allows this building to function, but gives you a face as well and gives them something that's within work, then well, yeah, I think that's one of the really unique things about this plot.

Speaker 5:

Actually, within the master plan, this is the only uh flaw that actually front clods brick laid, and so, as well as try to enhance that aspect brick laid you'll see, maybe let's take a walk down and we can have a look. So, uh, you'll feel the difference in the environment, how this kind of noisy, vibrant environment changes to something very different. But it's but also perception terms, like a big part of this is try and create new access points into the site, new points of reference for the local neighborhood and community and obviously strengthening what is what is already on Brigg Lake. So why don't we take a wander down, kristen?

Speaker 3:

I think it's taken and done well.

Speaker 4:

Walking nice and slowly progress on. That's it. She's looking around. What do we have to say about the graffiti here so we can animate the language the way that we're talking? Well, you can say that the guys at Only Building, the trimmers, are very kind of, they respond to the area and they are relaxed about what people are doing and so they allow things like. So there are deliberate pieces, like you'll see, on the door, where someone has painted something I don't know what it is, and then there are stuff inside you can see, but there's also much more organic stuff that is just allowed to happen.

Speaker 2:

Oh yeah, you can see that they sort of.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, there are pieces that are deliberate and there are pieces that arrive, but every time we come and take photographs it's different. So when we're trying to submit drawings of what the building actually looks like, it's quite a challenge. Updated, it renders every time Pretty much, pretty much.

Speaker 3:

Anyway, not all of it is successful and not all of it is great, but Well it's it is great. Well, it's an artist's objective. Exactly, it all changes so often. This is another interesting perspective from this Allen Gardens. Here, which is really metropolitan open land, it's just space left over after the war and the clearance of what were two up, two downs and it's really been left pretty much like that since. Grass has grown but and there's some trees planted, but not much more. But it is a very popular space because there's so little green space here. So it's kind of like a new. This, this elevation that we'll see from a new master plan, will become really important because it'll be kind of something which addresses it for once how will it achieve that?

Speaker 3:

Well, through its openings and its windows and and the way that it's massing and form kind of will address what is a big space. You know, it's a really big space here and the connectivity of this entrance and I think there's another one we've got planned here on the further on the right here, so that it'll it'll be more porous, and I think that's something which is a really strong element of the master plan, that what was closed will become porous and people will be able to walk through and enjoy many different aspects of the plan.

Speaker 3:

So you'll be changing, making changes to this wall here well, yeah, we're not the architect for this particular part of it, we're more for the boiler house. So the beauty of the master plan is it's all made up of different architects.

Speaker 2:

That's right.

Speaker 3:

And that's its strength, and that you'll get different characters as consequence for each of the buildings. And our building will rear industrial response to the industrial heritage of the building and it's brief, so it would be clad in core 10 and quite robust and but elegant and beautifully detailed, whereas other buildings will be brick and concrete and with big window openings because they're a different function. So I think it will be quite a change on this site, but in a very positive way. This area really needs that kind of positive change.

Speaker 2:

You talk about this area as if you know it. Tell me a little bit. Are you local?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I've been living here for over 30 years now, so I moved here when it was all we could afford. At the time, as a young architect, I wasn't running my own practice. I was working for Stirling and Wilford at the time and then my family love it and I love it and you become ingrained. It's like you've just become part of the area. I love the character and the place.

Speaker 2:

Has that helped inform the design that you make together?

Speaker 3:

Well, I the practice is to a nearly 19, 20 years old, and we've been working together for a long time, matt and I, and in the way that we approach our projects, it's always bespoke, isn't?

Speaker 4:

it yeah, in terms of how we handle each project. Yeah, it's always a contextual response, isn't it? There's not a pattern book. Yeah, you start with the building you're working with and then you work out what it means yeah, we don't really have a formula for every project.

Speaker 3:

We just like to look at it fresh and then, with those ideas, we then create something new. So you know, it took a little while to find what we wanted for the expression of the building, but I think we have a good proposition now and it's a strong idea and and.

Speaker 2:

As a local, what kind of insight do you have that you think has informed you more on this decision?

Speaker 3:

I think more just from using the site. You know I mean, my kids are architects and artists and my wife's a teacher we just we absorb. Every weekend we'll walk around and use the area, the markets, and here on this site, you know, historically there's been this art car boot sale and you know all sorts of wonderful events that go on and I think we just you gain it. It's just like sort of um infusion you kind of learn from by being here and it just becomes a part of your DNA and understanding of an area. You know, but it's something we all love and I think that's translated into the team's approach to the project as well.

Speaker 5:

It definitely feels like a local community around here. Yes, you know you can feel already. We've walked about 100 metres and people listening will be able to feel the difference in the dynamic. You can hear birds chirping now instead of, you know, angry horns on Brick Lane. It's incredible and that sort of yeah, that vibrancy and vitality of the neighbourhood. Like you know, it'd be a great place to live. I've enjoyed spending more time here over the past couple of years and trying to get under the skin of it a little bit, but but what are the things that you really feel like you know are maybe the strengths that that can be preserved and enhanced through the scheme, and also what are the things that are challenges, things that would, with a scheme that be really successful, will actually try to kind of help along really, yeah I think a use of natural materials like brick is inevitable.

Speaker 3:

I think that's something which is really appropriate, but it doesn't necessarily have to always be the same kind of brick. It can be something which is warmer and of a different color, and things like the industrial metal window systems that are used on the existing building. I think those sort of palettes of material. London is largely brick, apart from the city which is largely stone, but here it seems very appropriate to be using that material.

Speaker 2:

Was that easy to source here? Was that easy to source here? I mean, is locality, hyperlocality, a factor in material choices in that sense?

Speaker 3:

Well, I think we now get bricks all over the place now. Unfortunately, in the UK we don't make many bricks of our own at the moment, but it's nice to be able to think that in the due course, when this construction starts, that we might be able to source those bricks in the uk here. But we've built projects locally, not far away, two streets away, using um danish bricks which are a lovely varied red color, and those have been really successful in matching in on fashion street, for example, next to the moorish market, which is a listed building as well. So we there we contrasted. We use a red brick against the yellow bricks and that looks really good and it's very warm. So I think it's it's about thinking about the color of material choices and material in the immediate context and how that looks. That's important.

Speaker 2:

And you talked about access before. What kind of challenges will there be with the redesign to provide access or to get to where you need to go to? What are you having to handle and deal with with the building in its current state or in its current design?

Speaker 4:

So internally you can't tell from the street, but internally the floor of that building is a meter above brick lane level and you can kind of get a feel for it as you look at that ramp. It all goes up. So that's been something we've had to try and work out in terms of where does our entrance go and how do the spaces flow internally. Also, the back of the hopper, which we'll see later, has a beautiful two-story crittle window the full length of its facade, and what we really wanted was to be able to walk through one space into the next. So you had to get that level, which means we've had to work out how, through the landscape, to get up to the height that we need to get to to make the building flow.

Speaker 4:

But we've done that. I think We've done it well and we've looked at ways of doing it. Externally is a much more natural way to do it, because you don't notice that you're going up that meter, which is really good. I mean it's just contextual. You just have to work with it really. I mean, off brick lane we're not going to change the entrances, so you still come in and then that section is lower and there are still ramps to get you up, but that would all stay. But from this side it will all feel much more natural, much more step free and you sort of spoke about.

Speaker 2:

Now you've got a special word for the chimney. What's that called the hopper?

Speaker 4:

So the hopper is the large building with the shoulder.

Speaker 4:

So when the building was a boiler house. They had boilers at ground level in what is now the exhibition space and that building, the top two stories of it with a great big coal store. So it had conveyor belts that took coal up to where those doors are, drop them into the hopper and then the hopper would have fed them into the boilers as it went. That took coal up to where those doors are, drop them into the hopper and then the hopper would have fed them into the boilers as it went. So when you get inside you can still see the scalloped shape of the hopper on the wall where the coal dust is, because it's just such a weird space to get to that no one has managed to, so it's all still there and you'll retain all of that yeah, so that space is retained and then we're going to reuse that space so it'll be usable by the public.

Speaker 4:

At the moment it's just got M&E plant and ductwork in it because no one knew what to do with it. But because we're building our extensions from the back, you can get people up to that level safely and easily and then we can use that room. That's part of the character of it.

Speaker 2:

Where are you going to put all that plant?

Speaker 4:

So some of it will go in the basement, some of it will go on the roof. There's actually quite a lot more efficient for the same area, so it will all kind of work very well. And we're working with arab to reduce our energy use, so therefore reducing the amount of kit that we need by doing things like insulating the building better and using more modern systems.

Speaker 2:

and then there's talk of district systems, which are evolving, so yeah, so it will all kind of come together and what other environmental considerations have you given to Okay, and what other environmental considerations have you given to the design at all?

Speaker 4:

So there's a lot of, in our mind, questions about control of daylight, because the building needs to be flexible and because we don't know what's going into it. You don't want to create dark black boxes, but you do need to be aware that you need to be able to create dark black boxes. So questions of how we control the large opening. Chris was talking about whether we have shutters across it or not, or whether you have something internal, whether the roof lights that exist need to have something in the glass that will allow them to go opaque, or whether they can have something underneath. So it's questions like that, really. In terms of heat and environmental concerns, it doesn't overheat at the moment, which is really good, but it doesn't overheat because it isn't insulated, so all the heat just disappears out through it. So you have to be a bit careful with what we do. But that's okay, we'll manage it, so okay there's a lot of thermal masses, yeah.

Speaker 4:

That old brick wall, yeah well there's a lot of thermal mass in the wall. There are holes in the roof because the roof isn't even watertight.

Speaker 1:

So it's a leaky building well, you can see it's not leaky.

Speaker 3:

It's deliberately designed that way you can see daylight coming in through the gutters so, yeah, it is what it is, we'll sort it out, okay.

Speaker 4:

Well, it was a boiler house, it didn't really matter to me, it was lots of fresh air, yeah exactly.

Speaker 3:

It's a different use. It's subtle changes like that which begin to challenge the way the fabric works, and then we have to address that in the new project.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and so you mentioned darrett before. Um, there's obviously multiple architects and consultants on this game, so how? How are you sort of influencing each other and and working together on this?

Speaker 3:

well, it's usually. It's a. It's a dialogue. You know they come forward with ideas, options. We discuss things, we say what the pitfalls or what the constraints are with a listed building and what are the opportunities to incorporate these new ideas.

Speaker 2:

And it's an ongoing dialogue really that you come up with structural solutions and heating and ventilation solutions, with our fire strategies that are all appropriate for the new use which may may alter or adapt the building and in terms of the sort of aesthetic narrative that this building will have, is that going to be echoed anywhere else in any of the other buildings, or is each sort of component its own thing, with its own sort of dyson arctic stamps? You know how does that? How does it translate across the entire site?

Speaker 4:

as a building it is its own thing. Okay, it doesn't, because the other buildings are commercial and their offices above something at ground floor. They tend to have kind of a rhythm of windows and a lot of glazing and that kind of stuff, whereas ours doesn't have the same brief and so it made. We looked at it, we looked at ways of doing it in britain. It didn't seem to make a lot of sense to try and create this grid of windows that didn't do anything, that we'd end up blinding because they were unhelpful.

Speaker 4:

So actually we've come down to a much more kind of esoteric solution which is kind of Corten steel and it's a much more singular building, but it allows our building to really kind of be seen in terms of its development. So you have the 1830s building, the 1930s building, then our building, one, three next to each other, all relating to each other. But our bit is different to the 1930s because the 1930s bit is different to the 1830s. But you can see the development as it goes and then next to it you have bricks. So it all, you know it relates back.

Speaker 5:

Yeah, we've talked about that a little bit as we walk down. Already this building's got a number of different aspects. We're on kind of the second of those now on buxton street but, as you say, when we walk in you'll see from the new yards that we're creating that the building has another face there, totally, and as matt was saying, I think, in terms of a brief, you know, this is the opportunity to do something, you know, unique, something that's appropriate to the use. Obviously that's very heritage led um, but that provides a new marker on, particularly on the yard that we're creating behind here, named chimney yard, obviously after the chimney which is in the shadow of.

Speaker 5:

So, yeah, it's a really fun opportunity, I think I think that's the word I've used quite a lot through this process, for this building is fun I think it does have that um, that looseness, that fun to it which befits the uses and hopefully befits the kind of the vibrancy and vitality that not just this building but the whole scheme is going to bring, so that, yes, there's areas of quiet, areas of calm, but also there's areas that are fun, that are vibrant, that are active throughout the day, the night, the week, and so that chris and his daughter, on the weekends, can have something fun to do as well it's about creating a destination, I think as well.

Speaker 3:

I mean the buildings, like an exhibition buildings are destinations. People will look it up online and go visit and make plans to go see the area and the knock-on effect for the rest of the area economic will economically will also be good, um, because of all the people using it and how the cafes and bars become more energized and all that really positive story, and it's already working. I mean, truman are very successful at managing these sorts of spaces. The one on the old stable block on Commercial Street, for example, is a blind building as well. In many respects. It's hemmed in on all sides. There's only one entrance and that has Van Gogh shows and all sorts of different digital displays. It doesn't need windows, it doesn't need daylight and but it's a huge draw, you know, and the benefit to the area is something really to be admired and I think we'll have the same here yeah, tom, why did you pick this, this architecture firm, for this particular building?

Speaker 2:

I'd love to know, what that is.

Speaker 5:

Well, I think Chris, matthew and his team they've got a long standing relationship in the neighbourhood, in the place, which is really, really important, and also, on top of that, they've got a very long relationship with Truman as well a number of other successful projects with Truman in the past and that married with their skill set and expertise in listed buildings, sensitive extensions, but also things that are for the future. So it's not, you know, marrying that balance appropriately, I think, makes them a great part of the team for this. So, yeah, it's been a really good process. I think working together and, as Chris said earlier, you know that whole team approach, from Truman as the owner operator down to the various architects, consultants and team members, has been really fun, dynamic on this, on this project, but yeah, it's felt very natural, hasn't?

Speaker 5:

yeah.

Speaker 3:

I don't think it's been forced in any way. I think it's been a very natural process. Thank you, yeah, so the chimney has been what's the right word.

Speaker 4:

It only goes to ground floor okay, and so it sits on a great big brick cube that is kind of, you know, three meters tall and all of our plants in the basement and all of our plant is on this side of the building. So to try and use it would involve digging some sort of like cold it's tunnel underneath and up and you're not going to do that. I mean we did, we entertained it, okay, yeah, it just needs repair.

Speaker 2:

Climbing tricks, yeah, and so talk to us about the repair work that it might need, because there are people who are really enthusiastic about bricks and I mean, is it the bricks that need replacing? What will need?

Speaker 4:

repointing and it'll need bricks looked at locally, but until you get a scaffold up you can't really tell what the full extent of it is. It looks to be in pretty good condition and I think truman have had someone off it. Relatively they do so.

Speaker 3:

They do look after it and maintain it and keep an eye on it. It's a machine made brick, so it's quite glossy and it's finished, you can tell. But it's um, you know it's a very robust brick. It's probably the mortar that needs attention more than anything from time to time fantastic, and so you mentioned that there would be a new component.

Speaker 2:

Is that, is that here, or is it out there?

Speaker 3:

yeah, it's just just just where these little cabins are. Okay, this is where the new building will sit. Um, and this entrance will remain largely where it is. It might be modified slightly, but basically it'll be there and and that defines the wall and the big doors will be just in this area here. Yeah, so you'll be able to see how, you know, trucks will be able to come in and there could be a big bar that unloads stuff from the truck. If you had a big piece of art or object or something, you could bring it straight in, which is a real advantage for exhibition space to be able to get big things in as well as small things. And brick lane is really congested, as we saw. You know you could. To unload stuff in brick lane is just not really feasible, so it's a great opportunity to bring stuff in and unload stuff and bring it back out and take it away and what about this area here?

Speaker 2:

what's happening over here? Do you have any um, do you have any influence on on the sort of the design through the ground and how that connects to the rest of the buildings?

Speaker 3:

yeah, I. I mean we're looking at with Space Hub Design. They're doing all the landscape, aren't?

Speaker 2:

they.

Speaker 3:

In terms of the way the surface will be treated. We'll be looking at that fresh and making a response that makes streets and squares effectively out of this big yard. So the spaces between the buildings are as important as the buildings themselves. The surfaces, the way they're handled, the activities will all become really interesting and will draw people through.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, fantastic I'm sure they will talk about it themselves, but the master plan has been designed so that the passages that run through are scaled to the streets in the surrounding area. So the distance between our building and the building that's here is seven meters, which is about the same as where our office is on Fashion Street. So it's not a kind of boulevard, it's a thing that you pass through. It's deliberately designed to be kind of small because that is the character.

Speaker 3:

Push and pull and compact and then open.

Speaker 3:

The open spaces will focus on different views and have different characters, like this one will be chimney yard, will focus on chimney and you know other aspects will look at the cooperage and you know there'll be sort of a series of different characters created which was very common. You know this area, you know when it was the time of the Huguenots there were yards at the back and there were backland developments of industry and workspaces and workshops. So it's more of that character which is just being led in the 21st century in a sense.

Speaker 2:

Fantastic. Who were the Huguenots?

Speaker 3:

Huguenots were the French settlers in the early 1720s and onwards who were seeking refuge from France, where they were oppressed, and they came over, as have. Many generations of immigrants have come and arrived here in Spitalfields, and they were one of the first. They adapted the buildings and put up lofts weavers lofts to be able to work as long as sunrise and sunset would allow them to do so. So that's the character of a lot of these Georgian houses have these big, as long as sunrise and sunset would allow them to do so. So that's the character of a lot of these. The Georgian houses have these big glazed attic stories which you can see.

Speaker 2:

So it's always been a place of industry and change and movement of people and character. And what's your hope for the result of this? What? What do you think about when you're you know job done, you know pens down, everything's been delivered. When you walk through here in 10 years time, what are you hoping to experience yourselves?

Speaker 4:

so I'd like the building to have the character that has today. I think one of the things that the master plan is getting right is it is acknowledging that this part of town is quite scruffy, and that is a really important part of it, because you get the vibrancy, you get the youth, you get excitement through the fact that nothing is perfect. We're not building the Royal Academy or an offshoot. It's not going to be a perfect building. It's going to be a building that people can kick around and use as they want and the room that we're creating that is 150 square meters, beautiful cube. If somebody wants to mess it up, it's fine. You just repaint it when it's finished.

Speaker 4:

You want that kind of liveliness still to be part of the site and that's something that's really hard to get in a master plan, because often you get a thing that is perfect on day one and then it takes time to be inhabited. I don't, we want that. We want this to just keep on going as it is, and that's the plan.

Speaker 2:

Obviously, this is a historic site full of really interesting materials. Talk to me about any material reuse that you're managing to achieve.

Speaker 4:

Sure. So circular economy is something that's very important to us as a practice and to the master plan in general, because there are lots of buildings that have to come down, so there's a lot of material to reuse. So we're currently looking to reuse all of these historic ground coverings. So there's cobbles and flagstones as you go into the boiler house, which we've taken up and preserved and reused the metal up there, probably not going to be able to do too much wood because actually it's very, very thin and not very useful. Bricks we will definitely retain and there are some really good painted doors like sliding industrial doors that will be taken from the middle of the site, where they are now, and reused as the entrance to the site at the front, just to keep in with the theme of kind of reusing everything and graffiti everywhere and just putting in a starting point and letting people continue fantastic, great well, matt chris, thank you so much for your your time today and walking us through your designs.

Speaker 2:

We're really excited to see how this all transpires uh, here at the grow places, true, and brewery development site.

Speaker 1:

Thank you thanks guys thank you, cheers thank you for listening to the grow places podcast. For more information, visit growplacescom and follow us at. We grow places across all social channels. See you next time.