Practice North

Practice North based both projects this year in urban locations: a Co-housing project in the Georgian Quarter (Semester 1) –adjacent to our University campus- and a Film School in the post-industrial landscape of north docklands (Semester 2). These projects aimed to explore the rich context of the city by introducing contemporary ways of living and working.

The Co-living brief explored an emerging housing trend for collective living and shared amenities and the inevitable implications for private space and, even, personal possessions. It required high density development of the site in order to reflect the approach of modern developers and to excite challenging responses. This was also a corner site surrounded, in large part, by traditional brick terraces. Each design had to advantageously negotiate the corner condition and, on another level, address issues of building materiality in a world where brick is no longer a safe choice.

The Film School brief involved a range of differently sized spaces from film studio spaces, workshops, cinemas, classrooms and offices. The site was much larger than in the previous project, contained derelict sheds at the front –suitable for adaptive reuse- and was located alongside a designated creative district in city docklands. The project started with a bus trip to a film school and studios at Edge Hill University, Ormskirk in order to explain the process of film making. There were also master class sessions in landscape design delivered by an eminent local practitioner. Richard Dod

Students

Studio Staff

Richard Dod (Lead)
James Crawford
Alex Turner
Dan Wiltshire