cullinan studio anthology
DESCRIPTION
In October 2012 we moved into our new studios adjacent our previous offices in north London. At the same time, we changed our name from Edward Cullinan Architects to Cullinan Studio. To celebrate the move and let the world know our new name, we created an anthology about what inspires us, who we are and where we are.TRANSCRIPT
CULLINAN STUDIO
The Foundry, 5 Baldwin Terrace, London N1 7RU
+44 (0)20 7704 1975
www.cullinanstudio.com
CULLINAN STUDIO
CULLINAN STUDIO
3
CAST
CULLINAN STUDIO
5
Cast
6
The life of our 1 Baldwin Terrace building (formerly a foundry) and its materiality is not a fixed condition but rather an evolving enterprise. Inevitable redundancies create a rich palimpsest of archaeology to excavate, revealing urban artefacts that once contributed to the sense of place. As occupiers, this depth of character has been reinstated in our minds as we approached the imminent departure into our new adventure next door.
We were interested in pilfering the past to create a new monument; not to invent an impressionistic pastiche of observations, but rather to investigate the well of conclusions that might otherwise be left unrecognised. The process of reproducing a discarded artifact isolates a detail from the whole and can acquire an alternative impressiveness that has significance beyond the framework of its era.
A structural brace of the original foundry supported its construction and, in addition, created a stronghold to withstand the forces of a winch on the other side of the wall which would have been repeatedly used in daily life from the mid 19th century onwards. The remaining intrusion of the relic viewed from within 1 Baldwin Terrace was unrecognised by many, a stark contrast to the significance of the piece throughout its life. Soon to be hidden forever in a wall of insulation and plasterboard, we feel we have duly acknowledged, explored and recorded a piece of history integral to the workings of this building.
CULLINAN STUDIO
7
Cast
8
CULLINAN STUDIO
9
Cast
10
CULLINAN STUDIO
11
Cast
12
CULLINAN STUDIO
13
Cast
14
CULLINAN STUDIO
15
CORPUS
CULLINAN STUDIO
17
Knowledge and Social Justiceby Irena Bauman
Despite the need for each consecutive generation to re-learn what is already known, we constantly accumulate knowledge. It could be argued that the knowledge thus far accumulated is already sufficient to draw up and implement a plan to eradicate all injustice in the world and to achieve a good life for all.
However, the possession of knowledge is not enough: in following closely the patterns of distribution of wealth and political power, knowledge is likewise unequally distributed, hidden, misrepresented and manipulated. Recently we have seen major challenges to the ability of the powerful elite to hide information: twitter revelations travel quicker than formal news items and bypass the filters of dictators, security guards, editors and politicians; journalists who acquire knowledge through unethical means are outed by other journalists; politicians who hide information are vulnerable to wikiLeaks; a spot light has also fallen on the chief executives and chairmen of financial institutions, exposing multiple misrepresentations and greed-driven foul play.
The new knowledge emerges as the net impact of such exposures and we are better informed of the devious means by which recent decades of consumption were fuelled, and of the rapidly increasing inequalities in its distribution.
But exposure of knowledge is still insufficient to move us to collective action. The power of knowledge is challenged by denial and forgetting –the tools that allow vanity, greed and pleasure to trump sense of justice.
We know so much about the future- the impact of changing climate is closely monitored and we can already see and measure its effects. We know that some resources are finite and we know that burning of fossil fuel is causing irreversible damage to the atmosphere. We know that all of us in the west are consuming more then we replenish, we know that
Corpus #1
18
we buy things we do not need, that we throw away 30 % of the food we purchase and that many of us do not use even a fraction of the space we say we need. But we are constantly denying that this knowledge requires personal action because to accept it would require us to let go of what we perceive to be our exclusive rights to the good life.
From history we know that there have been many other models for structuring economy and society such as Schumacher’s Small is Beautiful or Steady State Economy promoted by John Stuart Mills, but those are denied and forgotten as the consumption fuelled lifestyle obscures any desire for long term considerations.
So for those who do care for social justice, there are frustrating times ahead - we have to deal with the paradox of deeper and more available knowledge causing resistance to change that will lead to ever worsening conditions.
But there is another way already spoken about by Mahatma Gandhi: ‘be the change you want to see in the world’. We each have the choice to use the knowledge we have to guide our personal actions.
Bus shelter in Bradford designed by Bauman Lyons Architects
CULLINAN STUDIO
19
Celebrating Cullinanby Peter Buchanan
Although this does not apply to all modern architecture, much of it is very narrow in its concerns, ignoring context and culture, and focusing primarily on function and construction. But at least these are real issues. By contrast, postmodernists, a more pervasive movement than merely those who applied historic motifs, treat design as the illustration of spurious theories or scenarios. Another large group have turned modernism into a style without an agenda, while yet others, whether confused or despairing, merely chase fame and fortune by following the latest formal fashions.
In contrast to all this, Cullinans has always ploughed an independent furrow, pursuing a wider range of concerns than most architects while remaining firmly grounded in the multiple realities impacting a project. Yes, it is concerned with function and programme, but has expanded this into a commitment with shaping vibrant communal dynamics by providing a range of opportunities for social interaction. Yes, it is concerned with construction and materials, but is constantly inventive in its approach to these and has now added a similarly exploratory and rigorous approach to pursuing sustainability. Cullinan’s architecture has also always been sensitively responsive to context and history, letting these influence choices of materials and aspects of composition, but also becoming an active presence in its setting rather than the pursuing a passive, life-sapping parasitism, such as results from being merely deferential.
Although a Cullinan building is often recognisable as such, its final form emerges not from any formal preconceptions but from the process of exploring the concerns listed above, and many others as well, to see what emerges. Hence buildings as strikingly different from each other as the RMC1 Headquarters concealed below a formal garden, the shaggy yet structurally supremely efficient Downland Gridshell and the energy efficient pavilions of the Cambridge Centre of Mathematical Sciences, which create a whole hierarchy of opportunities for social engagement.
It is important to note though that this range and unpredictability of form and expression is very different from the current obsessive quest for novelty and originality, the result of which are buildings of, at best, only passing interest. Much of the difference between such works
1Ready Mixed Concrete
Corpus #2
20
and Cullinan’s is that the former are largely ego-driven and the latter encapsulate a big-hearted generosity of spirit which includes that of service. It is this, combined with perpetual exploration, that accounts for the seemingly unself-conscious emergence of true originality.
Many architects lack the open-mindedness, and are too concerned with the judgments of their peers, to permit themselves to embrace what can be such unconventional solutions. Ironically, many of the architects admired for their uncompromising approach – committed to raw concrete and glass blocks, say – are in fact the most timidly conformist – a charge that could never be levelled at Cullinan.
Let’s close with a story that reveals some of what is admirable about Cullinan. Writing about one of the buildings, I criticised some details as being overly-explicit in expressing all of the components they brought together, thus drawing undue attention and detracting from the appreciation of the whole. I was invited to Cullinan’s office to elaborate on this point with him and the project architects. When the latter leapt to defend themselves, Ted stopped them to let what I had said sink in. Only after time for this did he offer his defence while recognising the legitimacy of my criticism. If there was a weakness in the work, he said, it was because it was “overly eager” – a wonderful choice of words –but how much better to be that than the antithesis.
Green roofs of the RMC Headquarters in Surrey
CULLINAN STUDIO
21
Place and Natureby Sue Clifford
‘What meaning does your construction have?’ …Where is the plan you are following...?’‘We will show it to you as soon as the working day is over; we cannot interrupt our work now.’….Work stops at sunset. Darkness falls over the building site. The sky is filled with stars. ‘There is the blueprint,’ they say.
(Italo Calvino. Invisible Cities. Picador, 1979)
Surely our highest aspiration should be to work with Nature. But less in the abstract and more in the quotidian, to lift life, to help people build relationships with each other and their everyday surroundings.
It is the accumulation of story upon history upon natural history that makes each place unique. Places echo with meaning. Perhaps grand buildings, spectacular landscapes, rare wild life offer iconic images, but meaning resides in the commonplace and places are culturally maintained in daily activity. Places we want to be in, places we want to share, bind us, ground us, are part of what makes life worth living.
Bringing change needs indigenous knowledge and tumbleweed expertise, local people and professionals, to help each other to understand the warp and weft, the vitality of the differences in detail and patina - the local distinctiveness that makes a place.
Change is the dynamo of Nature. Long, quiet ecosystems weave an ever more intricate web. A forest fretted by fire or a valley rent by flood responds by exploring, developing possibilities. We have more responsibilities. When we seek to intrude on the assets of place - familiarity, ‘ownership’, long explored ways of living together amongst the locally typical - we need to aim high and add richness. And we need to live within our means, to give Nature room.
Corpus #3
22
Choosing to use local materials, for example, can resonate deeply. Stone, brick or timber from a nearby quarry, pit or woodland will reinforce the colour and texture of a place. More, the lichens and mosses, plants and creatures will know how to use it. The impact of winning is understood and experienced directly, local people maintain jobs, lorries go by their window, memories of better or harder times remain in currency, longevity of experience may curb excesses: smaller scale working, close to us, keeps us in touch with the exploitation our lives demand. Culture is kept in good heart if intangibles also cling to the locality and with them comes appreciation, pride, identity, belonging: vernacular words and particular techniques, music rooted in songs once sung to help men work rhythmically together to split rock.
Creating new reverberations demands creativity beyond design - fitting in does not mean regurgitation or stasis. Finely tuning new buildings to locale and people should offer each more depth of meaning, the potential for new connections should bring nourishment to place.
Nature thrives on exploration and increasing complexity of relations – animating difference. Deepening local distinctiveness, rather than homogenizing, feeds the humanity and imagination we shall need as Nature increasingly reminds us we are stardust, part of everything, but not necessarily golden.
Four exemplars of local distinctiveness
Dorset Westmorland
Devon Suffolk
CULLINAN STUDIO
23
Joyby David F. Ford
In his collection Tongues, Micheal O’Siadhail1, a superb poet who engages both head and heart in the core questions of life and death, meditates on key words in different languages (mother, face, belief , forget, thanks, friend…) These meditations climax in lyrics of gratitude and joy, in response to those who first taught him Welsh, Norwegian, Icelandic, Catalan, German, French and Japanese. ‘A tongue to thank in’, ‘Most of all that sense of delight/Gift of joy…Ma∂r er mannz gaman. Man’s joy man.’, ‘A touch of joy in Poitiers’ late spring…Merci infiniment!’, and the final haiku: ‘In the beginning/The word. So too in the end./Birds of paradise.’ When I reflect on the greatest joy I have experienced in the Cambridge University Faculty of Divinity building, designed by Edward Cullinan and shaped in so many ways by Colin Rice, I think of the taking flight of conversation about and around many scriptural texts in many languages. Passing through the Faculty door, which is inscribed with texts on wisdom in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, English, Sanskrit, Syriac, and Arabic, vignettes of these fruitful conversations crowd in.
There is a current Hebrew reading group of four or five. None of us except our teacher, Andrew Macintosh, is much good at Hebrew, but we revel in reading aloud a passage and then coming at it from various angles – including kindred words in Arabic, and translations into Greek in the Septuagint and Latin in the Vulgate. We follow red herrings with delight, and through it all there is the fascination of languages, the interplay of fields of meaning, and the new ideas generated through the effort of translation and seeing how others have coped. And all of that inseparable from the endlessly rich theological poetry of Isaiah or the Psalmist, or the wisdom of Proverbs.
I think too of supervisions on the Gospel of John for two students at a time. They are taking my final year course on theological interpretation of John. I have already read their essays – on the literary craft of ‘John’ (if that is the author’s name – nearly everything about the origins of this Gospel is mysterious), or the first eighteen verses (the most influential short text in history, perhaps?), or the Gospel’s puzzling two endings, or ‘God’, or the Greek word menein – dwell, remain, stay. We are now free to take off in conversation around the text, and one can never predict what will happen, as interpretations down the centuries are explored, compared and improvised upon.
1Micheal O’Siadhail, Tongues (Bloodaxe Books, 2010)
Corpus #4
24
Most of all the joy has been in the practice of Scriptural Reasoning (see www.interfaith.cam.ac.uk ), as the Tanakh, Bible and Qur’an are studied by Jews, Christians, Muslims and others. It is best with around eight or nine participants, with each tradition represented by at least two people. Each brings an ‘internal library’ (Aref Ali Nayed’s phrase) to be drawn upon in this new event of the text’s history. Perhaps never before have these particular verses from each scripture been brought into conversation with each other. We take off in riffs of interpretation that resonate with past readers, while also reaching for a good reading for now. Ideally we find ourselves drawn into the complex joy of multiple deepenings – deeper into one’s own tradition, deeper into those of others, deeper into the common good of our shared world, and deeper into relationships of trust and understanding.
Through all this there can be another, stranger joy. As we stretch ourselves in mutual understanding and face apparently irresolvable differences, we can improve the quality of our disagreement to the point where there is something like a miracle: we still disagree, but we are friends.
Preparing the graphics for screen-printing onto the Cambridge University Faculty of Divinity door
CULLINAN STUDIO
25
A Journalby Matt Gibberd
My father only ever gave me one piece of careers advice, and it was as bald as the head on his shoulders: “Do anything you like, as long as it’s not architecture.” A lifelong architect himself, and the son of one of the Modern Movement’s most prominent figures – Sir Frederick Gibberd – he spoke from experience when he outlined the frustrations of cantankerous clients, obstructive planning laws and never getting anything built.
Taking him at his word, I have indulged my obsession with buildings in every way possible without actually designing them. I have written about architecture for newspapers and magazines; my holidays are entirely predicated upon which Modernist buildings I will be able to see in any given country; and since co-founding The Modern House estate agency in 2004, I have sold hundreds of them too.
The Modern House is something of an anomaly in the property industry. For a start, we don’t wear flammable suits. Most importantly, we focus not on a particular location but on the design quality of the properties themselves. The idea for our agency emerged after my business partner, Albert Hill, wrote an article for Wallpaper magazine about a realtor specialising in the sale of Mid-Century Modern housing in America. Having been initially sceptical about the scope of our modern architectural heritage this side of the Atlantic, we quickly discovered that there simply wasn’t a forum for it. Our database of houses and flats numbers several thousand, and grows with every architecturally proficient new-build.
Among our most memorable sales is the Lost House in King’s Cross designed by David Adjaye, the interior of which is almost entirely painted black, including a subterranean lap pool where one imagines Batman practising his backstroke. There’s the Thirties studio of the painter Augustus John in Hampshire, which we sold to a prominent sculptor. There’s an early work by John Pawson and Claudio Silvestrin – a Chelsea apartment from the Eighties that’s like a perfectly preserved paint-by-numbers for the master minimalist. And there are any number of Eric Lyons-designed ‘Span’ houses from the Fifties and Sixties – modest, carefully detailed homes in little clusters on beautifully landscaped estates throughout southern England. I like to think that we have advanced the notion of a house as a collector’s item. If a Dutch still life or a tribal headdress has a provenance, then so too must a building.
Corpus #5
26
For many years I have been putting together a gazetteer of the buildings I have visited around the world, documenting them all alongside interesting places to stay and restaurants I have unearthed en-route. I can often be found lurking behind a hedge surreptitiously trying to photograph a particular house while the owner glares out of the window. Most recently, my preoccupation with Modernism took me to Los Angeles, where I visited Frank Gehry’s first house, as well as the Eames House, the Schindler House, a handful of Richard Neutra buildings and hundreds more designed by little-known architects. In San Francisco I was moved to tears by Pier Luigi Nervi’s Cathedral of St Mary, with its extraordinary latticework concrete ceiling punctuated by ribbons of stained glass.
On a road trip through France last year, I managed to take in every Le Corbusier building between Paris and Marseille. My wife, Faye Toogood, is a game and glamorous co-conspirator. Travelling through Languedoc-Roussillon, we decided to scope out the artist Anselm Kiefer’s now-abandoned studio, a hauntingly beautiful derelict silk factory immortalised in the film Over Your Cities Grass Will Grow. But we couldn’t find it among the olive groves and rocky outcrops, and the lady in the Tourist Information office at Barjac declared our mission ‘Impossible!’, so we retired to a bistrot and ate some cheese. Even Modernists deserve an afternoon off sometimes.
Augustus John’s studio in Hampshire, designed by Christopher Nicholson in 1933 Sold by The Modern House in 2008
CULLINAN STUDIO
27
How big corporate can lead us to a more sustainable futureby Wayne Hemingway
For three decades now, I have been known as part of a design team that has been known as questioning, independent, and over the past decade or so, champions of social and sustainable thinking.
Over the last few years, we have begun to work with large corporate organisations, not to feed turnover, but because it has become increasingly clear that, because of the scale and investment available, bold initiatives can be undertaken.
The likes of Greenpeace and WWF (and the legions of small activists) have done wonderful jobs in hounding and naming and shaming corporations which have failed to take the environment, sustainability and ethical trading seriously. Their tireless campaigning has made a significant section of the public aware and helped to build a business environment where it makes business sense to “care”.
Whatever the tipping point has been, my overwhelming experience is of corporates who now place sustainability, the environment and ethical thinking at their core. They have set up corporate responsibility departments and whole segments of the business who are dedicated to this thinking. They have employed directors who are zealous and “dedicated to the cause”, directors who have significant budgets at their disposal. They now have the economies of scale to really start to make a difference.
The work we are doing with McDonalds (in collaboration with up-cycling and re-use specialists Worn Again) in terms of working out a system that allows the uniforms of their 88,000 UK staff to eventually be able to be made into new material to make new uniforms ad infinitum is bold, industry leading and takes considerable investment.
Corpus #6
28
The project we have with Coca Cola promoting their move towards plastic bottles that have significant PET content (in simple terms, plastic derived from sugar cane and molasses) is forward thinking, helps to reduce reliance on fossil fuels and, ultimately, makes financial sense .
We learnt a decade ago, when we started working with (Taylor) Wimpey Homes that sustainable projects of scale that resonate far and wide are much easier to deliver by collaborating with those that have most to gain (and to lose) .
So it’s time for people to stop raising their eyebrows and look surprised that designers like us are choosing to work with the kind of corporations that the campaigning bodies that we support once hounded. Big Corporations are not The Devil incarnate - they have an ability to lever their tremendous resources and some are now leading the way.
Uniforms for McDonalds by Wayne Hemingway Design
CULLINAN STUDIO
29
Tomorrowby Dr. Neil Hopkin
In the UK school system of the 20th century, the prevalent factory model of learning was informed by managerial target setting and centralised prescription. The result was that children were the recipients of school leaders’ misguided but understandable attempts to meet KPIs which led to dry, joyless lessons designed to jump statistically through metaphorical hoops and over public relations hurdles. Smart school leaders soon learned that to avoid the punitive and public criticism of poor league table performance, they would need to lead their schools with a new focus, designed to deliver results that met the publishable requirements of their political overlords. Pretty soon schools were concentrating their efforts on getting students with Ds to become Cs, were abandoning Es, and neglecting Bs and As because they had already passed the required level. Even our youngest children in primary schools were being labeled and overlooked as adults declared around them, “They will never reach Level 4, just concentrate on those that might.” Booster classes proliferated to progress children newly described as “on the cusp”, whilst those who were more, or less able were left to run out the time until the test. It would be almost impossible to design a system that would be more efficiently ruthless in its ability to disengage learners, dismay and demotivate a generation of teachers or disempower a future workforce. It was a backward looking, short-sighted and short term approach. It was, and is, a disaster.
Today, schools are able to make many more of their own decisions and as a result, some have begun to value other measures that were once ignored. Ingenuity, creativity, cognitive agility and adaptability are now supported through a creative and applied curriculum in learning spaces that are more akin to home than to a Victorian work house. Unsurprisingly, standards are rising and are replacing standardisation, whilst schools are empowering children to fulfill the ever changing needs of the 21st century workplace. Now, inspired school and community leaders are measuring schools’ impact through a much more intelligent and subtly nuanced set of metrics such as employment rates, reduced teenage pregnancies, parental engagement, applicants for vacant posts and stage-not-age based success.
Corpus #7
30
But what of tomorrow? As the current generation of parents look ruefully at the simpler world of their predecessors and live through the outworking of generational mismanagement of the world’s political, social and economic affairs, we all wonder, with a sense of guilt, about the legacy that we are leaving for the children in our schools. However, whilst it is right that we reflect upon our own shortcomings, our children are far more pragmatic about the task that lies ahead and, in those visionary schools where pupil voice is treated seriously, they are starting to seize the educational agenda. This new generation of interdependent learners are rejecting the bells, whistles and fixed schedules of mass instruction, are rejecting irrelevant, unapplied knowledge, are saying a resounding “no” to Dick Turpin style Stand-and-Deliver teaching, are questioning the logic of copying swathes of writing in class whilst being banned from ignorantly copying from the web at home and are refusing to be complicit in a model of learning that is “delivered” rather like milk once was.
It seems as though, in a rather gentle and grass roots way, a learner’s revolution is sweeping aside that old factory model of learning, perpetrated by the political and adult society, to replace it with an approach to learning which is exciting, engaging, relevant and actually fit for its 21st century purpose. What a wonderful lesson in futures thinking our children are giving us. I hope we are all listening because, whatever our profession, we should all be in the business of learning.
Refurbished classroom at Rosendale Primary School
CULLINAN STUDIO
31
Problems with expertsby Prof. Peter Landshoff
As the world gets more complicated, we have increasing need of experts. But most of us are in awe of them and cannot check what they do, which is bad.
Having worked with Cullinans on the design and construction of the Centre for Mathematical Sciences in Cambridge, I put what I had learnt to good use by running a forum for major clients of the construction industry. Its purpose was partly for them to share their woes, of which there were distressingly many, and partly to learn from the experience of others. A Formula 1 CEO told us how he had tried to inculcate into the team who was providing a large building to house a wind tunnel his industry’s principle that OK is not OK, and that he had achieved this by ruthlessly sacking a succession of under-performing managers. And one of the instigators of the Boston Big Dig told us that, at that time, it was already $10 bn over its initial budget of $6 bn, partly because, after each election, the politicians changed the specification (which we all know you should never do), but mainly because they had no idea how to control experts.
Too often, we cannot understand what experts say to us. For a while, I worked on a data project with someone whose previous job had been as an army colonel. Every sentence contained a string of unintelligible acronyms. When I went to give a talk to the Major Projects Association I was told they had a solution to this: if I used one in my talk, they were trained to yell “acronym” at the top of their voices. Fortunately I was safe, as the only acronym I knew at the time was s106.
I have learnt that experts are often narrow and insecure. When we had to decide how to cool some of the rooms in the Centre for Mathematical Sciences, I was somewhat terrified to go by myself to a meeting of experts. I soon realised that much of the time they could not understand each other, but they would not admit it. Towards the end of the meeting, the university’s maintenance manager came in and gave us a 5-minute harangue on why it was obvious that we should use VRV. VRV had been used in this project, VRV had these advantages, VRV was comparatively cheap, VRV did not cost much to run. When he had finished there was a long silence, until eventually I asked “What’s VRV?”. After he had left, the experts thanked me for asking that.
Corpus #8
32
My house was flooded ten years ago, and an expert advised that we should trim the bushes along a lane opposite so that water could run along it more freely. I asked whether that would make much difference. Three weeks later, when he was consulting in Azerbaijan, he emailed me to say how offended he was at my questioning his expertise. I managed to mollify him by saying that, as an academic, I am trained always to ask questions.
Too often, experts cannot see the wide picture. There is an EU directive about increasing the fraction of biofuel we put into our petrol tanks, but apparently the energy experts in Brussels did not think what effect this would have on our food supplies.
And I have not even mentioned the experts on banking and finance.
Centre for Mathematical Sciences, University of Cambridge
CULLINAN STUDIO
33
Collaboration by David Mullins
The Oxford English Dictionary defines collaboration as: the action of working with someone to produce something. To our team at WMG1 it is far more than this. Collaboration is the essence of how we have been able to grow over 30 years into a large group making a major impact on countries and companies around the world. At its heart is the identification and delivery of mutual benefit, a cornerstone of the group which has enabled our collaborations to last so long and to be so effective.
Our group is based in a university environment, but to us the knowledge that we create lacks meaning unless it is exploited by users in industry and society to enable economic growth and individual wellbeing. We cannot assume that knowledge will be exploited; it is our responsibility to put knowledge in the form that users can exploit easily and, through effective collaboration, to put in place the relationships required to enable exploitation.
Our collaboration with Cullinans has been a mutually beneficial relationship sustained over 20 years and through three iconic buildings that they have created for us at the heart of the University of Warwick campus. The design of the buildings has been a key factor that has enabled the collaboration between academic staff and end users that we require and which is essential if the knowledge that we create is to add value, economically, environmentally and socially.
We view everyone as a customer of WMG, seeking to ensure that what we provide addresses a need or an opportunity. Such a philosophy requires that the ability to collaborate, to have an empathy and understanding for the needs and requirements of others, takes central stage. This approach requires the ability to undergo near constant change as new opportunities present themselves. The buildings in which we operate have to be able to accommodate this change and to serve a rich community from undergraduate students, through researchers, innovative small companies that we host, through to staff of major companies that are co-located and collaborate with us.
1Warwick Manufacturing Group
Corpus #9
34
The International Digital Laboratory designed by Cullinans is such an environment. Opened by the Prime Minister in 2008, we still receive a stream of visitors from governments, companies and universities that wish to replicate the user focused collaboration environment that we have created. Many of these visitors are international and WMG’s programmes are delivered around the world from China to India, from Malaysia to South Africa. At the heart of the programmes is the art of effective collaboration. It is an innate British skill, one that we hone through teaching, which differentiates us and provides a major facilitator for the growth and rebalancing of the economy that we are striving to achieve, for mutual benefit.
As Cullinan Studio grows from strength to strength, we look forward to embarking with them on our latest collaboration, the creation of a unique Collaborative Research Centre to support companies in the resurgent automotive sector.
International Digital Laboratory, University of Warwick
CULLINAN STUDIO
35
Continuityby Prof. Richard Simmons
According to Bertrand Russell, “order, unity, and continuity are human inventions, just as truly as catalogues and encyclopaedias”, whereas “change is scientific” and “indubitable”. Continuity in this interpretation is a device of the mind, an artefact we use to structure a world of chaos and mutability, the better to deal with it.
If Russell is right, many have set great store by an unempirical construct. Continuity has been claimed as a cornerstone of Englishness, Conservatism, Common Law and, of course, Contextual, Traditional and Vernacular architectures. You can even take a BArch in Continuity in Architecture.
So is our conception of continuity illusory? Just a comfort blanket developed to shield us from the harshness of an uncontrollably changing world? It all depends on scale, temporal and physical.
Let’s begin at the molecular scale. DNA is very old. It must have emerged no later than 3.4 billion years ago, when the first cyanobacteria lived. DNA encapsulates both change - its mutations and permutations enable evolution and speciation, and continuity - the same intertwined double helix structure has served for millennia as the building block of genes. DNA’s dual nature is indubitably science, not artefact. Whilst immense diversity has evolved in response to changes in the living world, at the chromosomal level lies a continuity which links us inextricably with our ancestors, and with what is alive around us.
This is all very well, but what about stuff we can see and touch? Let’s move up the scale but stick with (literal) building blocks. Timber construction began in the Neolithic era. Bricks were first laid around 8000 BCE; mortar was added around 7000 BCE (apparently leaving a millennium in between for some testing defects claims). Metal appeared in plumbing c. 2600 BCE. It was used for windows from the Middle Ages and structurally from the eighteenth century. Concrete dates from the third century BCE. You get the point. Styles and uses change; materials persist. Seen over this expanse of time, at the scale of building blocks we see massive continuity. There is, though, evolution too. Timber is machined. Fired bricks replace sun-baked. Concrete is reinforced. Steel succeeds iron. There is duality. Continuity and change are intertwined. Both modalities are science.
Corpus #10
36
As one would expect, though, Russell wasn’t all wrong. When the blocks are assembled into buildings, science recedes and artefacts appear. Continuity is urged as a justification for archaic forms to prevail over those created for our own age. Catalogues of styles and orders are prayed in aid. Encyclopaedic knowledge of antique geometries is conjured to condemn the contemporary. There is much to admire in the best of Neo-Classical, Neo-Gothic and Neo-Vernacular. Much that is modern deserves its critics: but we do need to recognise that continuity as artefact can get in the way of our ability uniquely to express our contemporary culture.
Is there, then, an architecture which reconciles the duality at the heart of our nature: the desire for stability with the need to advance? Cullinan’s Gridshell at the Downland Open Air Museum, Sussex, is a standard bearer for such an architecture: an inspirational example of how the DNA of ancient building blocks can be woven (literally) into something new but redolent with continuity. Our oldest building material, wood, carpentered with rigorous science into a structure that speaks of our time, yet sits easily alongside the venerable timber-framed buildings whose conservation it serves. We need more buildings like this, embracing both continuity and change. That embrace is, after all, how we came to be human, with minds that evolved to order chaos and build the extraordinary, the lasting and the beautiful.
Workshop at the Downland Gridshell
CANAL
8th August 2011
Canal
40
CULLINAN STUDIO
41
8th August 2012
Canal
42
CULLINAN STUDIO
43
Canal
44
CULLINAN STUDIO
45
Canal
46
CULLINAN STUDIO
47
CONVERSATION
CULLINAN STUDIO
49
Woodville, W., Hooker, W.J., Spratt, G., Medical Botany, 3th edition, vol. 4: t. 225 (1832)ea)
Conversation
50
The Leaf
In the early 1800s, Britain was enjoying 9 million cups of Chinese tea annually. It had become a important commodity for the efficient
functioning of the empire; like today’s energy supply, a stable source was vital for economic stability.
In 1788, the esteemed botanist Sir Joseph Banks noticed tea plants growing wild in the slopes of Nepal. This observation spurred a search by traders for an Indian variant of tea. In 1823, Major Robert Bruce witnessed the people of the Assam region drinking a tea from a local
plant. Samples were sent to the East India Company for identification but they refused to release the results, likely to protect their Chinese trade route. It took a further 11 years before the plant was officially recognised
as camellia sinensis var. assamica (Assam tea) .
Kew Gardens has collected an array of publicly accessible tea samples over the last 200 years. These are stored in ideal preservation conditions within
our recently designed Herbarium .
CULLINAN STUDIO
51
Conversation
52
The Brew
During the height of the Blitz, thousands of Britons were forced out of their homes each night. The Empire Tea bureau was struck by the inferior
standard of the tea being served in shelters. In 1941, they released the public information film “tea making tips” in which a stern tea instructor
warned the population of drinking dirge tea in an urgent clipped voice.......
“Tea is not a manufactured article which can be made, bottled up, and served at will. It must be prepared every time it is required and its
success or failure depends entirely upon the attention you pay to the six golden rules.”
1. Always use a good quality tea.2. Always use freshly drawn water.3. Remember to warm the teapot.
4. Measure the right quantity of tea for the water in the pot.5. The water must reach boiling point, pot to the kettle,
not kettle to the pot.6. Let the tea brew for 5 to 10 minutes before serving.
Only then tea will revive you!
‘Tea making tips’ is stored in our recently completed master film store for the British Film Institute. All stills are BFI copyright and used under licence.
CULLINAN STUDIO
53
Text and images to be placed, as you wish, within these margins (or full-bleed image)
Dashed line is just for guidance - please delete.
“Tea?!...
...we’d need a set of jump leads to get him started!”
Conversation
54
“there’s something quite suspicious about people bringing you piles of cake”
...we’d need a set of jump leads to get him started!”
CULLINAN STUDIO
55
Text and images to be placed, as you wish, within these margins (or full-bleed image)
Dashed line is just for guidance - please delete.
“No sugar for me” -“He’s on a Brixton!”
Conversation
56
“three sweeteners, milk in first - am only having two today
because it’s only half a cup”
“No sugar for me” -“He’s on a Brixton!”
CULLINAN STUDIO
57
Text and images to be placed, as you wish, within these margins (or full-bleed image)
Dashed line is just for guidance - please delete.
“You’can’t beat PG tips, nothing fancy, just PG Tips...
...though we do call him ‘Earl Grey’
Conversation
58
“you say ‘mugg’ we say ‘maaag’!”
CULLINAN STUDIO
59
COMPRENDE
CULLINAN STUDIO
61
Comprende
62
Outpost
“Voir. Refaire. Comprende.” The doctrine of a French tutor that I once knew.“ Look. Refer. Understand.” The only way to make good architecture, he said. He missed out “Listen.”
“S’par-hear. Shak barak. Que falaq? Tamam. Inta que falaq? Quais, hamdulah….” Protracted greetings, pleasantries, coffees and invitations. You can’t do this from an office: you have to get out there.Out there is far more fun but takes longer. Patience. The project gestates on the road.
Heathrow. Tripoli (approach over air disaster wreckage). Visa problems again. One car to the next.Benghazi airport. One home to the next.This driver has already eaten (he doesn’t know we haven’t). Don’t make a fuss (spare flapjack – thought this might happen).Sunset site visit then an extra, unscheduled meeting. PowerPoint and take-away food in our partner’s office and another protracted debate about appropriate plot sizes.
Early start again. Speak for a bit. Wait while the main man takes another call (it’s him we need to convince).Breakthroughs are when an opponent of an idea turns champion of the same idea and the debate breaks down into Arabic again.Another ally for our work of many authors.
CULLINAN STUDIO
63
Comprende
64
CULLINAN STUDIO
65
CLAN
CULLINAN STUDIO
67
1965
1970
1975
1980
1985
1990
1995
2000
2005
2010
1965
1970
1975
1980
1985
1990
1995
2000
2005
2010
Rob
in N
icho
lson
Rod
dy L
angm
uir
John
Rom
er
John
ny W
inte
r
Mar
k Be
edle
Suna
nd P
rasa
d
Car
ol C
oste
llo
Tch
aik
Cha
ssay
Wen
Que
k
Pete
r In
glis
Ant
hony
Pea
ke
Ale
x A
bbey
Mic
hael
McG
rath
Kri
stin
a R
oszy
nski
Sean
Har
ring
ton
Laur
a M
arr
Dav
id L
egge
tt
Lara
Mic
hael
Sash
a Bh
avanSt
eve
John
son Si
mon
Fen
eley
Kev
in G
oh
Jam
es R
oach
Din
ah B
orna
t
Chr
is Jo
hnso
n
Stev
en W
este
rn
Phili
p Ta
bor
Mar
y-Lo
u A
rsco
tt
John
Cad
dell
Ger
aldi
ne R
eilly
Emily
Hen
ning
sen
Dav
id C
awst
on
Clo
dagh
Lat
imer
Chr
is W
hitm
an
Ale
c G
illes
Ric
hard
Goo
den
Phili
p G
raha
m
Nita
Sha
rmaLu
cy B
ritt
ain
July
an W
ickh
am
Joe
Nav
in
Alla
n C
ollin
s
Ala
n Sh
ort
Mun
go S
mith
Kar
en C
adde
ll
John
Mon
ey-K
yrle
Gre
gory
Pen
oyre
Chr
is C
roft
s
Bren
dan
Woo
ds
Tom
Wel
ls
Pete
r K
irkh
am
Mar
k Be
edle
Julia
Mor
timer
Jona
than
Hal
e
John
Cad
dell
Jere
my
Stac
ey
Elea
nor
May
field
Aoi
fe K
eigh
er
Am
y G
love
r
Vale
rie
Kei
per-
Kno
rr
Tom
Fitz
sim
mon
s
Susa
n Fo
rd
Supr
iya
Man
kad
Ray
Mw
anah
iba
Pete
r Ber
nam
ont
Mon
ika
Kow
alcz
yk
Mir
iam
Fitz
patr
ick
Julia
n Bi
ckne
ll
Gile
s O
liver
Gar
eth
Man
tle
Fran
ces
Hol
lis
Emm
a M
cDow
ell
Eliz
abet
h D
evas
Deb
orah
Str
othe
r
Dav
id L
info
rd
Che
rry
Har
ris
Ann
alie
Ric
hes
Tom
Wel
ls
Tom
Bro
oksb
ank
Tim
Fra
ncis
Tim
Bra
dley
Ted
Fow
ler
Sim
on K
nox
Scot
t Je
nkin
s
Sahi
ba C
hadh
a
Rut
h Le
gget
Ros
alee
n C
rush
ell
Ron
Sm
ith
Pete
r In
glis
Nic
k Tur
zyns
ki
Mar
iett
e Sm
ith
Lorn
a H
arpe
r
Julio
Sem
ler
Jona
than
Mar
fleet
Jo N
utta
ll
Jess
Tay
lor
Jere
my
Gay
Javi
er V
alla
dare
s
Jasp
er V
augh
an
Jam
es F
oste
r
Hel
en A
ttri
dge
Ed M
cCan
n
Dia
na T
imbr
ell
Dan
Rig
amon
tiC
lare
Ste
vens
on
Car
ol C
oste
llo
Bre
ndan
Sex
ton
Bert
Ste
rn
Ben
Hop
kins
And
rea
Sinc
lair
Ale
x Fr
eem
antle
Willi
amYo
ung
Wen
Que
k
Vic
tori
aM
anse
r
Tris
tanW
igfa
ll
Tom
Rob
inso
n
Tom
Daw
son
Tom
Cul
linan
Tin
g Tin
g D
ong
Tayl
or H
uggi
ns
Stev
e Jo
hnso
n
Soph
ia Jo
nes
Sara
h Je
ffers
on
Sara
hB
ickf
ord
Sam
Spe
ed
Sam
Pen
n
Sam
Ain
sley
Ros
Cul
linan
Ric
hard
Whi
te
Ric
hard
Ow
ers
Reb
ecca
Hob
bs
Rac
hel
Cal
ladi
ne
Phi
lipN
aylo
r
Pete
rT
so
Pete
rC
oupe
r
Ogi
Ris
tic
Nor
esh
das
Gup
ta
Nia
llG
ault
Nat
alie
Paul
Mir
iam
Fitz
patr
ick
Mim
aK
earn
s
Mik
eK
ozdo
n
Mic
hael
Koh
n
Mic
hael
Has
lam
Meg
haC
hand
Meg
haC
hand
Mat
thew
Lett
s
Mar
kTu
gman
Mar
kT
hom
pson
Lucy
Pri
est
Loui
seC
layt
on
Tom
Bro
oksb
ank
Liz
Ada
ms
Kat
eT
hom
as
Kas
iaB
ousl
awsk
a
Kar
uga
Koi
nang
e
Julia
nB
ickn
ell
Jord
anW
inte
rs
Joo
Han
Bae
k
John
Pro
ctor
Jose
phB
edfo
rd
Joan
naPe
ncak
owsk
iJo
anna
Penc
akow
ski
Jero
me
Part
ingt
on
Jane
tM
arri
ner
Jan
Bir
kste
d
Jam
esR
iseb
oro
Ian
Pic
keri
ng
Ian
Gos
s
Het
tySt
artu
p
Gor
don
Shri
gley
Gle
nnSh
rive
r
Gile
sO
liver
Ger
ald
Adl
er
Fran
ces
Mad
ders
Emm
aM
cDow
ell
Emm
a M
cCra
cken
Dom
inic
Cul
linan
Din
ahB
orna
t
Den
nis
Ho
Dav
idD
enni
sD
anie
lK
err
Chr
isO
’Con
nor
Cha
rlie
Wic
kham
Cec
ilyH
orro
cks
Cat
heri
nePe
ake
Car
los
Eles
ser
Bru
noPa
oluc
ci
Bri
anO
’Bri
en
Boy
anna
Elks
Ben
Cha
mbe
rlai
n
Aoi
feK
eigh
er
Aoi
feC
onsi
dine
Ann
aJo
ynt
Ang
usB
row
n
Ang
ela
New
man
And
rew
Abd
ulez
er
Alic
eM
ilo
Ale
xW
hitt
onAgn
eisz
kaK
nera
Wen
dyG
arre
tt
Tony
Bel
cher
Tom
Dol
lard
Stev
eM
yers
Soph
ieN
oble
Sara
hO
’Reg
an
Rhy
sM
ortim
er
Raq
uel
Ard
ao
Pre
rna
Kar
la
Pete
rSt
. Joh
nPe
ter
McG
ough
Pete
rB
erna
mon
t
Paru
lR
ewal
Paru
lR
ewal
Mar
kM
acek M
arga
ret
McC
affe
rty
Lyn
Dan
vers
Kei
thD
obso
n
Kay
Hug
hes
Kat
ePe
ndle
ton
Julia
Wils
onJo
nes
Joey
Weg
rzyn
Jilly
Wat
son
Jess
ica
Bai
ley
Ivan
aB
ocin
a
Hel
enEv
ans
Hal
Ingb
erg
Gay
ePa
tel
Fran
sN
icho
las
Emm
aM
cCra
cken
Eliz
abet
hSh
apir
o
Dom
inic
Cul
linan
Den
nis
Pie
perz
Dee
pak
Rai
ani
Dav
idSt
orri
ng
Cat
heri
neG
reig
Car
lFa
lck
Bar
rySt
anto
n
Axe
lD
orm
er
Ata
lant
aB
eaum
ont
Ann
uka
Pie
tella
Ann
eB
rand
on-
Jone
s
Ann
eB
rand
on-
Jone
s
Am
anda
Pott
s
Alis
on G
wyn
ne
Aka
yZ
orlu
Loui
se P
otte
r
Clan
68
1965
1970
1975
1980
1985
1990
1995
2000
2005
2010
1965
1970
1975
1980
1985
1990
1995
2000
2005
2010
Rob
in N
icho
lson
Rod
dy L
angm
uir
John
Rom
er
John
ny W
inte
r
Mar
k Be
edle
Suna
nd P
rasa
d
Car
ol C
oste
llo
Tch
aik
Cha
ssay
Wen
Que
k
Pete
r In
glis
Ant
hony
Pea
ke
Ale
x A
bbey
Mic
hael
McG
rath
Kri
stin
a R
oszy
nski
Sean
Har
ring
ton
Laur
a M
arr
Dav
id L
egge
tt
Lara
Mic
hael
Sash
a Bh
avanSt
eve
John
son Si
mon
Fen
eley
Kev
in G
oh
Jam
es R
oach
Din
ah B
orna
t
Chr
is Jo
hnso
n
Stev
en W
este
rn
Phili
p Ta
bor
Mar
y-Lo
u A
rsco
tt
John
Cad
dell
Ger
aldi
ne R
eilly
Emily
Hen
ning
sen
Dav
id C
awst
on
Clo
dagh
Lat
imer
Chr
is W
hitm
an
Ale
c G
illes
Ric
hard
Goo
den
Phili
p G
raha
m
Nita
Sha
rmaLu
cy B
ritt
ain
July
an W
ickh
am
Joe
Nav
in
Alla
n C
ollin
s
Ala
n Sh
ort
Mun
go S
mith
Kar
en C
adde
ll
John
Mon
ey-K
yrle
Gre
gory
Pen
oyre
Chr
is C
roft
s
Bren
dan
Woo
ds
Tom
Wel
ls
Pete
r K
irkh
am
Mar
k Be
edle
Julia
Mor
timer
Jona
than
Hal
e
John
Cad
dell
Jere
my
Stac
ey
Elea
nor
May
field
Aoi
fe K
eigh
er
Am
y G
love
r
Vale
rie
Kei
per-
Kno
rr
Tom
Fitz
sim
mon
s
Susa
n Fo
rd
Supr
iya
Man
kad
Ray
Mw
anah
iba
Pete
r Ber
nam
ont
Mon
ika
Kow
alcz
yk
Mir
iam
Fitz
patr
ick
Julia
n Bi
ckne
ll
Gile
s O
liver
Gar
eth
Man
tle
Fran
ces
Hol
lis
Emm
a M
cDow
ell
Eliz
abet
h D
evas
Deb
orah
Str
othe
r
Dav
id L
info
rd
Che
rry
Har
ris
Ann
alie
Ric
hes
Tom
Wel
ls
Tom
Bro
oksb
ank
Tim
Fra
ncis
Tim
Bra
dley
Ted
Fow
ler
Sim
on K
nox
Scot
t Je
nkin
s
Sahi
ba C
hadh
a
Rut
h Le
gget
Ros
alee
n C
rush
ell
Ron
Sm
ith
Pete
r In
glis
Nic
k Tur
zyns
ki
Mar
iett
e Sm
ith
Lorn
a H
arpe
r
Julio
Sem
ler
Jona
than
Mar
fleet
Jo N
utta
ll
Jess
Tay
lor
Jere
my
Gay
Javi
er V
alla
dare
s
Jasp
er V
augh
an
Jam
es F
oste
r
Hel
en A
ttri
dge
Ed M
cCan
n
Dia
na T
imbr
ell
Dan
Rig
amon
tiC
lare
Ste
vens
on
Car
ol C
oste
llo
Bre
ndan
Sex
ton
Bert
Ste
rn
Ben
Hop
kins
And
rea
Sinc
lair
Ale
x Fr
eem
antle
Willi
amYo
ung
Wen
Que
k
Vic
tori
aM
anse
r
Tris
tanW
igfa
ll
Tom
Rob
inso
n
Tom
Daw
son
Tom
Cul
linan
Tin
g Tin
g D
ong
Tayl
or H
uggi
ns
Stev
e Jo
hnso
n
Soph
ia Jo
nes
Sara
h Je
ffers
on
Sara
hB
ickf
ord
Sam
Spe
ed
Sam
Pen
n
Sam
Ain
sley
Ros
Cul
linan
Ric
hard
Whi
te
Ric
hard
Ow
ers
Reb
ecca
Hob
bs
Rac
hel
Cal
ladi
ne
Phi
lipN
aylo
r
Pete
rT
so
Pete
rC
oupe
r
Ogi
Ris
tic
Nor
esh
das
Gup
ta
Nia
llG
ault
Nat
alie
Paul
Mir
iam
Fitz
patr
ick
Mim
aK
earn
s
Mik
eK
ozdo
n
Mic
hael
Koh
n
Mic
hael
Has
lam
Meg
haC
hand
Meg
haC
hand
Mat
thew
Lett
s
Mar
kTu
gman
Mar
kT
hom
pson
Lucy
Pri
est
Loui
seC
layt
on
Tom
Bro
oksb
ank
Liz
Ada
ms
Kat
eT
hom
as
Kas
iaB
ousl
awsk
a
Kar
uga
Koi
nang
e
Julia
nB
ickn
ell
Jord
anW
inte
rs
Joo
Han
Bae
k
John
Pro
ctor
Jose
phB
edfo
rd
Joan
naPe
ncak
owsk
iJo
anna
Penc
akow
ski
Jero
me
Part
ingt
on
Jane
tM
arri
ner
Jan
Bir
kste
d
Jam
esR
iseb
oro
Ian
Pic
keri
ng
Ian
Gos
s
Het
tySt
artu
p
Gor
don
Shri
gley
Gle
nnSh
rive
r
Gile
sO
liver
Ger
ald
Adl
er
Fran
ces
Mad
ders
Emm
aM
cDow
ell
Emm
a M
cCra
cken
Dom
inic
Cul
linan
Din
ahB
orna
t
Den
nis
Ho
Dav
idD
enni
sD
anie
lK
err
Chr
isO
’Con
nor
Cha
rlie
Wic
kham
Cec
ilyH
orro
cks
Cat
heri
nePe
ake
Car
los
Eles
ser
Bru
noPa
oluc
ci
Bri
anO
’Bri
en
Boy
anna
Elks
Ben
Cha
mbe
rlai
n
Aoi
feK
eigh
er
Aoi
feC
onsi
dine
Ann
aJo
ynt
Ang
usB
row
n
Ang
ela
New
man
And
rew
Abd
ulez
er
Alic
eM
ilo
Ale
xW
hitt
onAgn
eisz
kaK
nera
Wen
dyG
arre
tt
Tony
Bel
cher
Tom
Dol
lard
Stev
eM
yers
Soph
ieN
oble
Sara
hO
’Reg
an
Rhy
sM
ortim
er
Raq
uel
Ard
ao
Pre
rna
Kar
la
Pete
rSt
. Joh
nPe
ter
McG
ough
Pete
rB
erna
mon
t
Paru
lR
ewal
Paru
lR
ewal
Mar
kM
acek M
arga
ret
McC
affe
rty
Lyn
Dan
vers
Kei
thD
obso
n
Kay
Hug
hes
Kat
ePe
ndle
ton
Julia
Wils
onJo
nes
Joey
Weg
rzyn
Jilly
Wat
son
Jess
ica
Bai
ley
Ivan
aB
ocin
a
Hel
enEv
ans
Hal
Ingb
erg
Gay
ePa
tel
Fran
sN
icho
las
Emm
aM
cCra
cken
Eliz
abet
hSh
apir
o
Dom
inic
Cul
linan
Den
nis
Pie
perz
Dee
pak
Rai
ani
Dav
idSt
orri
ng
Cat
heri
neG
reig
Car
lFa
lck
Bar
rySt
anto
n
Axe
lD
orm
er
Ata
lant
aB
eaum
ont
Ann
uka
Pie
tella
Ann
eB
rand
on-
Jone
s
Ann
eB
rand
on-
Jone
s
Am
anda
Pott
s
Alis
on G
wyn
ne
Aka
yZ
orlu
Loui
se P
otte
r
CULLINAN STUDIO
69
CULINARY
Office Friday Lunch 08.06.2012
carrotsradishes
smoked mackereltortilla
orange saladgreen salads
gooseberry foolEnglish cheeses
chocolate
England London allan collins England London alex abbey
England Worcestershire amy gloverEngland London Islington bread
Ireland Cork brendan sextonEngland butter
England London Kings Cross calendula flowersUSA Nebraska carol costello
England London Kings Cross carrotsEngland South Yorkshire cherry harris
England Lancashire Gloucestershire cheeses England London Kings Cross chives
Guatamala chocolateEngland Somerset claire herniman
England Surrey colin riceEngland London edward cullinan
England London Highbury Freightliners Farm eggsNorthern Ireland Belfast emma mcdowell
England Hertfordshire gooseberries England Warwickshire helen evans
England London john romerEngland Durham johnny winter
England Generation Global kara weekesEngland Bedfordshire kevin goh
Germany Foundation Development Sustainable kirsten priebeEngland London kristina roszynski
Zambia Kitwe lara michaelSpain lemons
lettuce Staffordshire Englandlucy brittain South Yorkshire Englandmariama ceesay Gambiamint Berkshire Englandmonika kowalczyk Polandmustard green Kings Cross London Englandnicole van den eijnde Global Generation Canadaonions Englandoranges Spainparsley Surrey England pawel kowalczyk Polandpeter inglis Lanarkshire Scotlandphilip graham Edinburgh Scotlandpotatoes Englandradishes Suffolk Englandraquel ardao Spainrobin Nicholson Hertfordshire Englandroddy langmuir Derbyshire Englandrocket Kings Cross London Englandsarah o’regan London Englandsmoked mackerel North Seasorrel Wood Green London Englandscott jenkins Edinburgh Scotlandtap water London Englandtim francis Yorkshire Englandtoyosi adebonojo Global Generation Englandwen quek Seremban Malaysiawilliam young Cambridgeshire England
Culinary
70
CONTINUERS
CULLINAN STUDIO
73
Stonehenge: the pure geometry of the solar temple i
n th
e l
ands
cape
...‘CONTINUERS OF HISTORY’
The web of history runs through our work. Where has it
come from? Where is it taking us?
With roots in both classical and arts and crafts traditions it appeals to the head, the heart and the hand.
This is a snapshot of some of those threads.
‘Beauty comes from the correspondence of the whole to the parts, of the parts to each other and the parts to the whole’
Palladio, Villa Capra 1570
Ted’s ‘Architecture is the
celebration of the necessary’ brilliantly paraphrases Pugin words of 1841: ‘There are two
great rules: first, that there should be no features about a building which
are not necessary for convenience, construction, or propriety;
second, that all ornament should consist of enrichment of the
essential construction of the building’
Philip Webb, ‘father of Arts and Crafts architecture’, built the Red House for William
Morris in 1856 and stayed a loyal friend. ‘Architecture to Webb was first of all a common
tradition of honest building’ Lethaby 1915
Continuers
74
Romanesque capitals and interlocking arches at Durham Cathedral
A different kind of order: Hawksmoor’s
brooding silhouettes, tactile spaces,
vigorous forms. St Anne’s Church Limehouse 1730
The Arts and Crafts movement reinterpreted building in a strongly regional way whether
in England, Scotland or the USA. Hill House by Mackintosh 1902
Le Corbusier’s villa that shares its parti with Palladio’s Villa Foscari 300 years earlier
Villa Stien at Garches 1927
CULLINAN STUDIO
75
Greene and Greene’s Gamble House 1908:
construction celebrated till it glows
Frank Lloyd Wright combined Arts and Crafts sensibility with Post-Cubist spatial composition, working ‘in the nature of materials’ and breaking the box to let space
flow from inside to outside under broad sheltering roofs - supremely at the Robi House 1908
The ground plan of Lubetkin’s
1935 Highpoint: revolutionary,
rational, poetic
In the Villa Sayoye, 1929, Le Corbusier made the ‘promenade architectural’ the organising idea
Continuers
76
Our future lies in a new architecture of the sun...
The line of succession: Ted
worked for Lasdun who worked for Lubetkin - like Le Corbusier a generation
earlier worked for Auguste Perret, whose roots in turn went back to the structural
rationalism of Viollet le Duc
Lasdun’s 1961 Royal College of Physicians
Although indebted to Wright, Schindler’s 1921 house in Hollywood is rawer and
celebrates living close to nature
Wright, First Jacobs house 1936 Rooted to the hearth, yet sharing the
horizon, all for $5,000
CREED
CULLINAN STUDIO
79
CREEDIn attempting to achieve a concise vision statement for the practice, I’m aware that the ‘10 things that make us tick’ shown here can seem so summarised that they lose part of their meaning, or even sound a little pompous! But I think they are useful in creating a sort of canopy over our every-day endeavours - a reminder of the journey we are making and the continuity that is enshrined in the values of our organisation. What is it that binds our practice together
Creed
80
beyond the particular qualities and eccentricities of the individuals? What is the constant that remains as one architect leaves and another joins? Perhaps it just helps to keep reminding ourselves that a creative process founded on shared values will always win the day over form and fashion. This particular canopy follows the beams of the roof structure of the John Hope Gateway in Edinburgh’s Botanic Garden.
CULLINAN STUDIO
81
CYCLE
CULLINAN STUDIO
85
Cycle
86
Tree planting
CULLINAN STUDIO
87
at Gib Tor
Cycle
88
CULLINAN STUDIO
89
CONSTRUCTION
CULLINAN STUDIO
91
Construction
92
CULLINAN STUDIO
93
Construction
94
CULLINAN STUDIO
95
Construction
96
CULLINAN STUDIO
97
Construction
98
COMMUNITY
CULLINAN STUDIO
101
Community
102
‘do we still got life in us?......yeah man’
CULLINAN STUDIO
103
‘So what do you think of this building?’
‘it’ alright’
Community
104
Time of your life
Our Stonebridge Hillside Hub design in west London which was completed on site in 2009 was designed to pivot around a cafe space which would have tied the community functions of the
mixed use hub building together
No tenant has yet been found for this space but, once a year, the Stonebridge Older Persons Forum, one of the many local community groups which meets in the hub, appropriates the cafe space for their ‘Time of your life’ day which enables the local community to gather
together for speeches, dinner, dancing and talking.
This year we were welcomed as guests of the forum along with the Mayor of Brent and local councillors, and were honoured to
share in their day.
health centre
cafe space
community hall
CULLINAN STUDIO
105
Community
106
‘I have one request to make......that you invite me next year
CULLINAN STUDIO
107
CALVERTS
CULLINAN STUDIO
109
WET PROOF
Proof made on press using plates, ink and paper specified for the job
Thisis a printing office
Crossroads of civilisation • Refuge of all the arts against the ravages of time • Armoury of fearless truth against whispering rumour • incessant trumpet of trade • From this place words may fly abroad not to perish on waves of sound, not to vary with the writer’s hand but fixed in time, having been verified by proof
Friend, you stand on sacred ground,This is a Printing Office
Beatrice Warde
Typeset by calverts.coop
Calverts
110
WET PROOF
Proof made on press using plates, ink and paper specified for the job
Thisis a printing office
Crossroads of civilisation • Refuge of all the arts against the ravages of time • Armoury of fearless truth against whispering rumour • incessant trumpet of trade • From this place words may fly abroad not to perish on waves of sound, not to vary with the writer’s hand but fixed in time, having been verified by proof
Friend, you stand on sacred ground,This is a Printing Office
Beatrice Warde
Typeset by calverts.coop
CULLINAN STUDIO
111
Calverts
112
CULLINAN STUDIO
113
Founded in 1977, Calverts is a common ownership worker co-operative specialising in high quality print for the arts, design industries and commerce. Our watchwords are collaboration and sustainability.
The images on the preceding pages illustrate the wet proofing process used in the printing of this Anthology.
Thanks to Edward Cullinan Architects for the opportunity to showcase our work.
www.print.coop
Calverts
114
Founded in 1977, Calverts is a common ownership worker co-operative specialising in high quality print for the arts, design industries and commerce. Our watchwords are collaboration and sustainability.
The images on the preceding pages illustrate the wet proofing process used in the printing of this Anthology.
Thanks to Edward Cullinan Architects for the opportunity to showcase our work.
www.print.coop
CHOREOGRAPHIES
CULLINAN STUDIO
117
‘the arrangement or manipulation of actions leading up to an event’
Choreographies
118
CULLINAN STUDIO
119
Choreographies
120
CULLINAN STUDIO
121
Choreographies
122
CULLINAN STUDIO
123
Choreographies
124
CULLINAN STUDIO
125
Choreographies
126
Baldwin Terrace 2011Bobby Lloyd, Artist
A photographic response to the internal re-workings of art space to work space
CULLINAN STUDIO
127
CODA
CULLINAN STUDIO
129
Moving
Our practice has a great portfolio of completed projects; yet some key projects won through competition disappeared along the way for a variety of reasons – architecture is so rewarding but hard! We have weathered four major recessions - 1970, 1980, 1990 and 2008 - and each time the practice has adjusted its focus. This one is no different.
In 1991, we moved from Camden Town to Islington and started working on a sequence of projects at Cambridge University, quickly followed by others at the Universities of Warwick, Gloucestershire and Charlotte, North Carolina. Since then, university design has been one key part of our portfolio both in the UK and abroad, alongside urban regeneration, housing and a range of cultural projects.
Now we are moving next door to the Foundry and changing our name to CULLINAN STUDIO to reflect our wider interests. Our work is changing to include both larger masterplans abroad and smaller community diagnostics, coupled with a growing interest in retrofitting our existing building stock, especially our education buildings - universities, FE colleges and schools.
While there are clearly big opportunities in luxury apartments for foreign investors and slick city office buildings funded by our pensions, what we really need is 350,000 homes a year, spacious enough and designed well enough to be sustainable long term, and another more radical rethink about the workplace in the light of e-mobility, the circular economy and popular dissatisfaction with many people’s self-interest.
Coda
130
Back in 1991, we won the limited competition for an International Conference Centre for BP outside Newbury only to see their shares fall through the floor closely followed by the Chairman and then the project that would have carried us through. This time in 2009, we were asked to design a carbon neutral garden city for 60,000 in Eastern Libya only for the Revolution to stop it just as it was about to go on site. Our Libyan partners are quietly confident that this will start up again as there is a serious housing shortage in that region.
Despite this long period of national peace and notwithstanding our participation in other people’s conflicts, we live in troubled times and yet we are the world’s eighth richest nation. Our privilege as architects is to be able to use our talents wisely for the greater good.
Our team is highly motivated and experienced; as a cooperative, we share knowledge and work for one another to produce really useful and enjoyable buildings. Our buildings seek to lift the spirit and promote interaction in the search for a more sustainable future for us all.
“Today, when the market and the free play of private interests so obviously don’t come together to collective advantage, we need to know when to intervene…As citizens of a free society we have a duty to look critically at our world. But if we think we know what is wrong, we must act upon that knowledge.” - Tony Judd 2010 as quoted by Stephen Hill to be published 2012/13.
CULLINAN STUDIO
131
Credits
132
AcknowledgementsCullinan Studio thanks all who are or have been part of Cullinan Studio and Edward Cullinan Architects over the past 47 years, in particular those participants who have helped to create this anthology.
Cullinan Studio also thanks our wider circle of friends who have contributed to this anthology.
This CULLINAN STUDIO anthology is published by Cullinan Studio in the United Nations International Year of Co-operatives and London 2012 Olympics. Copyright © Cullinan Studio
AddressCullinan StudioThe Foundry5 Baldwin terraceLondon N1 7RU
[email protected]: 0207 704 1975
DesignCullinan Studio
Editorial TeamAllan Collins, Amy Glover, Cherry Harris, Wen Quek
TypographyGotham
Print Calverts Co-operative9-10 The Oval, London E2 9DT020 7739 1474www.print.coop
PaperCyclus OffsetSymbol Freelife Gloss
All papers are:- 100% recyclable- Elemental Chlorine Free (ECF)- PH Neutral- Long Life- Heavy Metal Absence CE94/62
All inks are:- Vegetable oil-based- Biodegradable
Dust jacketImitlin
Further information on the anthology can be enjoyed on our blog:cullinananthology.blogspot.co.uk
CULLINAN STUDIO
133
Compositions and Creators
COVER
CONTOURS Amy Glover created the end papers using the Japanese marbling technique of suminagashi.
COME HITHER Johnny Winter photographed our street-side entrance on 10 October 2012.
CHROMATIC Allan Collins devised the colour progression to mark each composition.
CAST Emma McDowell and Tim Francis rediscovered a structural relic.
CORPUS Robin Nicholson brought together the contributions below:
#1: Knowledge - Irena Bauman is a founding member of Bauman Lyons Architects and Professor of Sustainable Urbanism at the University of Sheffield.
#2: Celebrating Cullinan - Peter Buchanan is a London-based architecture writer and lecturer. Photo: Richard Learoyd.
#3: Place and Nature - Sue Clifford is a founder director of Common Ground (www.commonground.org.uk) and has been at the forefront of cultural campaigning in the environmental movement and raising environmental awareness in the arts. Photos courtesy of the author.
#4: Joy - David F. Ford is Professor of Divinity in the University of Cambridge and Director of the Cambridge Inter-faith Programme. Photo courtesy of The Cardozo Kindersley Workshop.
#5: A Journal (This article was first published in The World of Interiors) - Matt Gibberd is co-founder and director of The Modern House, the UK’s foremost estate agency for architect-designed properties, and he writes on architecture for The World of Interiors, The Sunday Telegraph, Acne Paper and GQ Style. Photo courtesy of the author.
#6: How big corporate can lead us to a more sustainable future - Wayne Hemingway is co-founder of HemingwayDesign and Vintage by Hemingway. Photo taken from HemingwayDesign website.
#7: Tomorrow - Neil Hopkin is the Executive Headteacher of Rosendale Primary School and Christ Church CE Primary School, West Dulwich and Brixton with Rosendale, Liz Atkinson and Cherry Tree Children’s Centres. Photo © Paul Raftery.
#8: Problems with experts - Prof. Peter Landshoff works for the Cambridge-MIT Institute and is a former Professor of Mathematical Physics at Cambridge University - he was part of the client team for the University’s Centre for Mathematical Sciences project.
#9: Collaboration - David Mullins is Warwick Manufacturing Group’s Director of Administration (Academic), working to implement the Group research, education and knowledge transfer strategy and to facilitiate the evolution of the group.
#10: Continuity - Prof. Richard Simmonds is a visiting professor of City Design and Regeneration, School of Architecture, University of Greenwich. Photo: Simon Feneley.
CANAL Lucy Brittain sighted a rainbow over the City during the riots in 2011. John Romer and Nick Shurey snapped shots of life and light on the canal a year later. Alex Abbey was struck by the beauty of cast-iron coal hole covers in the local pavements. He was intrigued that they announce a space below, now obsolescent in function, and mused whether some might have been cast in our old/new foundry building.
CONVERSATION Cherry Harris, Scott Jenkins and Brendan Sexton enjoyed a morning cuppa with client/contractor Jerram Falkus’s Site Agent, Ben Rayner, and subcontractors in the site hut over Baldwin Terrace, 29 June 2012Thanks to Brian Robinson (British Film Institute) and Odile Weber (Royal Botanic Gardens Kew) for their help with images. Page 47 - photo © Tim Soar.
Credits
134
COMPRENDE Philip Graham was posted to Libya as part of the collaborative team with Sami Jaouda and the Libyan Engineering Office (LEO) for the design of Shahat Garden City, and Ramboll UK on the sustainable development strategy for the Green Mountain Region.
CLAN Peter Inglis graphically represented people past and present in the practice.
CULINARY Raquel Ardao, Helen Evans, Wen Quek and Will Young organised an office Friday lunch tableau.
We thank photographer Pawel Kowalczyk for his time and patience. Also present were Kirsten from the Sustainable Development Foundation and Nicole, Kara and Toyosi from Global Generation.
CONTINUERS Colin Rice sketched out our architectural lineage.
CREED Roddy Langmuir drew out the creed that makes us tick.
#1: PurposeOur studio exists to design buildings and places using the highest standards of creativity and skill.
#2: HumanityPeople are at the centre of our design process, and our thinking at every level.
#3: DesignWe will seek solutions that respond to context, climate and local culture.
#4: CollaborationWe will listen and respond to all those we work with, aware that good design arises from great teamwork.
#5: MakingOur buildings will find expression from the process of their construction.
#6: Part of a WholeWe welcome the challenge to make socially, environmentally and economically durable buildings and places.
#7: StructureWe work with a cooperative structure as the foundation of excellent business practice.
#8: InnovationOpportunities for innovation and research are vital to the continuing success of our practice.
#9: NutureWe will develop our skills and share our knowledge, disseminating this through teaching and lecturing.
#10: DevelopmentWe will follow the work available, adapting ourselves to prepare for the ever-shifting opportunities ahead.
CYCLE Ted Cullinan set out the elliipse for tree-planting at Gib Tor in the Pennines. Will Young provided the images from 17-18 March 2012 session at which he planted about 250 trees with Alex Abbey, Raquel Ardao, Cherry Harris, Carol Costello, Scott Jenkins, Kristina Roszynski and their family and friends.
CONSTRUCTION Allan Collins constructed a solid in seven stages in sequences of 1, 2, 4, 8, 18, 32 and 64 lines on the X and Y axis of a grid.
COMMUNITY Cherry Harris, Scott Jenkins and Brendan Sexton celebrated with the Stonebridge Older Persons Forum at their annual ‘Time of your life’ event at Stonebridge Hillside Hub on 30 June 2012.Photo top left and middle right on page 103 © Simon Feneley.
CALVERTS Calverts assisted us with the artwork and printing of this anthology.
CHOREOGRAPHIES Bobby Lloyd speculated on the purpose of physical marks and actions observed on site during the re-construction of 5 Baldwin Terrace.
CODA Robin Nicholson reflected on our evolution as a practice and creative studio.
