Project Studio were invited to design the interiors across the amenity floors. Our response was to dramatically reorganise the shared spaces. Split across two levels, the challenge was to find a way of linking the two floor plates to provide additional natural daylight to the ground floor and provide visual connections to the various activities on offer. This was achieved by introducing a series of punctured cylindrical voids within the first floor slab.
These voids were placed at strategic locations; the first within the main reception lobby. This allowed residents, upon arrival, to get views into the co-working lounge above, helping in turn to activate the lobby and provide a feeling of community and an atmospheric buzz.
The second cylindrical void was located towards the darkest corner of the ground floor plan, allowing natural daylight from the first floor terrace to filter down into a shared lounge. This area also became home to providing some more unique resident amenities, such as a podcast room and editing suite, and a series of content creation spaces. These offer residents creative spaces in which to work and play.
Our other big architectural shift was to introduce a new bleacher staircase connecting the two amenity floors and providing a space for hosting residents events, such as TED talks, a pop-up cinema, and live music and theatre. The staircase links a resident’s lounge bar and café space at ground level, with a large communal co-working area at first floor level.
Other residential amenities include a multi-use suite for residents to book out for private dining, sporting events, and lunch meetings, and a large quiet lounge to the rear of the ground floor with a feature glazed brickwork wall in reference to the Victorian bath house that the development looks onto. At first floor level, the co-working area provides acoustically lined phone booth pods, along with custom communal tables with integrated power and lighting, fabricated by a local lighting workshop. A bookable meeting room that also doubles up as a poker and Mahjong room by night, and a snug room which is connected to a large terrace, offers a bar and prep kitchen along with a flexible cinema space for hosting events.
Project Studio were also responsible for the design of a 2000 sq ft gym, a multi-use studio space, and specialist spin class studio.
The proposed material palette for the scheme looks to take inspiration from the site’s industrial past; on the ground level, polished concrete floors, band sawn oak flooring and joinery, limewash plaster, mild steel, and glazed tiling are a reference to the local Victorian bath house and beer houses found in the area, whilst destressed leathers, boucle fabrics, and rich velvets provide comfort and warmth.
