Rural Studio
- Published: 05 December 2007 14:59
- Last Updated: 05 December 2007 14:59
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Architype's new Herefordshire offices show the firm practising what it preaches on sustainability, writes Oliver Lowenstein. Photography by Leigh Simpson
The 'deep' green sustainable architectural community is relatively invisible, but surfaces increasingly frequently in these frenetic days for environmentalism. The RIBA's Sustainability Award this year went to one of these practices, Architype – one of the earliest and most committed sustainable architects. Its recent conversion of a Herefordshire stone ruin barn into its new West studio offices is an example of a green design approach along with an attempt at a sustainable lifestyle.
The barn at Upper Twyford Farm sits in the folds of a farming landscape near Hereford, and was nearly totally derelict when Architype head Jonathan Hines first visited the remaining standing walls seven years ago. Since then, the practice has restored it, transforming the ruin into a light-filled working studio. Architype's landlord is the Duchy of Cornwall, and the success of the project has been instrumental in moving the regional Duchy office towards more sustainable practices.
Architype, which began life in south London in 1984 and employs 30 people, opened its satellite West office in 1995 to tackle work in rural areas. In a sense, Architype winning the RIBA's award is a signal to consider rural culture more seriously as a credible architectural issue, as well as recognition of a practice that is passionate and excited about the countryside.
Upper Twyford Barn highlights the sustainability agenda in a rural setting
Viewed from half a mile away, the barn is a restrained presence amid the rolling fields. Up close, its regionalist Modernist sensibility is much clearer; part of a traceable tradition from Aalto to Zumthor, so central in the aesthetic backdrop of many in the green architectural universe. For a critical architectural visitor, this restraint could well be interpreted as conservative, and a more radical intervention in the land can easily be imagined.
Realisation of anything more radical, however, would have been complicated given the client, and the two-tier design approach emerged only after protracted negotiations with the planners, moving from an all-stone proposal to a timber-frame second floor. Using Douglas Fir from Duchy woodlands in Cornwall, a scissor-truss system rises up from the lower-floor stone-walls. Chestnut flooring has been used from the Duchy's nearby Aconbury woods, visible from the studio's large windows. These windows, along with clerestory strip windows below the tiled roof overhang, provide natural lighting for both the upper floor and the open ground floor.
A series of low-energy light fittings supplement the natural light; these were developed by Architype's in-house 'Renaissance Man', Nick Grant (Hines' description), and local craftsperson Colin Chetwood. Such hybrids – lighting technology fused with a craft approach – were a starting point, which could be taken considerably further, given the Architype ethos. This approach is equally evident in the stone-work left expressed on the ground floor.
Both Hines and Meadowcroft repeatedly emphasise the work-friendly feel of the £420,000 barn. For Meadowcroft, the project 'is warm, rather than cold and contemporary'. He recalls German landscape architect Peter Latz's evocative words, 'it's about the genius of the place, rather than the genius of the office,' and adds, 'it's a very old building, and we need to allow it to be itself '.
This doesn't stop the practice using some quite funky mechanical kit. A biomass boiler, fuelled by woodchip sourced from local sawmills, links into an emerging West Country biofuels network. The toilets are also a departure – Architype claims they are the first in Britain to use the Ifo airflush system. Grant, whose speciality is water systems, developed the system for both the urinal and the WC, and also designed an adapted reed bed system.
Architype's new office feels very much rooted in the land; a meadow has been planted, vegetables grow, an orchard is planned and meals are sourced from a local organic café. The studio is seen, they say, as very much contributing to and integrating with the local economy. Within this there are weak spots, for instance, transport – despite professed encouragement very few bikes were evident on my visit, while the parking area was full with cars.
Nevertheless, the barn sets a countryside exemplar that is only too relevant to any rural future agenda, and it will be interesting to see if Architype can push this further – if only to avoid the kind of dystopian agri-industrial future some are planning, such as multi-storey cowsheds. A low-tech, craft-based and nature-empathic approach is at odds with much of architectural culture, which seems to so actively dislike natural environments and natural systems, and invariably plumps for apparently sophisticated and expensive techno-fixes. By contrast, Architype's rural West studio presents a future closer to the natural world.
Oliver Lowenstein runs the green cultural review magazine Fourth Door Review
