Commercial Interior Design

The second year is where the theories and practice developed in year one are applied into the complex and professional framework of commercial interior design.

The framework is introduced in this unit and includes issues of building structure, materials, colour and lighting. Also an appreciation of the commercial value of interior space, the costs of design and construction, and the statutory regulations that contain it.

In the methods and tools of design practice, there is an increased emphasis on digital technologies in 2 and 3D, to record, design and communicate ideas and proposals.

Learning Outcomes:

On successful completion of this Unit you will be able to:

• Set and justify the design into a cultural and historical context of design practice
• Use creative thinking, brainstorming and visual research to undertake a creative development process
• Recognise and apply issues of commercial interior design into the planning of a design proposal
• Select and incorporate issue of building structure, services into the planning of a design proposal
• Apply theories of interior design, colour, lighting and materials into the development of a commercial design proposal
• Select and present examples of coursework and project work for assessment.

Rationale

Museum and retail experiences have been combining. In the resulting blended, semi-public, semi-private environments Experience Design and Service Design are emerging as distinct disciplines. Interior and Spatial designers are under increasing pressure to adopt new practices and consider content in addition to form, structure and finish.

This project is an opportunity to intervene in a high-profile, highly contested space on behalf of interesting and interested clients and the LCC – to take a position in the new interiors landscape and make your mark as a designer.

Design Brief

Your task is to deliver the Cuming Museum Collection to a wider audience by interpreting one of its startling pieces of archaeology, ethnography, social history or natural history within the internal spaces of the Elephant & Castle Shopping Centre. You are not able to install objects from the collection directly into the space. Your intervention must therefore offer a new, spatial way of experiencing both object and shopping centre. This is an opportunity to explore notions of what is public / private, content, ownership and experience design across two contrasting local cultural beacons.

Your proposal must be both inventive and practical. Detailed readings of site, users, content and an understanding of construction and health and safety issues are key to the successful completion of the project. Proposals will be submitted to clients the Cuming Museum and St Modwen, owners of the Elephant and Castle Shopping Centre.

Contact name: Camilla Langlands
Email: c.langlands@lcc.arts.ac.uk
Phone: +44(0)20 7514 6655

The Gallery at LCC is a public place for discursive thinking in and around design and media practices. Located in central London at the heart of a £1.5 billion regeneration scheme at the Elephant & Castle, this exhibition and event space engages with local context and global cultural networks through critical interventions and creative encounters. The street-level Gallery provides a platform for collaborations, conversations, interactions and connections in relation to the creative industries. With UAL students at the core of its remit, the space functions as a critical site of public debate opening up opportunities for exploration, engagement and experimentation.

The New Gallery located on the lower ground floor adjacent to the 3D Interior offices, computer labs and workshops has been in existence for approx 18 months. With the opportunity to host external events the HOC decided that the space needed a re-design. Priorities included an investigation into how the space is used and how it could become more accessible to external users without compromising the security of the college during out of hours events. As part of their Detail and Commercial Interior Design projects the year 2 BA Interior Design students were asked to carry out an audit of the space and to produce a series of designs which were flexible enough to support any redesign of the gallery..

The brief was broken down into 3 parts:

Part 1 was to look at the existing space, how it is used, access and security.

Part 2 students had to design an entrance/exit to bypass the main entrance to the school, which would enable users to arrive and leave without the need for the front of college to remain open. Students were asked to write their own design proposals, focusing on current gallery users and the potential for external users to hire and use the gallery. The consensus was to open up the north wall space onto the ‘Triangle’ area where the coffee kiosk is currently located, which would utilise the fire exit and minimise costs of demolition. Many students considered the use of an ‘Intervention’ linking the inner and outer spaces with a reception area. Professional design consultant Ugo Passin worked alongside the students to help produce a series of quick and exciting spatial and architectural ‘sketch prototype’ models.

Part 3 will commence later in the Spring term and focus on the interior of the gallery as well as considering the provision of amenities such as toilets, communications room/studio and office space. Important technical elements such as temperature and humidity control will also need to be considered and included in the redesign.

BA Interior Design Year 2

Unit: Detail Design Term 1 “What lies beyond”

“An idea is salvation by imagination” Frank Lloyd-Wright.

Learning Outcomes:

• Identify where and in what form design and construction information can be found.
• Demonstrate control over the design of interior design elements in detail, in regard to their construction, specification of materials and finishes.
• Select and present examples of coursework and project work for assessment

Introduction:

A gallery can be categorised into three main types: purpose-built spaces that house recognised collections such as The National Gallery or Tate Britain; sites which have been adapted from buildings which initially served another function such as Tate Modern located in a former power station; and purpose built structures where the architecture is as important as the work it contains such as the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao or the Mendel Art Gallery in Saskatoon Canada.

Some cultural institutions were built as symbols of state or regional power and function as icons within the city, while others glorify the individuals who brought them into being through generous private endowments and bequests. Galleries and museums are viewed as crucial for improving the status of any ambitious town, borough or city. They form part of a tradition of ‘intellectual enlightenment’ where the aim of civilising the masses has been recalibrated into inclusion and access for all.

Galleries are also becoming more business-focused and increasingly well-informed about visitor profiles through changes in technology and information systems. In the past 30 years galleries and museums have been transformed from authoritative and imposing institutions (look-up images of the old museum of Geology, now the Earth Centre) where interaction between the objects and users was kept to a minimum to the interactive and experiential places of today.

Additionally, the architectural and vernacular expression of the gallery has evolved from Victorian statements of Imperial Neo-Classism (National Gallery) to the ‘user friendly’ and opens environments of today’s ‘child centred’ statements of modernity (Museum of Childhood). The early decades of the 20^th Century saw a shift in the perception of the gallery as more than an extension of the Victorian library to a space with its own character and personality. This was exemplified by Mies Van der Rohe’s Barcelona or German Pavilion of 1929 where the space was as important as the objects exhibited.

The rise of a ‘pop-up culture’ has also helped to redefine what a gallery should be by emphasising the temporary and ephemeral over the permanent and traditional. In our fast moving, market-driven society the search for the new has led to experiments with the re-use of existing but unoccupied spaces such as vacant units in shopping malls, abandoned warehouses and factories. Pop up exhibitions and galleries have appeared in a variety of venues, generating a buzz without any accompanying heavy financial investment or lengthy commitment to a particular site.

The scenario:

Within the context of a climate of austerity and increasing competition for visitors’ time and money galleries have to create a unique identity in order to compete in the marketplace. This is as true for university museums/galleries as it is for all cultural institutions. The LCC Gallery is a versatile space, a modular environment able to accommodate local/national/ and international touring exhibitions. Its purpose is to house experimentations in art, design and technology and to provide a platform for celebrating the important contribution made by LCC graduates.

Located within the centre of a £1.5 billion regeneration scheme the gallery has the potential to play a key role in animating the area through an engagement with local community groups as well as its students. Currently the frontage is closed off from the public and there is no direct access to the street. This needs to be addressed in order to allow the gallery to function independently from the college in terms of opening hours, events, etc.

The gallery requires a clear identity in the marketplace which should relate to its core purpose of students, courses and subject specialism’s (The body of marketing research undertaken by GMD students in relation to LCC values could be useful here). The LCC Gallery should be sustainable from an economic, social and environmental perspective and its remit to create/exhibit/debate/sell

Brief:

In the light of the above, the existing gallery space at LCC which is situated on the ground floor (the old WG06 studios A, B and C) at the end of the main corridor is to be refurbished. The space will be used for exhibitions/shows but also as a conference and lecture hall, allowing private parties and events to take place.

As part of a design team, you are requested to explore and investigate a design proposal, which reflects the ‘full line’ of gallery services which may be made available to both UAL projects as well as potential external user’s and community events. This will include conferences, fairs and seminars that could and invariably will take place outside of normal UAL opening hours.

The project will be delivered in 2 parts:

Part 1: Access

A ‘primary’ element of the refurbishment will be the need for clear, good and un-restricted access to the space. Ideally, this could utilise the existing fire exit and ramp which ‘sits’ between both the gallery and HE admissions office; and would allow access to and from the street with the minimum of alterations to the structure.

That said, the retention of all the existing wall space areas is vital so, if any wall is removed, use of peripatetic or movable walls or even fixed walls elsewhere must be considered; the ability to use the space in a flexible manner is vital to a successful out to the project.

With this in mind your first objective is, to design an entrance/exit/intervention which will enable those using the gallery to ‘by-pass’ the existing entrance in the main atrium (Lower Street) and could allow free passage to and from the main street including bus stops directly into the gallery space. This area needs to have an intervention space that will act as both a reception (information) area as well as a security hub where, the possibility of bags etc could be deposited and guests received before going into the gallery proper.

For part 1 of this project, you are being asked to design an intervention/ reception area at the top of the fire escape ramp

Whilst contemplating your intervention, your design should reflect both the philosophy of LCC as well as the modernist nature of the existing building structure.

Once you have fully researched into the identity of the college and gallery, you need to write yourself a short brief, understanding the LCC identity, its philosophy and ethics against which, you will deliver an exciting spatial and architectural driven Interior intervention proposition, focusing on both the aesthetic and operational elements of your proposed scheme.

Submission Requirements:

Part 1: Research:           Research, summer ‘detail’ project

1:100 site model.

Series of ‘freehand site drawings’

Orthographic site plans, elevations and sections.

Detail model of part of the structure (in an appropriate scale).

Part 2: Design Development:

Self directed brief setting out objectives of your proposal.

Development drawings, models

Materials board (these could be images and spec numbers)

Design (scale) drawings, general arrangement, (one of your drawings must show details of how part of the structure is constructed), Detail of the intervention in situ (your choice of scale).

Finished sectional model (choice of materials).

As part of writing the brief and producing a project planning programme, you should specify in detail the general requirements above and their delivery dates.

All work must be accompanied by sketchbook drawing and development, including recorded information of spatial and conceptual sketch modelling.

As part of the Detail Design unit, there is a concern that the finished design drawings should express some of the design proposals into a standard of constructional detail expected at year 2 level.

References:

www.springer.com/birkhauser/architecture+&+design Detail Practice Series

Ashcroft, R. (1992) Construction for Interior Designers. Harlow: Longman.

Kilmer, W, O. & Kilmer, R. (2003) Construction Drawings and Details for Interiors. Chichester; Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley.

Styles, K. & Bichard, A. (2004) Working Drawings Handbook. 4^th ed. Oxford: Architectural Press.

Zell, M. (2008) The Architectural Drawing Course: Understand the Principles and Master the Practices, Thames & Hudson

Schedule:

14^th Oct:  Lecture: Sections, floors and staircase design/drawing.

21^st Oct: Lecture: Flooring, suspended, floating and detailing of structures, detailed drawings.

28^th Oct: Tutorial Week. Self directed study

4^th Nov: Lecture, Orthographic Freehand Drawing. Materials and fixings. Project Briefing.

11^th Nov:  Project tutorials

18^th Nov: Communication and presentation Project tutorials.

26^th Nov: AM: Interim Presentations PM Group tutorials

2^nd Dec: Submission 10:00 W301 Please do not be late as even by 1 minute will be recorded as a late submission and referred to the exam board.

9^th Dec: Drop onto Commercial Interior Design until Jan 2011

Ceramic Artist Nicola Malkin advises students on translating small objects into large installational pieces. The session was facilitated by graduates from LCC BA Interior Design.

See http://nicolamalkin.com/ for Nicola’s work and a short film about her practice.

This Powerpoint presentation is by a group addressing the 7 Ps of the service marketing mix as it relates to the Victoria & Albert Museum.

Pu torino (Maori trumpet)                      Fake Figurine                               Giraffe-hair Hat