Shifting Sands

Thomas Heatherwood was asked to re-design an old Kiosk which is situated in Little-Hampton, a small seaside resort on the south coast of England.

the building is sliced diagonally into ribbons which wrap up and over the building, forming a layered protective shell, open to the sea in front. The opening is filled with glass doors and windows, protected at night by roller shutters concealed within the building's geometry, the 30-centimeter width of the ribbons being the dimension of a shutter mechanism.

In contrast to the conventional white-washed seaside aesthetic, the building is raw and weathered, its structural steel shell finished with an oil-based coating that permits a rust-like patination to develop without affecting structural performance.

The Eden Project

The Eden Project is a large-scale environmental complex in England. The project is located in a reclaimed china clay pit, located 1.25 miles (2 km) from the town of St Blazey and 3 miles (5 km) from the larger town of St Austell.^[1]

The complex comprises a number of domes that house plant species from around the world, with each emulating a natural biome. The domes are made out of hundreds of hexagons plus a few pentagons that interconnect the whole construction together; each of these is a transparent cushion made of tough plastic. The first dome emulates a tropical environment, the second a warm temperate, Mediterranean environment.

The project was conceived by Tim Smit and designed by the architect Nicholas Grimshaw and engineering firm Anthony Hunt and Associates, with Davis Langdon carrying out the project management, Sir Robert McAlpine and Alfred McAlpine undertaking the construction and MERO to design and build the biomes. The project took 2½ years to construct and opened to the public on 17 March 2001.

Trafalgar Square

Trafalgar Square is a square in London, the capital city of the United Kingdom, that commemorates the Battle of Trafalgar (1805), a British naval victory of the Napoleonic Wars. The original name was to have been "King William the Fourths Square", but George Ledwell Taylor suggested the name "Trafalgar Square".

The northern area of the square had been the site of the King's Mews since the time of Edward I, while the southern end was the original Charing Cross, where the Strand from the City met Whitehall, coming north from Westminster. As the midpoint between these twin cities, Charing Cross is to this day considered the heart of London, from which all distances today are measured.

In the 1820s the Prince Regent engaged the landscape architect John Nash to redevelop the area. Nash cleared the square as part of his Charing Cross Improvement Scheme. The present architecture of the square is due to Sir Charles Barry and was completed in 1845.

Marsh Meadow Cookham

Marsh Meadow in Cookham Berkshire was a project that started in 1997 to create a habitation area alongside the river that would act as a retreat for birds, insects and generally mammals of all sizes and kinds. The project was started by Holy Trinity school in cookham back in 1997 when i was still at school there.

It was a project with which the school worked with the natural trust to create this marsh area which would be fed by the river Thames and over the winter months would flood to allow new species of plants to breed and also to make the vast derelict area of grass and woodland more enjoyable along this part of Cookham and the Thames.

After Re- visiting the Marsh meadow after almost 9 years it is remarkable how it has developed and flurished itself into an eco- system that depends upon the Thames that runs along side it.

Canary Wharf Londons Business District

Canary Wharf is a thriving and vibrant Business district, with a wide range of shops, bars, restaurants and wine bars. As well as this there is also an extensive arts and events program.
The Vision of Canary wharf is now a reality with leading business now taking key advantage of the area and the specification with the increasing need for office buildings and a state of the art environment, no other place in the world can compare to the fine detail to that of canary wharf.

Floral street Bridge

Twisting above Floral Street in Covent Garden, the "Bridge of Aspiration" by Wilkinson Eyre Architects provides the dancers of the Royal Ballet School with a direct link to the Grade 1 listed Royal Opera House.

The award-winning design addresses a series of complex contextual issues, and is legible both as a fully integrated component of the buildings it links, and as an independent architectural element.

The skewed alignment and different levels of the landing points dictate the form of the crossing, which is geometrically and structurally simple.

A concertina of 23 square portals with glazed intervals are supported from an aluminum spine.

Flooding in Maidenhead

Maidenhead is a town that was built as a settlement on a floodplain. As of this as we all know we had some dreadful downpours a few weeks ago and well one of the areas that was badly affected was wee i live which is maidenhead!. Maybe the government will now start to realize that over building on floodplains will cause the local amenities to break down with the increased public and transportation through the area and also that it is not good in sustaining the environment.

Tate Modern London

The tate Modern in London offers a look at modern art that is like nothing of this time. Situated in an old Turbine warehouse along the Thames it has large spacial areas for displaying all sorts of Marvelous art work and sculptures.


The main attraction to the Tate modern is the large entrance hall known as "the main Turbine hall", which hosts different creations through- out the year. At this time the l;latest installation was that of the slides which were positioned at different levels throughout the turbine hall.

Hyde Park London

When King Henry VIII and his court were thundering across Hyde Park in 1536 in pursuit of deer and wild boar, it would have been difficult to visualize that years later the noble art of tai chi would be peacefully performed among the trees in the early morning, and the Italianate tenor of Pavarotti would echo across the park, applauded by vast audiences.

Hyde Park is one of London's finest landscapes and covers over 350 acres.

Henry VIII acquired Hyde Park from the monks of Westminster Abbey in 1536; he and his court were often to be seen on thundering steeds in the hunt for deer. It remained a private hunting ground until James I came to the throne and permitted limited access. The King appointed a ranger, or keeper, to take charge of the park. It was Charles I who changed the nature of the park completely. He had the Ring (north of the present Serpentine boathouses) created and in 1637 opened the park to the general public.

Hyde Park was created to satisfy a royal passion for hunting. But over the years it became a place where people have pursued many other pleasures.

Exhibition: Renaissance The Revitalisation Of Elephant and Castle

Going to an exhibition at the NLA helped in seeing what new projects are happening in the city centre itself and also how new facades of buildings are being revitalised to provide a modern city for the 21st century and beyond.

The exhibition runs between the 17th July – 25th August and looks mainly at the £1.5 billion regeneration of Elephant and Castle is an ambitious urban redevelopment programme transforming one of London's oldest and most infamous areas.

Currently best known for its high rise estates, labyrinth subways, busy roads and red shopping centre, Southwark Council's £1.5 billion, 170-acre programme promises a massive new pedestrianised town centre, market square, green spaces and thousands of new homes and jobs.

New London Architecture

New London Architecture is a vital addition to the public debate about the future of London. The capital is undergoing a period of massive change and NLA is a place where everyone - professionals, politicians and public - can find out and get involved in what is happening to their city.

The NLA space is a centre for display as well as a centre for debate and for networking. It is where visitors to London can orientate themselves, where school children can learn about their environment, where communities can be consulted.
A permanent exhibition of a 1:1500 scale model of Central London, surrounded by a display showing a cross section of current building projects, is enhanced by a programme of temporary exhibitions addressing London issues.

Kew Gardens Alpine House and Master Plans

Kew Gardens has recently gone a step further in its research for protecting plants in the future with the installation of a new alpine house. Designed by Wilkinson Eyre Architects at a cost of three million and designed to provide a sustainable energy efficient growing environment for world- renowned collection of Alpine Plants. It is comparable to the innovative high quality green houses which are traditional to kew and, as the first new glasshouse to be commissioned for nearly 20 years, will raise the profile of the Alpine collection and create a new focal point for this part of the site. The glasshouse is conceived as two back to back arches which create a stack effect to draw warm air out of the building.



Below ground level, air is pushed into a concrete labyrinth for cooling and then re-circulated around the perimeter of the house via a series of displacement pipes. Further environmental control is provided by a unique shading solution based on a fan- like- form similar to a peacocks tail.