London College of Fashion

This was a building commission with three ‘clients’ in effect, each with their own focus and priorities, each needing to be addressed. Firstly, the London Legacy Development Corporation (LLDC) as the overall steward of Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, focussed on the urban role and the interface with the public realm and park; then, the University of the Arts London (UAL), of which LCF is one of six constituent colleges, as the landlord, focussed on the long term value of the asset – its flexibility and adaptability to change, its robustness and ease to maintain, key decisions on storey heights, and carbon. And thirdly, the faculty and staff of LCF: The building’s users – focussed on the experience of the student, of the here and now, the collective and the institution. how the building is used, how interdisciplinary and social interaction benefit all.

As well as a broadening curriculum, LCF like other higher education institutions has seen changes in ways of learning and teaching practice and a growing emphasis on cross-disciplinary practice and creative collaboration. While non-specialised space with flexibility and capacity for change was therefore fundamental to the brief, LCF’s creative, practice-based making courses retain requirements for spaces equipped with machinery and specialist equipment.

The building operates like a vertical campus bringing together a diverse range of functions and typologies across 17 floors.

Needing to accommodate, and be appropriately scaled, for both individual work and larger group activities and fully exploit the benefits of bringing all departments together, the circulation and shared spaces at the heart of the building’s organisation were designed to actively encourage planned and incidental interaction, exploration and a sense of shared identity.

Square in plan, the building’s structural stability derives from a simple rectilinear column grid that delineates a central circulation route. At this ‘heart’ are the building’s fixed elements: vertical circulation; lifts; and WCs. In cross-section, through the layering of different configurations, the heart becomes a singular, yet ever changing, interconnected vertical space that links the building’s generous entrance hall and public functions at its lower levels – the auditorium, gallery, cafe and library – to the workshop and teaching floors at its middle and the refectory, drawings studios, roof terraces and support functions at its upper levels.

Through this heart travel the stairs: At the publicly accessible lower levels these are generous, expansive and sculptural, unfurling like orange peel to create a dramatic vertical catwalk to see and be seen. At the upper floors they are simpler, made of steel, but with openings that provide visual and physical connectivity between faculties as well as natural light and ventilation to the centre of the plan. At every level they allow the visitor to understand where they are in the building. The generosity of circulation (from the width of lift core to the leaning ledge to voids) actively encourages interaction.

Flexible and adaptable workspaces are located around the perimeter of the floorplate. They vary in depth of plan, and because their partitions are lightweight and non-load bearing, are capable of future reconfiguration without impact to the building’s organisational diagram. Their tall, repeating, factory-warehouse like windows give the building its distinctive and robust character.

The material palette is simple and muted – concrete, timber, black metal – with a consistency of detailing to all elements that, while complex and rigorous, enables the informal character of students and their activities to take centre stage.

Each of the three materials performs a distinct function: Concrete is the robust structural skeleton, timber (a warm maple) provides the tactile elements of the building (doors, screens, balustrades, fixed furniture, handrails), and dark metal accommodates services (power, information, drainage).