Tag: Architecture

A hive of activity

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A hive of activity

This personal favourite of mine, shot a couple of years ago, is from my project photographing the Marine and Carpenter’s workshops in Newhaven as they became the new UTC@harbourside. It shows the new cafeteria in the later stages of the build. There is something about this photograph that amuses me – the bustle and activity that seems almost posed. It really wasn’t, I promise.

A print of this photo will be going on display at the Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust along with ten other prints from this series. The exhibition is part of an event that celebrates the partnership between the Trust and HKS, the architects who designed the transformation of the two derelict Victorian warehouses into an inspiring new engineering college for 15 to 18-year-olds. All photographs from this project can be found here.

Plasterboard pink vs winter blue

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Plasterboard pink vs winter blue

This week’s photo comes from The Depot Cinema in Lewes, where I am documenting the renovations of a former brewery depot as it becomes a community cinema. My clients use the photographs to keep local residents updated on the progress of the project and to build on the excitement of this eagerly awaited venue.

It always surprises me how much colour I come across on a building site. One might expect the predominant shades to be greys, browns and blacks. In fact, I find vivid colours to photograph at every stage of the process. This bubblegum-pink plasterboard is a good example, splashed with sun and offering an appealing contrast to the blue winter afternoon light. More photographs of this project can be found here.

‘Designer walls’

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‘Designer walls’

This photo of the week is from my most recent shoot at The Depot Cinema in Lewes, where I am documenting the renovation of a former brewery depot as it becomes a community cinema. One of the joys of doing this work is capturing a brief moment in the transitory stages of the development of a building.

This wonderful blue and white abstract pattern is not expensive designer wallpaper. It is merely part of the process of building the walls and will soon be covered with sound-absorbing materials. I particularly like the doorway that hints at further depths of patterned spaces.

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Reflected glory

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Reflected glory

I have been photographing this long line of colourful dancers at the Depot cinema building site for over a year now. They twirled their way along two walls of a large warehouse room at Harvey’s Depot, a former industrial building I have been documenting as it becomes a new community cinema. Although they are slowly disappearing through the process of the build, these last few revellers persist, now dancing waist-deep in reflected water.

As the renovation progresses, I like seeking out these remnants of earlier uses that linger on, reminding me of how much has changed. The dancers will be gone soon, remaining only in the photographs. They have been good company and have been part of many of my shoots of this building.

If you have a workplace, building project or event that you are thinking of photographing, please get in touch. Subscribe to my blog to receive my photo of the week directly to your inbox.

Beautiful rubbish

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Beautiful rubbish

The builders have been litter-picking at Southover Grange, the Tudor manor in Lewes that I am photographing. But this is rubbish with a difference. This detritus from the past is in fact a cigarette packet-sized window into another era. The workers have collected a very small treasure trove of artefacts from the first decades of the 20th century: a toothpaste carton, a razor blade wrapper, shoe polish, match boxes, cigarette packets of varying designs. Not only are these lovely little objects fascinating as relics of bygone product design, they also start my imagination going. Who was smoking these “wild woodbines” 70 years ago? What were their lives? How did they spend their time?

It is this curiosity that drives my passion for photographing renovations. Old buildings always hold windows into the past – hand chisel marks on stonework revealed beneath ancient lathe and plaster, layers of colour and wallpaper uncovered below peeling paint. By documenting the restoration of buildings, I keep these clues available to us once all has been glossed over and the buildings have begun their next incarnation. All photographs of Southover Grange can be found here.

If you have a workplace, building project or event that you are thinking of photographing, please get in touch. I deliver photographs that delve deeper than showing just the surface of things. Subscribe to my blog to receive my photo of the week directly to your inbox.

The scaffolding birdcage

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The scaffolding birdcage

My photo of the week of a scaffolding birdcage, is an update on the Depot cinema construction site. There is great anticipation in Lewes about this building. For years it was empty and unused once it had become obsolete as a depot for Harvey’s Brewery. Now it is in the throws of transforming into a community cinema. No wonder people are excited about it. I have been hired by the cinema to document the process of the building works. They use my photographs to keep local residents informed and to broadcast the progress being made.

On my latest visit this intricate scaffolding structure, called a birdcage, was being taken down. It was being put up during my last visit a month ago to provide wide areas of continuous access at roof level. I was fascinated with the repeating shapes and angles the birdcage made, which were then reflected in the puddles of water on the floor. At this point in the build everything changes so quickly that it will look very different by the next time I visit with my camera.

If you have a workplace, building project or event that you are thinking of photographing, please get in touch.

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