Balliol Facade Trip

BALLIOL FACADE TRIP

APRIL 2017

We are working on new student residential buildings for Balliol College, Oxford. As part of the detailed design development we have been working with a façade sub-contractor based in Belgium, and recently made a visit to their manufacturing factories. The itinerary for the day – a design workshop, a factory tour and a review of samples. Lots of coffee after an early Eurostar, and a good lunch.

There had been several similar design workshops before; where gathered around the meeting table, sketches were scattered as we questioned the architectural intent and the construction details equally. Brick samples sat in front of us, books piled up with precedents opened, past project drawings and models pulled out for reference. How to compose the language to create a calm and unified façade across the site. The engineers, the architects, the craftsmen who will build the façade.

These sorts of discussion are an aspect of everyday practice, and incredibly valuable part of the process – marrying the conversations of design aspiration with the actual making of. The bricks and mortar that see the architecture delivered from the paper to the physical form.

DEDICATION SERVICE FOR THE BISHOP KING EDWARD CHAPEL

FEBRUARY 2013

The Bishop King Edward Chapel at Ripon College, Cuddesdon is now complete. The theological college celebrated the opening of its new chapel with a service of dedication attended by the Bishops of Oxford, Gloucester and Dorchester. The services were followed by a dinner and presentation ceremony for those involved in the project.

The Sisters of Begbroke, who are resident on the college campus and who have funded the project, expressed their delight at the finished chapel, ‘We knew that what was needed was not just a building but a work of art which would touch the spirit. We are thrilled that this is what Niall McLaughlin has delivered.’