Somerset House
Somerset House is a working arts centre and home to London’s largest creative community, with hundreds of artists, thinkers, makers and creative business leaders. This project will create a new landmark space where artists can create, collaborate, perform, experiment and engage directly with each other and audiences at Somerset House; a purpose built auditorium that transforms a 1960s conference centre into a new, dynamic forum that is suited to the needs of artists and audiences today.
Our competition winning proposal for a new multi-purpose auditorium and public space at Somerset House was conceived as a timber ship placed in the ‘dry dock’ of the existing courtyard. The ship recalls the historic origins of the western side of Somerset House as the offices for the administration of the Royal Navy. Our concept embodies two ideas about the project: the first is a metaphor that describes the relationship between the auditorium and the existing building. The second is an approach to construction that favours prefabrication and low carbon materials over site formed constructions and high-carbon materials.
The new auditorium and foyer are placed in the two storeys below street level. The auditorium will provide a state of the art, flexible space that enables the widest-possible usage within a robust, accessible, and highly sustainable new building. The roof of the auditorium will provide a new public space in the city, capable of supporting a diverse range of programmes from fashion shows to street markets. Conceived like the deck of the ship, an array of slender masts provide infrastructure for lighting and a demountable roof.