MOST was shortlisted for the Wilcox Road Gateway competition run by the London Festival of Architecture and the Lambeth Council Regeneration Team, the brief to create a new piece of public realm opposite Nine Elms Station, on a limited budget.
A Lambeth based collaboration between MOST Architecture, Urban Growth and The Remakery came together through their shared interest in design for sustainable public space. Urban Growth is expert at developing public gardens and landscape proposals through open community consultation, and The Remakery is established as a creative organiser and facilitator for the re-use of recycled materials in a wide variety of projects.
We have designed a series of six objects along the south side of the street, the first being a marker on the corner with Wandsworth Road that beckons pedestrians to follow the trail. They have been imagined as de-constructed pieces of traditional retail architecture, made from a combination of found objects. Each abstracted element fulfils a slightly different role, from swapping-library bookshelves to children’s games and reclining benches.
The objects will be constructed in a hybrid of concrete and timber using wooden form-work made at The Remakery by local people who have been trained by the organisation’s expert craftspeople. Reclaimed tiles will be collected and colour matched, and a selection screen-printed, stencilled or hand painted with the branding of existing and historic shops, consumer products, and the logos of other local community organisations.
Our design proposal is structured around a small number of recurring themes and references that have been drawn from Wilcox Road, the Portuguese community, London retail and street traditions as well as the historic graphics of the London Underground. We sought to address the brief in regards to active community involvement in a way that is entirely inclusive, uses sustainable materials and addresses to carbon neutrality, longevity and budget. And most importantly, we have attempted to suggest an intervention that gives a degree of ownership to the community of retailers and shoppers that visit the street, whilst providing striking urban markers and places to convene and unwind, rather than pass on by.
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