OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Features of the New and Current Buildings

Themes found within the features of the current building:

• In many of the studios large windows allow lot of natural light into the rooms. Throughout the university there is an interesting mix of various shaped and sized windows.
• The building is fairly complex and has evolved over time meaning it can be difficult to find your way around the building initially, also due to an inconsistent layout and wayfinding system.
• Throughout the university there is an eclectic mix of lighting, ranging from wall mounted lights to hanging ceiling lights with reflective metal.
• Plants are heavily used around the Printed Textiles department, but not so much around the rest of the university and course studios.
• There are exposed pipes, vents and other structural elements around the building, particularly on the ceilings.
• Common materials around the college include foil (from the extraction system), metal (stainless steel, galvanised sheet metal, reflective metal), and plasterboard (on walls).
• The main colours around the building are grey, particularly on the doors and lines on walls, white on the studio walls, and blue used on most of the doors.

Themes found within the features of the new building:

• Common colours proposed for use in the new building are metallic gold.
• The new building continues use of suspended lighting, such as LED strip lighting which is a necessary feature due to the high ceilings within many of the rooms.
• Sky lights will also become a feature to allow for natural light to enter the buildings.
• Common materials which will be used throughout the new building are concrete (flooring in gallery spaces, ceilings and other surfaces), anodised golden metal (with details for external walls), grey carpets, timber surfaces, wood wool (acoustic baffles), steel, plasterboard, aluminium (trims) and galvanised (pipes).
• Other interesting features suggested in proposals include magnetised paint on the walls which will be grey in colour, large scale wall art, hanging artwork, and spray painted timber to match the gold features of the building.