Living Building / Lived-in Building

Logged between the Olympic site to the East, the new hipster territories of Hackney to the North, and the new ‘London Vernacular’ housing developments of Fish Island to the South, Hackney Wick appears to be still left behind by gentrification. Located on the borders of the Borough of Tower Hamlets and Hackney, it feels like it doesn’t know where it belongs. Being part of what Peter Ackroyd calls the ‘Stinking Pile’ the area has never been part of the real London; but it seems to have always tried to carve its own path on the fringes of London. This special place is disappearing fast, and very soon the grain that defines it and the smells that identify it are disappearing - taking with them a rich tapestry of intertwined stories and fading memories.

The building projects by the MSci students are all set around Hackney Wick. They are responding to issues identified from our annual theme of Climate Change.

The pandemic of the last 18 months has transformed our understanding of our environments. Our physical and mental wellbeing has come much more to the forefront and our students explored ways how their architecture can echo these changes and propose alternative ways of living and working.