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News: July 2010
07/07/2010
Bedford Square buildings open to the public
Five Georgian buildings recently acquired by the Architectural Association School have been opened to the public for the first time as part of the School’s summer exhibition, Projects Review.
The properties in Bedford Square, the only Georgian square in London still intact, mark the latest stage of a multi-year campus development project. The project, first announced by AA School director, Brett Steele, five years ago in a plan to bring studio space to all AA students, is already providing expanded learning and teaching spaces of all kinds to the entire Architectural Association.
The new buildings will provide for a new workshop, as well as presentation, meeting and lecture facilities.
This year, for the first time in 50 years, all 650 full-time students and 120 teachers worked alongside one another at the Bedford Square campus. From autumn 2011, the new buildings will allow dedicated studio spaces for all students in its undergraduate and graduate design courses.
Plans for the later stages of the development strategy include a series of ‘live’ projects, platforms, installations and new facilities that will be designed by AA students, staff and members. Following a tender process this spring, the AA has appointed Wright and Wright as masterplanners.
The new buildings will also enable the AA School to expand its public programme of lectures, symposia, publication launches, exhibitions and other events associated with contemporary architectural culture.
Brett Steele, AA School director, said: “These buildings will provide the AA School with an incredible opportunity to carrying forward the investment and commitment to the teaching and learning of experimental architecture that the AA has long been famous for.
“With our new form as a single, central campus from which the AA’s increasingly global operations are focused, we are now able better than ever to bring together the world’s most talented students, teachers and public audiences.
“At a time when universities and schools of architecture in the UK as well as many other countries face unprecedented difficulties posed by cuts in government and other public funding, the AA’s independence, both financial and cultural, allows it to go forward confidently; growing our commitment to all our students, while not cutting back on reflecting our belief in the importance of courageous architecture to shape and affect our world.”
www.aaschool.ac.uk
The properties in Bedford Square, the only Georgian square in London still intact, mark the latest stage of a multi-year campus development project. The project, first announced by AA School director, Brett Steele, five years ago in a plan to bring studio space to all AA students, is already providing expanded learning and teaching spaces of all kinds to the entire Architectural Association.
The new buildings will provide for a new workshop, as well as presentation, meeting and lecture facilities.
This year, for the first time in 50 years, all 650 full-time students and 120 teachers worked alongside one another at the Bedford Square campus. From autumn 2011, the new buildings will allow dedicated studio spaces for all students in its undergraduate and graduate design courses.
Plans for the later stages of the development strategy include a series of ‘live’ projects, platforms, installations and new facilities that will be designed by AA students, staff and members. Following a tender process this spring, the AA has appointed Wright and Wright as masterplanners.
The new buildings will also enable the AA School to expand its public programme of lectures, symposia, publication launches, exhibitions and other events associated with contemporary architectural culture.
Brett Steele, AA School director, said: “These buildings will provide the AA School with an incredible opportunity to carrying forward the investment and commitment to the teaching and learning of experimental architecture that the AA has long been famous for.
“With our new form as a single, central campus from which the AA’s increasingly global operations are focused, we are now able better than ever to bring together the world’s most talented students, teachers and public audiences.
“At a time when universities and schools of architecture in the UK as well as many other countries face unprecedented difficulties posed by cuts in government and other public funding, the AA’s independence, both financial and cultural, allows it to go forward confidently; growing our commitment to all our students, while not cutting back on reflecting our belief in the importance of courageous architecture to shape and affect our world.”
www.aaschool.ac.uk
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