Artefact

Artefact has been shortlisted for the Young Architect of the Year Award. Earlier this year BD announced all the architects who made it on to the shortlists for our prestigious annual Architect of the Year Awards. Now we are shining the spotlight on each category in turn and publishing a selection of the images that impressed the judges. Set up in 2021, Artefact describes its work as ‘inspired by the culture of people, places and materials’. Triangle House, a suburban house extension, reflects the client’s Caribbean heritage while also demonstrating a lean, low-carbon building approach. The Common Rooms in London’s Clapton is a replicable model for providing community infrastructure by retrofitting underused buildings. The entry also includes its Project Stone research, which advocates greater use of stone in construction. https://lnkd.in/eFNjhz9q #architecture #AYAs #AYAs20in24 Artefact Benedetta Rogers Daniel Marmot

Double whammy! We are really pleased to have two projects shortlisted for the Dezeen Awards... Triangle House in the 'House Renovation' category https://lnkd.in/e8sHvAx3 and our work with Albion Stone plc and Hutton Stone Co Ltd on stone bricks in the 'Sustainable Design (Building Product)' category. https://lnkd.in/d7C39zCh

Just beyond the southern fringes of South London, in Epsom, Artefact has extended a 1950s property, making clever use of triangular blue blocks and terracotta tiles to add some Caribbean flavour to the suburban home. See more photos from Lorenzo Zandri and hear from director at Artefact, Daniel Marmot, in the link below! ⬇️ https://lnkd.in/eadaH3ty

Let's get stoned. A short video showing the stone installations at Clerkenwell Design Week. British stone suppliers Albion Stone plc and Hutton Stone Co Ltd have commissioned architectural practice Artefact to design a 3-metre high installation consisting of six pillars called Brick From A Stone which will appear on Clerkenwell Green. Both companies have invested in state-of-the-art machinery to turn ‘unloved stone’ into stone bricks that have a quarter of the carbon footprint of traditional clay-fired bricks. Stone Federation Great Britain is the trade association for the natural stone industry who are passionate about promoting natural stone as THE sustainable material of choice for architects, designers and specifiers.  This year, they’ve collaborated with leading architecture practice, Squire & Partners alongside Webb Yates Engineers and The Stonemasonry Company Limited to create Stone Tapestry; a unique natural stone showcase created using British stones from Albion Stone, Britannicus Stone, Dunhouse Quarry Ltd, Hutton Stone and Tradstocks - Scottish Stone. Hopefully as stone proliferates, and I progress, I'll get the opportunity to shoot more stone based projects, and visit the quarries and masons, showing the journey of the material. The more accessible and readily available sustainable materials are, the better! Steve Webb Pierre Bidaud #stone #architecturelovers #clerkenwelldesignweek

Earlier in the spring, we were shortlisted for the Devonshire Gardens Pavilion competition. The brief called for a new community pavilion within a mixed use development by Railpen and Socius near Mill Road in Cambridge. Sadly we didn't win the competition, but we are very proud of our proposal 'Pillars of the Community' developed with Sahra Hersi and Cake Industries in a really enjoyable collaboration. 'Our carbon neutral pavilion celebrates the spirit of Mill Road, with its diverse people, deep-rooted community, eclectic architecture, fiercely independent mindset and radical thinking. A collection of sculptural stone pillars, each with their own unique character, reflect the varied life and built fabric of the area. These community totems sit as found objects in the landscape, unified with a timber roof, a metaphor for the varied yet cohesive community spirit of Mill Road.'

We are delighted to be a finalist for the Building Design. Young Architect of the Year Award 2024! #AYA20in24 Building Design.

Really nice to have a piece in the Royal Academy of Arts architecture room after a slightly surreal opening party, with a procession through Piccadilly to a ceremony backed by some steel drums. Well done to Assemble and Maria Lisorgorskaya for curating a really engaging and eclectic show.

Great to see our sandstone maquette in the architecture rooms of the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition, curated by Assemble. 'Brick from a Stone' is a 1:3 fragment of a wider installation designed by Artefact with Albion Stone plc and Hutton Stone Co Ltd for Clerkenwell Design Week 2024 to promote the use of stone bricks in construction as a low carbon alternative to fired clay bricks. The sculpture is a celebration of the age old process of transforming stone from the quarry face into building blocks and of the rich textural variation of the natural material. The piece is a collaboration between Artefact and Hutton Stone Co Ltd, whose Darney Sandstone is quarried in North Northumberland. Sculpted from a single boulder in Hutton’s workshops by their stonemasons, it is a work of handcraft that parallels the industrial process.

It has been a busy week at Artefact, with our installation Brick from a Stone installed in Clerkenwell Green as part of Clerkenwell Design Week and attracting lots of visitors, both human and canine! It was designed for Albion Stone plc and Hutton Stone Co Ltd to showcase the beauty and variety of their limestone and sandstone bricks. In the UK, we have an enduring connection to brick. Almost 80% of new homes are constructed in brick with around 2 billion produced per year. However, the process of excavating, milling, shaping, drying and firing the clay to make conventional bricks is very carbon intensive. Stone bricks have around 25% of the carbon of clay fired bricks. By converting ‘unloved stone’ into small format bricks with known dimensions and the potential to be reused over time, there is significant potential to reduce the carbon in our buildings and expand the use of natural stone. Installed between two iconic London phone boxes, the installation picks up on the history of the site, referencing the nearby horse trough with a drinking bowl for local dog walkers, benches and a table to place drinks from the pub next door. Six stone brick columns in Portland limestone and Darney sandstone support a roof for shelter, constructed from timber and translucent stone templating sheet. While the front columns are smooth and finished, the rear columns emerge from a rough-edged boulder, celebrating the production process. There has been lots of nice coverage, including ... Abbey Bamford in ICON magazine https://lnkd.in/erUFMTe9 Alyn Griffiths in Dezeen https://lnkd.in/e38JjnWE Massive thanks to Michael Poultney and Marcus Paine for their ambition and vision, Belinda Fisher and Jeroen Bergmans from Friends & Co for getting us involved, Danny Hilton from ALBION STONE RESTORATION LIMITED for building it expertly, Public House for the engineering, and Ivan Jones for the photos!

Really pleased that our Triangle House project won an Architects’ Journal Small Projects Award last week. The project created a new wing to a detached house in Epsom, inspired by Caribbean style, with an enfilade of living spaces that chase the afternoon sun. The house was Highly Commended, and massive congratulations to Takeshi Hayatsu for winning the overall prize. Thanks to our wonderful clients, Jamie Dean for his lovely planting scheme, Janek Bednarz for his skill and dedication in building the project, and Simple Works for the engineering. Photo by Lorenzo Zandri.