From facades to lighting, furniture to metalwork, where does Buckley Gray Yeoman go to source the details that put its architecture on point?
The Furniture Practice is one of our preferred consultants when specifying furniture and fabrics – I’ve worked with the company for more than 15 years on a wide range of projects. It has relationships with all the key brands globally, so when we say what we are after, they know just how to achieve it.
One of the more challenging projects we worked on together was Roedean School in Brighton. We were refurbishing four Arts & Crafts boarding houses that had been designed by John Simpson, the architect of the old Wembley Stadium, and wanted to specify robust furniture with a very British feel. It was important to create a sense of cosiness and a home from home for the mostly overseas students. Each of the four boarding houses had its own identity, and we brought that out more through the choice of furniture.
The Furniture Practice’s knowledge was invaluable to match the right products to our brief. We wouldn’t have wanted to specify all the furniture from the same place, so we needed that key consultant in the middle with specialist knowledge of all the best suppliers, and crucially how to get furniture that was UK made, sustainably sourced, and had that quintessential Britishness. We couldn’t have done it all without them. They helped to source all the loose furniture and fabrics, and organised showroom tours and mock-up reviews. They also found the right manufacturer for the elements of fixed bedroom furniture.
Just Facades is an agent for a huge number of different facade companies, but we typically turn to it for its specialist brick relationships. They give us great advice on how to find the right brick product for the context.
We collaborated with the firm on Channing School, located in a conservation area setting in Highgate, north London. Here, it was important that we found appropriate, rustic red handmade brick for the new buildings, a series of pitch-roofed extruded forms.
Just Facades helped us to find the right brickworks for our requirements – Charnwood Bricks, who were able to came up with a bespoke selection for us including quite a lot of specials. We went down to their works in Loughborough to see the production, and had a go at making our own bricks while we were there.
We also had Just Facades’ expertise on the sourcing and detailing of the bricks for the Ice Factory at Victoria for Grosvenor, and 77 Coleman Street in the City of London, where we used a charcoal-coloured Coleford brick.
We’ve worked with them for over 15 years, and value their knowledge finding the right product to suit our aesthetic, technical and cost requirements. The company saves us valuable time by doing extensive research on our behalf.
There are a few great lighting designers out there. Pritchard Themis is a name that often comes up in conversations with clients, and has a great reputation. So we are very pleased to work with it when we get the chance.
At 77 Coleman Street, we significantly refurbished the 1980s building, revealing this fantastic coffered concrete soffit in the reception space. It had been cast with real skill, and we wanted a meticulous lighting design to work with it. Pritchard Themis suggested a bespoke pendant that really brought the concrete grid to life.
Together, we came up with a brass finish that nestles in the coffers to give a very warm glow. The same pendants hang from long cables in other areas to create intimacy. The lighting really enhances the luxurious finishes throughout the large reception area. It’s beautiful. It was great to create a bespoke solution that’s all about the building.
Edmonds is a long-established family business based in Birmingham that specialises in high-quality joinery and metalwork.
We went to visit its fantastic factory, where lots of really skilled craftsmen work by hand. You could see their craftsmanship and knowledge, and watch the whole process – it was beautifully old-school. That experience was key to us having the confidence the firm could deliver the metalwork at our Central Cross scheme in Chinatown, London.
This refurbishment project has a ground floor facade stretching over 100m from Charing Cross Road through Newport Court to Newport Place. We wanted a modern design that reflected East Asian cultures and traditional Chinese shopfronts. The selection of brass was key, as was creating a rich patina through the use of acid and bronzing powder.
We came up with a design for the metalwork that varied throughout the scheme to suit the different street conditions. This included laser-cut fretwork as part of the ventilation strategy. Fixed brass canopies with a curved uplift reference the sweeping profile of a pagoda roof. Edmonds built one-to-one prototypes of the column detail, canopy and fretwork pattern so that we had the confidence that it was the right solution.
We were really pleased with the results. I don’t think many manufacturers could have got to that level of quality and done that level of experimentation with the brass to get the effect that we were looking for.
FormaFantasma is a research-based design studio that works on all sorts of projects including product design. One of its products is ExCinere, a collection of glazed tiles made from Italian volcanic ash from Mount Etna. These are a new take on the use of volcanic lava as a building material.
A colleague was introduced to the company at a design fair in Milan, and loved the richness of the tiles, which use a traditional process to create something very new and modern. He immediately saw an opportunity to collaborate on one of our projects, Technique in the heart of Clerkenwell – that's all about sustainability and the juxtaposition of old and new.
The dedication to luxurious but low impact materials in this project is exemplified by FormaFantasma’s concept for the reception. It is a nod to the sumptuous modernism of Milan’s mid-century ingressi (entrance halls), with sharp-edged stretches of rich ochres. The effect is rigorous and minimalist yet almost glowing. They become a sort of installation that challenges the traditional idea of an office reception.
FormaFantasma’s work is a fascinating bridge between materials, their historical context and sustainability. We would love to collaborate with the firm again.
Laura O’Hagan is a director of BGY
As told to Pamela Buxton