A memory in stone

Born of our investigations into material reuse, the Castle Lane was at his inception a opportunity to study of a special brick aggregate. Giving a second life to the demolished building, we studied the solution composed wit aggregate panels made of the crushed brick from the site itself.

One of expectations when working in an urban site is to uncover archeological findings. In advance of such possibility our approach to a tight Westminster site has been to physically embed its past.

Creating a novel material, we proposed to turn the crushed brick of the demolished building formerly occupying the site into the new cladding of the project to be. The new aggregate serves as finishing surface of self-loading prefabricated façade panels. This material, tested through several prototypes, offers an array of design option in addition to its reminiscent recycling. Accepting and reinforcing the change in shade, the façade panels would respond the urban context, which is made of multiple shades of brick. Facades would gently varied from red to purple, from brown to red in a subtle gradient generated by the ashes of the former building deposited into the new: physical continuum and intrinsically novel.