one field many tents – fairground

Annoyingly I can’t find the full reference for the book, but I think the title was called Fairground Architecture and this was found on page 25.

What I like is the Liqurice Allsort appearance of the plan, and the way it also illustrates the paradigm “one field many tents”; albeit quite literally in this case.

Click on the picture to see it whole, plus the amazing legend that accompanies it.

Provisional Mo[nu]ments

Are circuses a provisional monument to cities on the move (i.e. changing cities) and if so, how do their provisional moments affect the urban environment?

Therefore, are the Tinsley Cooling Towers a provisional monument and/or moment for Sheffield?

Provisional components:

The Graffitied Iron Bridge -

Salavaged from the closed Brightside train station, less than half a mile down the tracks from the site, the iron bridge connects the Circus School with the Cooling Tower whilst reconnecting the public with its hidden and ‘out of bounds’ surroundings. The bridge also offers a readable sign from passing trams and trains, as well as marking the gateway to the urban parkland beyond.

The Wrapped Steel Pylon -

An existing redundant pylon found on site is retained and wrapped in the remnants of used circus tent fabric, providing a circus teaching space for aerial gymnastics, at the same time, replicating the performance heights achievable inside the cooling tower. The pylon also punctuates the low lying circus roof; enabling a high rigging point for external performances in the summer months.

The Repaired Concrete Cooling Tower -

Housed within cooling tower 6 (the one with diamond vents at the top, as opposed to chequered rectangles) the circus will appropriate this space as a performance venue for the Arts.

The Floating Timber Roof -

A reciprocal frame roof structure made out of reclaimed railway sleepers and telegraph poles spans 35 metres and provides a flexible circus training hall. The Circus school’s roof structure, which forms the main building component, is to reflect the many threads, facets and smaller elements that make up the complex web of Interdependence. The proposed structure, likened to an indeterminate timber cloud, is to hover above the circus performers, connecting and uniting all the spaces, functions and everyday moments under one provisional roof.

Since the beginning of this project, one quote from an interview I conducted with a circus school director about circus schools, stood firm in my memory when he described their role as “one field, many tents”. The wider project together with the designed circus school building, inside and out, attempts to hold on to this simple paradigm.

Architects and their drawings

“Architectural drawings have a variety of uses: to instruct, inform, indulge, confuse, confirm, congratulate and console”

Cedric Price

(In ‘Envisioning Architecture – Drawings from the Museum of Modern Art’ (Museum of Modern Art, New York) p.145 ISBN: 0-807070-011-1)

Good old Mr Price seems to be back in vogue lately, but like Kevin Keegan he did manage to create some timeless quotes, although perhaps I can add some more uses of the architect’s drawing; some good, some bad and some down right ugly.

Architectural drawings have a variety of further uses: to imagine, dream, storytell, collaborate, play, perfect, intimidate, control and destroy

Make your own Cooling Towers

I met with Go! Sheffield just before Christmas to discuss ways of celebrating the Tinsley Cooling Towers and hopefully to create a means by which to remember them after they are gone. They have decided to put some effort into creating limited Cooling Tower memorabilia and selling it from a stall somewhere prominant in the city centre. One such product I am proposing is a ‘Make your own Cooling Towers’ paper lantern kit:

“With a little patience, you too can create your own cooling towers, to stand watch over you like the real ones have done over the last 70 years for Sheffield. Simply cut out the individual strips and attach to one another by placing a little glue on the tabs and overlaying to form the beautiful curved tower. You will require 32 strips (4 X A3 cut out sheets) to form one tower. Good luck”Tinsley Cooling Tower Cut Out Sheet

reciprocal theatre

Sketch ideas for further work with Trish O Shea and Simon Birch in Leeds on a reciprocal theatre production, inspired by their short film Residue. The work will deal with questioning the body in space, and the existing interaction between the performer and audience.Work in progress

Looking for the fringe…

A visit to the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh this weekend, introduced me to a piece of work by the British artist Tom Phillips; started back in the late 1960’s, Phillips work uses the obscure Victorian novel ‘A Human Document’ by W.H. Mallock (1892) as his ‘raw-material’. Re-named by Phillips as ‘A Humument: A Treated Victorian Novel’ his work since the late sixties has been to alter and manipulate Mallock’s original book into an entirely new artist’s book.What I found particularly poignant was how he wasn’t starting from scratch, in fact he wasn’t even starting with something half finished, he started with a completed and fully published book or ‘product’. Using an existing narrative, Phillips draws, paints, scratches out printed words to reveal new narratives within the existing pages of text.My thoughts turned to Architecture and what Phillips work could possibly mean for the discipline and for the profession. Firstly a valuing of process could be transferable, by how the project demonstrates the advantages of a ‘work in progress’ that is constantly evolving and attempts to replace itself by updated revisions. And secondly, developing an ability to craft something interesting and of value out of the mundane. Both characteristics which are of course “easier said than done” but non-the-less, I believe will become ever more important in developing an Interdependent Architecture.