This afternoon we met up as a group with Nigel Cunning, a trained architect who works for Oxford City Council (OCC). Nigel introduced us to to the site and also the building on to which we will be applying our designs. Willmott Dixon is the contractor and as it is a Design and Build contract, they work for the architect who in turn get paid by Oxford County Council, effectively making Nigel our client and the students/general public a kind of stakeholder in the project. The school, when completed, will have a divide between public, which includes a cafe and canteen, and the teaching area.
At this point I have started thinking about the work of Studio Weave and also the quick-assemble projects of SHOP Architects. The solution could involve the off-cuts of Western Red Ceder to create an extremely simple method of construction that the students can partake in (in a similar way to how SHOP operates with construction user manuals). There is also the opportunity to hunt down sponsorship to enable a greater complexity of design as their is no available funding for this project.
Some freshly cut Western Red Cedar - nothing like the stuff I will be getting my hands on. More tomorrow when I've had chance to rack my noggin.