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Nature Calls A call centre and nature reserve for St Andrew’s Dock, Hull

Part 1 Project 2015
Miguel Angel Caceres Suarez
University of East London London | UK
Situated in the abandoned, ruinous wilderness of St Andrew’s dock, the project explores the potential of neglected industrial sites to create sustainable working environments.
Hull has one of the highest unemployment rates. The proposal for a new call-centre questions how large scale places of employment can offer benefit to the wider public: becoming more entwined with the city’s cultural life.
The beauty of the existing condition, its relationship to water, the ruderal ecology that has taken over the in-filled dock are seen as qualities to expand and amplify. Using material found on site, a strategy for creating new topographies and building structures is introduced: the dock is excavated and re-flooded, whilst the earth and rubble are used to construct a new workplace monument from rammed earth. Drawing comparisons to 18th Century romantic landscape paintings, the new structure grows out of the ground forming part of a new landscape experience.
Natural light, green space and biophilia design principle has proven to significantly impact upon wellbeing and productivity. Desktop backgrounds of computers are replaced by panoramic views of the greenery that surrounds, whilst the polystyrene suspended ceiling grid that defines the modern office space is replaced with woven bamboo acoustic panels


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2015
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