King's Cross, Urban Pioneers

This time, we had a about a week to recover from that half term week of activities, thats how I saw it anyways. This time, we did some designs for the invitations and I think the banner for the website which should hopefully be done soon. Anyway, we basically got the design brief, which was quite loose, basically do anything you want, and we just started from there.

Sarah, the project manager at the YCN, gave us lot a quick run down ofwhat YCN does and trying to inspire us at the same time. And Alex, an intern there, helped us out with our ideas, helped us out with the software and all that stuff. I might have under-played his role a bit as he helped out alot. And Nick the director popped in and out a couple of times. It was kind of refreshing to see people who are really laid-back and informal about their job, since we've met architects and designers, there's professional and perhaps formal feeling that I get. But today was like laid-back and cool atomsphere.

So in the end, we decided on a couple of different outcomes, it's hard to desrcibe in words but I'll try. My idea was a typical london underground logo but played around a little bit. Benas's one was a grid-like, train tracks design. Naomi's idea was to use the metaphor of a camera in a cool sort of way but that's as much as I know. And Holly did a 'tag' kind of design with Kings with train tracks etc. Ufortunately Michael and Kofi couldn't show up so I suppose they'll have to like what we've got. All in all, it was a fun excerise and it was cool, relaxed way to end a Friday afternoon. For me anyways. 

Oh, and I have to thank Sarah for the magazine and the other stuff, it was interesting to look at and still reading it.

Antony 

Well, now we come the end of the half term week and what I busy it has been so far. The past few days have been very engaging and tiring so I was looking forwad to seeing what Ruby had in store for us lot next. In my opinion, the things that we had been doing were very diverse like the sound trail and the visit to Camley Street park, which I never thought could relate to architecture. 

On thursday, we had a tour of the BDP offices by Lee Wyles and Julie Hawkins and gave us an introduction on the work that goes on there and how they use CAD for all sorts of things like design to simulation, and from initial designs to mapping out the final buidling (piping, electricals) etc. The building itself is quite a mission to get to, Holly and Naomi got lost but I can't blame them. The building was in an extraordinary location though, around slick and modern buildings and the bridge that connects the path to BDP's building is a cool feature. But think the fact that we got to watch architects and designers at work and in their offices was quite refreshing and gave us a great insight into the business we could be stepping into. Since there was no walls in the offices, we could see almost everything that the people who worked there were doing, and we got a very open and free feeling when we were toured around. And the models and plans of buildings and landscapes were impressive too.

After the tour, we were given a room where we could do some CADs of our own. Lee gave us quite a comprehensive talk about the ins and outs of the various uses of CAD and gave us a quick demo on the program sketch up. For me the program was tricky at first, but I got the hang of it after a while and got hooked, and I have been using it ever since. Afterwards, we had lunch with Adam Khan who designed the Youth Centre in King's Cross, around the Somers Town area just off Euston road. I think the most intriguing thing about the day was to exprience a major interdisciplinary pratice like BDP in the morning and then talk to Adam Khan who did it himself in setting up his own pratice. The youth centre itself is very interesting and one could see that Adam had put alot of time into it. The roof is made of copper, whch was the most striking feature of the buidling and the light reflected off that roof made it all the more spectactular. But the best thing of the building for me was the practicality of it. The interior of it could be chopped and changed, used for all kinds of purposes, and there is alot of storage. So al in all, the day was great us prospective architecture student to get insight on the business and different ways to approach it. 

And finally, Friday with Squire and partners. This is up there with one of the best days so far and possibly the best day so far. We got to redesign the tram shed in Kings Cross. But of course it wasn't for real but the competition made it worth while. But before that we got a tour of the office by Will and Clare, the offices were much like BDP's and it was great to step and work in that type of environment again. And the models were stunning and in abundence. We got seperated into two teams, one consisting of Namoi, Benas and Michael, and lead by Will. And the other made up of Holly, Kofi and I that was lead by Clare.

Kofi was definately the protagonist of our group and it was fun to watch arguements between him and Holly. The major one was about astro turf vs real grass, I wasn't paying attention much becuase I was on model making duty and just sat back and watched the arguement. I'm sure they'll shed light on the arguement. We ended up doing a day nursey/play centre by the day and in the night it would transform into a cinema showing independent/arthouse movies, it was a well-rounded idea and Clare was a big help in helping us with the needs of the Kings X area. The other group did an orginal night club/bar type of arrangement which they defended quite well I thought. The competition at that point got to the stage where we were trying to throw the other team off during the presentation. Surprisingly Michael Squire listened in on our presentations and he was impressed with what we did. Of course he was reluctant to pick a winner and was a wise choice in my opinion. But as I am currently going through the material that we produced that day, it is hard to pick a winner. Then afterwards, I spent the end of the day in the tram shed which was converted into a cafe/resturant/bar by Squire and Partners. It was a relaxing way to end a busy day and was a great experince for us to get to work with an existing building and going through sthe processes. We got quite passionate about the ideas at the end of the day. Also, we meet some people (very sorry about forgetting your names) from the hertiage lottery fund who visited in the afternoon, it was great to see their perspective on it as they represented the company who funded the project.

Yeah so you are now up to date with the project so far and looking forward to the upcoming days and things Ruby has planned.

Antony

On this day, we met a Librarian called Richard, who stored recorded voices of people, telling their encounters within the King's Cross area in Holborn Library. People telling their stories and talking about the 1940's onwards. Some were funny and had songs in them but others were quite tragic and sad, drawing on personal experiences within the area, expressing what they had to do to 'get by' and their childhoods. From all these recordings i was able to hear the history and even feel like i was in the same room as them, listening. Looking at their wide range of recordings, and the time and care spent in collecting them was fascinating - its sad that Richard will be leaving.

Our task was to re-in act what Richard had spent years doing, and interview people around the spaces we would be going to and talk to them, letting them tell us about their experiences. After this, we met an oral historian, Alan Dein, a broadcaster, who first took us to Coram's fields, which was a playground for children aged 12 or 14 and below and no parent could enter unless they had a child with them, this was strange to me, but was a good idea because children were kept safe and also could interact with children their own ages, just having fun! *=]... "Oh to be young again..."* It was kind of sad, just standing at the gates, peering in, wishing time could go back *hehehehe*. Having Antony amongst us, who also went to the playground as a kid, being a local in the area, we thought we should interview him and let him tell us about his childhood.

Listening to him reminiscing about the area and how much he enjoyed 'playtime', there was a correlation to what he said and what others, that were in the 60's, had said. After this, we went to 'The Boot' which was a pub, just off of Cromer Street, and walking into the place, you could definately see the history of it, the motif of boot ornaments that filled the shelves and the people seemed so nice, especially the Irish bartender who told us stories, at first being reluctant to be personal, but then feeling comfertable enough she explored some areas of her life in the area of King's Cross/Holborn - seeing a lot of things and meeting a variety of people, i particularly liked the Ghost story she told *=]... Did i get scared...? Nar, you must be joking! =P*.

Walking around King's Cross with a massive microphone and a tape recorder, was just too tempting not to mess around with - i think i may have annoyed the others *Ooops..* My favourite part of the day was talking to random people *Like i don't do that already =P* in King's Cross station, asking them what they thought about it, the area and where they were going, especially the little kid who did not seem to care much, but was really sweet. The couples, the person who was 'jamming' waiting for a Cab and listening to Prince, the people who just come to London for business, the person who could not speak much english, the people who just wanted a day out, people from France, Berlin all over were interviewed and i liked listening to what they had to say, the hardest part was asking the questions... Working with Alan Dein was great, he taught us a lot and also talked to us about other projects he has pioneered and the results he got from them, and how he uses that to progress, i thought was really interesting. I'd definitely do it again.

The Urban Pioneers completed their first design challenge on 19 February, when they visited Squire and Partners and were given a design brief for a former tram shed in Kings Cross. In two groups, they redesigned the building and presented their work to Michael Squire, and finally visited the building to see what the practice had done with it...

Adam Khan, the architect behind the imminently-to-be-completed New Horizons Youth Centre in Somers Town, gave the Urban Pioneers a guided tour of his project on 18 February.

On 18 February, The Urban Pioneers visited BDP's offices in Clerkenwell where they were given a tour of the building and learnt how the practice uses Computer Aided Design.

We're just about halfway through the King's X urban pioneers project I think, and it has been a busy couple of days. But the past three days have been very engaging, we have found out alot about the area and for someone who lives local like myself, it has been very interesting as I didn't know how much history my area had, it makes me see the area in a completely new light, and I'm sure the group feel the same.

From the top, on Friday 12 Feb, we meet a rather chipper Alastair Lansley, the cheif architect who completely redesigned St Pancras international station. For a man in his position, he was surprising an approachable and friendly chap. And for 13 years of dedicating his life to this project, it was impressive to see because he was still enthusiastic about the project as one could see his eyes light up as he was going through his presentation. And the dynamic between Alastair and Ian Gardner, the cheif engineers, added a new light to the project as they went from talking about the great glass roof to cutting the hole for the promenade under the tracks to the pillars and to the cost of each handmade brick (£14.50), which was very thought provoking. Then Alastair toured us around the station he designed and he showed us the importance of the small details, from the way that the advertising board blend into the walls to the way the metallic structure meets with the old red bricks was fascinating.

On Monday 15, the plan was to go Lille for the day but of course the tradegy of the train crash put an abrupt halt to the proceedings, which made the day a whole lot stressfull and challenging. But looking to the good points of the day, the company made the time go by quicker and the fiasco with Kofi's great time management made me laugh, but i think Ruby would strongly disagree. Also, meeting Tom Dyckhoff, a writer for The Times, put our minds off the cancallations as we could fire questions at him as he's a friendly and funny guy. And we got advice about career plans, the real down-to-earth talk about further education and career plan, it was refreshing to hear stuff we could use through our lives. So all in all, yes the trains were cancelled and no trip to Lille but I was with good company, met Tom and we're going sometime in March. So a bitter-sweet day with more sweet than bitter.  

And finally, today Wednesday 17, we first met Richard Knight, the the head of local history at the Holborn Library, gave us a presentation about the King's X voices presentation. Which comprises of the recording of local people in that area describing what it was like to live in King's X when it was a red-light district, during the war, growing up, during the regeneration and other similar topics. But I didn't think recordings of local people wouldn't be enough to grab the attention of 16-18 year olds but I was glad to be wrong as they were fascinating and engaging to listen to, and some great characters and stories emerged which painted a wonderful picture of King's X, and the people really made it great to listen to. And the stuff that Richard was saying like the Tonbridge boys club and popularity the boys ballet club there was very interesting and surprised me as I didn't know this was happening long ago. Next we met Alan Dein, who is a BBC radio 4 broadcaster and is the oral historian for the King's X vocies project, he worked in this project and around King's X for 4/5 years so he knew alot about the area. And his job as a freelance broadcaster, which meant meeting lots of different people, recording sounds and atomspheres, and building up knowledge about an area was fascinating for me and he looked like he really loved his job. But the highlight of the day was meeting all those different characters, it was quite refreshing and I wish I could remember all the names of those we interviewed but we got great material and made that day quite special. And I did get interviewed myself which was daunting to have the group ask me questions and to be put on the spot like that but it was great to visit those memerios again of my childhood that I haven't looked back on for years, I hope it comes out all right. 

So that's it so far, thanks to Ruby for organizing all of this so far and I'm looking forward to the next couple of days.

Antony

On 17 February, the Urban Pioneers met broadcaster Alan Dein to hear about the Kings Cross Voices archive, and took a tour from the south to the north of Kings Cross, collecting interviews at the historic Boot pub, One KX, Coram's Fields, St Pancras Station and Somers Town. Their radio programme will be available to listen to shortly.

Friday was very exciting - meeting the 'guy' who spent years of planning and developing Kings Cross Station. Alastair Lansley with the accompany of Ian Gardner, an ARUP Engineer, presented a 'short' presentation about the Kings Cross station. His passion and enthusiasm seeping through every spoken word, made me enthusiastic about the subject too, as well as his kind and humorous personality being made evident as the presentation went along. Knowing the history of the Kings Cross area was imperitive to me, because in comparison to other stations that were mentioned, such as Waterloo, Paddington and Euston, Kings Cross is the most vast and extraordinary Station in its volume.  Kings Cross, back in the 1860's, was a developing area, most known for Trade, so the Station had to be spacious, to make way for the goods being imported and also distribute them all over the country in the fastest most efficient way possible and so having to constantly decide on consolidating on certain features to keep the old and to incorporate the new, was shown to be very hard, but having its history and that knowledge in mind Alastair said, "In order to mix the two, you have to seperate them, and that's what we did...". Another thing that was interesting to know, was that everything that is built is Grade Listed, and so Kings Cross Station is Grade 1 Listed, which means nothing can change it, and it cannot be knocked-down without top authorisation. Sadly, my favourite station , Waterloo, is only Grade 2 listed *sniff sniff - tear* - Although Alastair did say it could have been Grade 1 listed *wink & a smile*. After hearing about 'how the roof of the building is like no other...' he gave us a personal tour, so we could see everything for ourselves, and the one thing that i especially noticed was that, eventhough the Station in huge and can be overwhelming, Alastair knew everything about it and was able to tell us all he could. I think this was essential to the project in understanding Architecture and Stations, it was fun to be around him and to know what he does.

The project has been going great so far. In the first session we met some very professional people including Pandas-loving-amazingly-awesome people [at Camley Street Natural Park]. Each one of us can learn something from them. Their determination and passion to take their idea forwards is inspiring and breathtaking at the same time. Shame we didn’t get to cook some pizzas in their nice stove.  The People’s of “King’s Cross Urban Pioneers” minds remained focused even when everyone was getting soaked in typical lovely British weather which kept us all going, and guess what, it was raining the next two sessions as well.

Our second session involved meeting the people behind St. Pancras station. The super-charged brains were Alastair Lansley (the architect) and Arup's Ian Gardner (the engineer). Alastair generously dedicated few hours of his time to enlighten us on the processes of building one of the world’s most extraordinary stations (yes, we will buy your book Alastair – promise). Alastair made an interesting comment after telling about working with Sir Norman Foster: “I became so Fostered, I nearly got adopted”. He also quotes further one of the greatest contemporary architects: “I don’t want reflections or shadows”.  Alistair admitted that most of modern civil sector buildings are based on this principal. St. Pancras was no exception. It’s a shame Gardner had only small amount of time available for us, although what he said in that short space of time settled in each one of us for countless years to come...or at least until Uni. Again, both of these men showed inspiring enthusiasm and professionalism. I suppose that is what’s going to have to keep us going in the studies ahead?

A crowd of tired early-morning faces greeted everyone in St. Pancras. Just on time to catch the Eurostar, oh wait, where’s Kofi? 1 hour 6 minutes, 2 assaults through customs and 1 cup of coffee later Kofi did manage to join us in the queue to board the train. But then, a great tragedy. Collision between two trains in Belgium on the Brussels branch led to all Eurostar to Brussels being cancelled. 16,250 times of begging Ruby to go to Paris later, we were forced to postpone the trip to another date. We did manage to meet and have a very interesting and rather friendly talk with Tom Dyckhoff, but more on that when we actually get to Lille next month.